You Can't Win Here

With about two minutes left in the game, the fans at Alumni Arena on Wednesday began chanting, "You can't win here," and for the first time it felt like that was a cold-hard fact, rather than mindless screaming from John Amitrano and company.

Now that the UB Bulls are finally playing to their full potential, and have clinched a home game for the first round of the Mid-American Conference tournament, the fans are coming out in droves to support them.

"In the beginning, you could almost introduce the crowd faster than you could introduce the teams," said Ohio Bobcats' head coach Tim O'Shea. "There were just a few kids behind me who yelled at me - they're still there, but now I don't hear them as much."

If you have ever been to a basketball game here, you understand how loud the rest of the fans have to be in order to drown out Amitrano and his friends.

At home, the fan support of late has been amazing, and aside from energizing the players, it has been completely screwing up the other teams.

"I think it's been great, especially the last couple games at home; it really messes with the other team's defense when they try to call plays," said Bulls' point guard Turner Battle.

Buffalo's fan support was lacking in the beginning of the year, as they averaged a completely uninteresting 58 points in their first three games, which were all losses, including one to local rival, Canisius.

They seemed to take off from there, turning around their scoring and winning five games in a row, three of which were at home.

But as the temperature got colder, so did the Bulls, and it seemed as if they would go winless in January after a 12-point loss at Marshall which capped off a six game losing streak and left them at 5-9 overall and 1-5 in the MAC.

The Bulls were able to save their season however, with a huge win in Northern Illinois, and since then they have averaged 79 points per game.

And if you win, fans will come. That's the golden rule in sports.

"It's nice to finally see this school come together," said freshman mechanical engineering major, Kevin Baboolal. "It feels like you're part of something when you're at these games."

Buffalo has been a lot more exciting to watch in the second half of this season, shooting from 3-point land with deadly accuracy. Over their last three games, the Bulls are shooting a ridiculous 54 percent from the land of plenty, including the 14 threes they rained down against Ohio on Wednesday.

Calvin Cage has been the Bulls' main spark off the bench, and one of the main causes for their second-half turnaround. He was named MAC East Player of the Week last week, averaging 20 points, 3.5 rebounds, 1.5 assists, and two steals against the two top teams in the MAC East, Miami (Ohio) and Kent State.

There is a visible improvement of this Bulls team from earlier this year. The 87 points they dropped on the Redhawks last Saturday tied the most points ever given up by Miami at home. Buffalo's current six-game winning streak is the longest such streak in UB's history and this coming Monday marks the first ever home playoff game for Reggie Witherspoon and the gang.

Most importantly, the Bulls stand at 15-11 and 10-7 in the MAC, their best record since joining the conference in 1998.

The buzz has definitely started, and you can feel that this is just the starting point for the program and its fans. Keep in mind that this is a team with no seniors, meaning they can only get better with more practice and more playing time as a unit.

Buffalo is a very confident team right now, and that shows not just in the players, when they march onto the court and light it up from wherever they shoot, but it shows in the fans as well.

UB fans come early to the games, and pack the seats during the pre-game warm-ups. They show their support for the team both the first time, and the second time the Bulls take the court before the opening tip off.

If the fans can keep up their high intensity for the team, the team will keep their intensity high for the fans, and there is nothing more valuable in college basketball than a good home-court advantage.

The message our fans send out to other teams is clear.

"You can't win here."