I don't know if I've ever seen a better way to cap off a regular season than the completely perfect experience that was the men's basketball game Saturday night.
There was something special about how it all went down, and I couldn't ask for anything more from both the team and the crowd.
Mitchell Watt being hoisted on the shoulders of the hundreds of students on the court and carried off as a hero as chants of "M-V-P" reverberated through the arena was incredible.
In my four years here I've always envisioned Alumni Arena that way – packed out to near capacity, with an electric feeling throughout the crowd, and that's exactly what there was on Saturday.
It was amazing.
There has been a lot of struggle to get fans to come out to Alumni Arena in recent years. I know it's something myself, and others have harped on in this very paper. But when the team needed fan support the most, when everything was on the line, the fans came out in full force.
Certainly the team deserves everything it's accomplished this season, but everyone that was there on Saturday deserves props as well because it was picturesque.
From a personal sentiment, as a senior it took four years for me to finally get to experience what I envisioned when I walked through Alumni Arena on my tour of the school.
I saw the big arena and without knowing anything about this school's athletic history, I expected that the crowd would be lively night in and night out.
Growing up outside of Syracuse I saw the record-setting crowds and expected that it was a given. I never expected the struggles that the mid-major schools would have to go through to pack the house.
I took for granted the Big East atmosphere of the Carrier Dome, and never understood why it didn't translate to the Mid-American Conference and the Bulls.
I'd been disappointed in the past for lackluster environments, but all that was erased Saturday. In my mind, Saturday made up for any shortcomings in the past four years.
The Bulls trailed by nine late in the second half but Buffalo's incredible run sparked by a coast-to-coast Watt breakaway dunk, and finished off with an improbable and-1 baby hook, was all they needed. Watt lived up to the MVP chants without question.
I love the feeling on campus right now and thankfully it's not over yet.
The win gets Buffalo in a position where it's only two wins from the NCAA tournament, which would be a first for the school.
See you in Cleveland this weekend.
Email: tyler.cady@ubspectrum.com
