Author:
An Observer
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Date Posted: 23:41:52 03/25/24 Mon
I had the opportunity to watch the Auburn game with two Auburn alumni in a room full of raucous unaffiliated fans. It was all good-natured ribbing with no tension at all.
At the beginning of the game, I told one of them, a good ol' Southern boy if ever there was one, that I thought Yale +12.5 was a great play. He replied, "I bet $500 on Auburn to cover." I reminded him to bet with his head and not with his heart.
As the game was winding down to the final minutes with Yale ahead, we had established enough rapport that I could say to him with no expectation of being punched, "I have bad news for you. If this thing stays close down to the end, the Yale players will not be tight. The moment won't be too big for them."
He looked at me with the kind of expression which says, "My alma mater which just won the SEC tournament is about to lose to a bunch of Ivy Leaguers *AND* it's going to cost me $500?"
During the game, the two Auburn fans couldn't stop complaining about how tight the referees were calling the game. The typical gripe would be, "In the SEC, that's not a foul. In the SEC, that's considered just physical play, not a foul. In the SEC, if there's no blood, there's no foul."
This went on all game long. As their complaining came out of the halftime locker room and continued into the second half, we had become friendly enough to the point where I quipped, "Let me ask you something. It's the third quarter. Do you think it's the referee's responsibility to adapt to the conference of the players? Or is it a better idea for the players to adapt to how the refs are calling the game?" No punches thrown.
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