New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
Huskies are back, in a very different NCAA tournament
INDIANAPOLIS — A steady rain began to fall at Reunion Park in Dallas that night on April 6, 2014, but the thousands of college basketball fans on-hand didn’t seem to mind.
Bruce Springsteen, after all, was on stage performing a free concert the night before the NCAA tournament’s championship game — which, of course, was won by UConn.
The Boss will not be performing at this year’s Final Four. And since the entire NCAA tournament is being held in Indiana, it’s worth noting that Hoosier rocker John Mellencamp won’t be performing, either. Or any other major musical artists, for that matter.
There will be no NCAAsanctioned events at this year’s tournament, and we all know the reason why. COVID-19 hasn’t gone away, vaccinations are still in their relatively early stages and the world hasn’t gone back to normal quite yet.
UConn returns to an NCAA tournament that will have a very different look from the Huskies’ last trip, in 2016 in Des Moines, Iowa, and certainly from that 2014 run to a fourth title in Dallas.
And yet, a quick trip through Indianapolis International Airport, down I-70 to downtown reveals a near sense of normalcy in the Circle City. A snazzy blue Indy race car with a Final Four logo and the words “The Road Ends Here” printed on its side greets arrivals in the airport lobby. “March Madness” signs dot the highway, and upon arrival to downtown Indy, it’s impossible to miss the giant NCAA tourney bracket that covers more than half of the 33 floors of the J.W. Marriott hotel.
“The decorations on all the street signs, you can’t go anywhere without knowing that there’s a basketball tournament,” Bill Benner, a volunteer for the local organizing committee, noted.
A small amount of fans, bedecked in team gear, milled around the downtown area, but it was still early. The games in Indy don’t begin until Friday (the First Four games on Thursday will be in Bloomington and West Lafayette). More fans will arrive over the next couple of days, and while there won’t be massive crowds clogging the streets, there will be an atmosphere.
Just like there was the prior weekend for the Big Ten tournament.
“I was downtown for the Big Ten semifinals on Saturday,” Benner noted, “and there was a buzz.”
Indeed, a limited number of fans will be allowed at games. Each arena will be allowed 25-percent capacity, which means anywhere from about 15,000 at Lucas Oil Stadium, home of the Colts, to about 1,700 at Indiana
Farmers Coliseum.
UConn’s opening-round game on Saturday is at Purdue’s Mackey Arena, nearly two hours down the road in West Lafayette. About 3,701 fans will be allowed in, including UConn’s allotment of 350 tickets. That includes complimentary tickets for families of players and staff, as well as tickets prioritized for highlevel donors and/or seasonticket holders who donated their entire 2020-21 payment to the university.
The only people distinctly lacking around the streets of Indy are players. They are all in the area, divided into five downtown hotels. UConn shares a hotel with 11 other teams. But they are being strictly quarantined, unable to leave their respective hotels except for practices or games. Practices are held at the Indiana Convention Center, which is accessible by downtown Skywalks connecting numerous buildings.
Transportation to games not accessible by the Skywalk will be by bus. UConn will have one, 90-minute practice at Mackey prior to Saturday’s 7:10 p.m. game.
Inside one of the team hotels, security workers are seemingly around every corner, directing the general public where they can or can’t go. Large areas of the hotel are curtained off; the hallways have tape running down the middle to create two lanes of traffic.
“It’s an extremely controlled environment,” understated Morgan Snyder, director of public relations for VisitIndy.com.
But outside, there’s a certain vibrancy. This is a city, of course, that has hosted eight Final Fours, most recently in 2015 Between the Big 10 men’s and women’s tourney the last couple of weeks, the NCAA tournament over the next few weeks and a half-dozen Indiana Pacers games (including Wednesday night)
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“Basketball is everywhere,” Benner noted.
Bike tours take visitors to see the iconic basketball sites within the city. An arts festival will feature over 600 roaming artists around town, displaying their work. Not everything’s the same. There will be no Fan Jam. The Dribble for Kids event, a Final Four staple where thousands of kids dribble from one spot in the city to the venue, can’t be held. Instead, kids will be dribbling at their schools throughout the state.
COLE STATUS
R.J. Cole (concussion) is going live at practice and will be evaluated on Thursday to determine if he can play on Saturday, according to a UConn spokesperson.