Nate Oats On Court Storming 'We Expect To Win Big Games'
The college basketball world was sent into a frenzy on Saturday after the Wake Forest Demon Deacons upset the No. 10 Duke Blue Devils 83-79. It wasn't the fact that the ACC powerhouse was upset that sparked conversation, but instead what happened after.
Duke forward Kyle Filipowski was knocked down by Demon Deacons fans who were rushing their way onto the court to celebrate the school's big victory. Luckily, Filipowski wasn't seriously injured but he's the second high-profile player to be knocked to the ground in a court storming scenario. Iowa's Caitlin Clark avoided injury after she was tripped in the aftermath of her team losing to Ohio State.
While storming the court seems fun for victorious fans, it can have dangerous consequences for the participants and people on the court.
The No. 14 Alabama Crimson Tide program hosts its biggest game of the year on Saturday with the No. 4 Tennessee Volunteers coming to Coleman Coliseum. It's a big game for Alabama as they not only have a chance for a top-five upset, but a victory would go a long way towards defending its regular season league championship.
"We don't storm the court here. We expect to win big games. We've won a lot of big games here. I actually love the fact that our fans are unbelievably great and give us a great environment during the game and then act like we've been there and done that after we beat - now we've beaten plenty of good teams in this building since I've been there. I like the way it's been here," said Alabama head coach Nate Oats on Friday.
"When I was at Buffalo and we were ranked 14th in the country, playing in the MAC. There was - you don't get very many home games against top-25 teams in the MAC so we had some court storming there. Shoot, we were involved in one last year when we were number one in the country at A&M. What we did at A&M last year is - the league title had already been determined. We had already won the league, we went there, we were trying to win, it's not like we gave them a win. But we let their staff know that if they ended up winning the game, which is what happened, if they ended up winning we were not going to stick around to shake hands, that we were getting off the court immediately, which is what happened. So we got everybody out as the buzzer was sounding and avoided any issue with the court storming. I'll say this, college sports is different than professional sports. The court storming is something that's kind of lined up just with colleges. If players are getting hurt in it, they need to do something about it. Whether it's somehow eliminating it. "
"Now, we've done a great job here of never storming the court. Like I said, Alabama sports in general expects to win big game. Football's won a bunch of national championships. They've got, what is it, five or six different sports that have won a national championships. We expect to win around here. Some other places that winning a big game doesn't happen very often and they feel like they need to celebrate. If you know it's coming, get the kids off the court. The handshake line at the end, it's not disrespectful in my opinion if you let them know before. I let Coach Williams know before that we weren't going to shake hands if they ended up winning the game just to avoid any kind of situations that happened last week."
The Alabama Crimson Tide fans will undoubtedly be in a frenzy on Saturday night in Coleman Coliseum. It's a perfect storm of circumstances as Alabama welcomes College GameDay for the first time in program history, hosts a top-five opponent who happens to be one of your schools bitter rivals, it's an evening tipoff and it's also for the first place in the SEC with just three games remaining.
Even with all the proper ingredients in place the Alabama fan base won't storm the court on Saturday night should the Crimson Tide emerge victorious. As Oats reminded the media and the public on Friday, it's just not who Alabama fans are.
