Duke coach wants ACC to prevent fans’ court storming

Star big man Filipowski hurt after Friday incident with fan

Duke coach Jon Scheyer wants the Atlantic Coast Conference to implement measures to prevent court-storming after star big man Kyle Filipowski was hobbled following a collision with a fan during a weekend loss at Wake Forest.

Scheyer said Monday that Filipowski was “a little bit sore” following the incident, which left him sporting a bag of ice on his knee after banging his right leg into the leg of a fan running by him toward midcourt.

“Absolutely we shouldn’t wait until next year, something should be done right now,” Scheyer said during the weekly league coaches teleconference, adding: “At the end of the day, players and coaches and officials are the only people that belong on a court.”

Scheyer — who initially misspoke Saturday when he said Filipowski hurt his ankle — said Monday that the preseason Associated Press All-American didn’t require any type of diagnostic internal imaging for his knee to search for a structural injury. Filipowski didn’t have a significant limp when he spoke to a few reporters after the game, though his status wasn’t immediately clear for the 10th-ranked Blue Devils’ game Wednesday against an eight-win Louisville team.

Scheyer followed his postgame call to ban court-storming with a plea for the ACC to put such a policy in place now, even with Duke down to four regular-season games and only one on the road (at North Carolina State on Monday).

The ACC requires member schools to have detailed safety procedures in place for managing court-stormings. But it historically has not levied fines, something four of the six major basketball conferences do for a first offense — such as the Southeastern Conference issuing a $100,000 penalty on LSU after its fans stormed the court following last week’s win over a ranked Kentucky team.