Publication Date: Wednesday, March 17, 2004
March Madness is off to slow start in grabbing interest of Stanford students
March Madness is off to slow start in grabbing interest of Stanford students
(March 17, 2004) by Elizabeth White
There may not be a whirl of excitement surrounding the Stanford Cardinal and its historic season - in fact, far from it - but amid the coming haze of final exams, some students at Stanford University are not letting the men's basketball team fade from their minds.
"There's so much energy surrounding the team," said Margaret Hsu, a senior studying human biology. "I'm friends with people who used to camp out before every game to be first in line and sit at center court."
Hsu, though, doesn't consider herself a true, dyed-in-the-wool fan. She has gotten interested as the season has gone on and the team has drawn more and more attention.
"I'm in between a bandwagon fan and a die-hard fan," she said.
A lot of students seem to be somewhere in that range. There is little fanfare on campus, except on game nights, when students gradually crowd in to Stanford's Coffee House or "CoHo" to see if Stanford can pull off another miracle win. Some watch the game and study during commercials, others don't even bring work with them, making the commitment to set up shop for a couple of hours and watch every last second of the game.
"There are definitely people interested," said Eric Chase, a junior studying math and a member of the school's Sixth Man Club. "But it's not dominating at all; it's not like overwhelming."
The Sixth Man Club was big this year, said Eric Sun, a member of the group that dons black T-shirts for every game.
"There's a lot of people camping out" for tickets to home games during the regular season, he said. "And that adds to the intensity. Basically there's hundreds of people there (at Maples Pavilion) waiting to get in."
But Stanford's fan base and the excitement surrounding the team, which until March 6 was undefeated, would pale in comparison to Duke, said John Wheaton, a junior studying physics.
"If you went to Duke you'd think there wasn't much going on here," he said.
In fact, the only evidence of any fervor on campus is a sign hanging outside the Stanford Bookstore on White Plaza that reads, "Don't Miss March Madness."
But Wheaton isn't disappointed in his less-enthusiastic colleagues.
"Stanford is a diverse campus," he said. "People aren't just interested in basketball."
Some students, though, think awareness will pick up as the month goes on and March Madness takes hold - as long as the nationally-ranked men continue to win. With the Pac-10 tournament complete, the focus now turns to the NCAA tourney that begins for Stanford this Thursday in Seattle, Wash.
"It's not really low key but I wouldn't use the word frenzy," said David Liu, who graduated from Stanford last year. "So maybe later this month there will be more of a frenzy."
Chase agrees.
"I think it's pretty awesome," he said. "I guess it's that more and more people are realizing - people who might not have been into it get into it."
Elizabeth White can be reached at lwhite@paweekly.com
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