We drove the 750 miles to St. Louis to watch Louisville win the college basketball national championship. Everything was going well for a while -- That is, until they actually played the games and Louisville got spanked by 15 at the hands of Illinois. Then we were left in quite a predicament.
But like we said, everything was going well up to that point. We were talking on the phone Easter weekend when Chris said he'd like to go to the Final Four and watch his hometown Cards play for the national championship.
David found some tickets online, and as of 1 p.m. Friday, after a scare that the tickets wouldn't arrive in time for the game, we were on the road.
We stayed Friday night at Chris's house in Louisville, and Saturday morning, some eight hours before tip off, we started for St. Louis -- Or, as we had dubbed it, St. Louisville. Decked out in Cardinal red, pom-poms blowing from our windows, a "Go Cards" sign taped to our back window, we got honks, thumbs up, and, most frequently, the "L" from the fellow Cardinal faithful.
(The "L," for those who don't know, is the international greeting symbol between Louisville fans. Put the index and middle finger up and point the thumb ninety degrees out -- That's the "L." You can use it to symbol in a caravan or on the street when you see a Cardinal fan. You can say, while making the "L" symbol, "Give 'em L, Cards." Also, had the Cards beaten the Illini, they would have "given 'em L.")
All through southern Indiana and Illinois, there was a Cardinal convoy, and despite all the talk radio chatter that Illinois was a team of destiny, that Bruce Weber's dead mom would guide the Illini to a national championship, that Deron Williams, Luther Head and Dee Brown were too much for the Cards to handle, we felt good about our team's chances. After all, we had Larry O'Bannon and Ellis Myles, the most loveable Cardinal senior duo in ten years. We had Taquan Dean's dead mom to offset Weber's. We had Rick Pitino, who, unlike Weber, isn't an idiot. We were feeling pretty good.
Judging by what we saw on westbound 64, we thought the Cards would have a significant contingent in St. Louis. But when we got there, we saw a sight that only Al Groh could love: thousands clad in orange. What seemed like a mirage -- that Illini fans were coming out of the ground -- actually turned out to be a quite literal truth -- coming out of subway stations were rows of Illini fans. Granted, we had mistakenly parked at the Illini fan zone, but after feeling so positive about the Cardinal fan base while traveling down I-64, it was obvious that the Illini orange would dominate the city and the arena. So much for St. Louisville.
Downtown St. Louis was a mix of Spartan green, Illini orange, Tar Heel blue and Cardinal red -- though it should be said that a strong portion of the Cardinal red was for the neutral St. Louis baseball Cardinals, not for ours. The Tar Heel fans had a calm, business-like vibe to their trip to the Final Four -- they were here to win a national championship, not to party in a festive atmosphere. The Spartan fans were quite the opposite. No one expected Michigan State to get this far, and its fans seemed happy just to be there -- they were waving flags, painting their bodies and being generally rowdy. Despite not being the most represented fans in the Gateway City, the Louisville fans were by far the noisiest. Chants of "C-A-R-D-S Cards!" could be heard up and down nearly every street around the Edward Jones Dome. The Illini fans' most recognizable trait was that they were everywhere, as seemingly the entire campus made the three-hour road trip from Champaign.
A fascinating aspect of the weekend festivities was the numerous displays set up by companies promoting new merchandise. When David heard that Pontiac was giving away free t-shirts, he knew he had found his destiny. David immediately donned the wrinkly shirt and for the next 15 minutes or so advertised for the new Pontiac Solstice.
Once inside the dome, we made our way up a half-dozen escalators until we reached the 400 level. The Edward Jones Dome was a football stadium converted for the weekend into a large basketball arena. To get an idea of where our seats were in relation to the floor, imagine you are seated in the upper deck of the student section at Scott Stadium and there is a basketball court in the opposite end zone. In other words, we were about as far away as one could possibly be when watching a basketball game.
The most forgettable portion of our trip was the game itself, given that we were so far away and that the Cards were unable to hang with the more talented Illini. As the outcome of the game became obvious, we weighed our options. We settled on two possibilities: stay for a game that neither of us cared too much about, or take advantage of the legions of rabid Illinois fans and scalp our ticket to Monday's championship game.
Throughout the Michigan State-North Carolina game we discussed our scalping strategy and wondered how we could sell them and what we could get. Any doubts as to whether anyone would want our tickets were quickly put to rest because upon leaving the dome, dozens of orange-clad fans descended upon the two kids in red like bees on the Newcomb Dining Hall patio in springtime. One man emerged from the crowd and the following interaction took place:
Man: You guys got tickets to the championship game you want to sell? Where are they located?
Chris: In my pocket!
David: Um, I think he means where in the stadium. Section 408, sir.
Man: How much you want for them?
Both: How much do you want to pay for them?
The man then gave a number, and we took his first offer. As amateur scalpers we were more afraid of the prospect of getting arrested in St. Louis than gouging a fan for his money. And besides, our seats weren't any good anyway.
Sadness then set in as we realized that we could have made at least twice as much for our tickets because euphoric Illinois fans were desperate to just get in the building to see their "Team of Destiny" win the tourney.
Chris spent the next 30 minutes beating himself up while David had a range of emotions, from reassuring Chris to lamenting, "We could have gotten a grand for those tickets!"
Solace came with a phone call to the wise Joe Lemire -- a columnist for The Cavalier Daily in town covering the event for Sports Illustrated On Campus -- who told us when we ran into him earlier in the day about his amazing adventures in scalping.
"It's a crazy market," Joe said. "But you guys did good, considering where your seats were located."
Taking our sadness into account, Joe repeated himself for emphasis, "You did good."
The next day we went downtown and attended a free concert, Dasani Fest, featuring Kelly Clarkson, among others. David was especially excited to see Springfest veterans Better than Ezra, repeatedly saying, "I am 'Desperately Wanting' to see them because they are so 'Good.'"
Midway through the concert, we left the festivities and made our way back home. Monday night we watched the championship game in a dorm room in Charlottesville, 750 miles from St. Louisville.
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