YOUR FRIENDS' ACTIVITY

    Discover Yahoo! With Your Friends

    Explore news, videos, and much more based on what your friends are reading and watching. Publish your own activity and retain full control.

    To get started, first
    The Dagger

    First Saint Mary’s sent a message. Then BYU fans sent one too.

    By Jeff Eisenberg | The Dagger – Sun, Jan 29, 2012 12:00 AM EST

    A BYU fan texts, 'These Refs are Horrible.' (Screen Grab via ESPN3.com)

    Whether it's a banner congratulating Baylor's Robert Griffin III for winning the Heisman Trophy or a sign urging Saint Mary's coach Randy Bennett to get well soon, BYU's student section has been very polite to opposing teams this season.

    Referees, however, do not appear to receive the same courtesy.

    The 22,700 fans who watched Saint Mary's defeat BYU 80-66 on Saturday night made it abundantly clear they did not think the home team received a fair shake from the officials.

    They forced multiple stoppages in play throwing debris onto the floor after disputed calls. They chanted "worst refs ever" during the game's waning moments. And when cameras panned to the crowd during one second-half timeout, one man memorably held up his smart phone to display a text message that read "These Refs are Horrible."

    There certainly were a few calls that went against BYU, but that shouldn't overshadow what Saint Mary's accomplished. The Gaels (20-2, 9-0) remained undefeated in WCC play by winning convincingly at an arena where the Cougars (18-5, 6-2) had lost just seven times in their past 106 games.

    The road sweep of LMU and BYU this week from Saint Mary's solidifies the Gaels as the most appealing road team in the BracketBusters event, meaning organizers will have to choose whether to send them to Murray State or Creighton next month. It also puts pressure on Gonzaga to also win at BYU on Thursday, or the Zags (17-3, 7-1) may be two games behind the Gaels when the two rivals meet for the last time in the regular season in Spokane on Feb. 9.

    Regardless, it will not be easy for Gonzaga to beat Saint Mary's even at home as well as the Gaels are playing. Elite guard Matthew Dellavedova went scoreless in the first half and didn't have one of his better games, yet Saint Mary's still shredded BYU's half-court defense and built a 23-point second-half lead thanks to the contributions of Clint Steindl (16 points) and Brad Waldow (19 points).

    In a second half that was physical and chippy enough to belong in an octacgon, BYU rallied behind frenetic, rabid. full-court pressure, forcing 23 Saint Mary's turnovers and trimming the lead to nine in the final five minutes. The feisty defense resulted in the Cougars drawing numerous second-half fouls, drawing the ire of the crowd but also enabling the Gaels to keep the Cougars at arm's length.

    If Saint Mary's has essentially wrapped up an NCAA tournament bid and is merely playing for seeding and for an outright WCC championship, BYU has no such luxuries.

    Already lacking a signature non-conference win to go with solid victories over Virginia Tech, Nevada and Oregon, the Cougars are now 0-for-2 against Saint Mary's. That puts pressure on them to beat Gonzaga in Provo on Thursday because otherwise winning the WCC tournament may be the only way BYU can feel secure about an NCAA tournament bid entering Selection Sunday.

    Saint Mary's got off to a strong start in WCC play last season, but hit a mid-February rough patch and missed the NCAA tournament. The way the Gaels are playing right now, it's hard to envision history repeating itself.

    What do you think?

    What does this championship mean for John Calipari's legacy?

    Not much -- he needs another one Everything -- this is the pinnacle
    39%

    50,060 people have answered this question.

    61%
    Loading...
     

    8 comments

    • Dean
      Dean  •  3 months ago
      As a BYU fan, I was embarrassed by the stupid fans who threw stuff on the floor. It only takes a few out of thousands to ruin the atmosphere. Kudos to St. Mary's, they have a great team and the inability of BYU to hit the outside shot again proved their demise. Yes, there were some bad calls but refs aren't perfect and my team shouldn't use that as an excuse.
      • Nathan B
        Nathan B 3 months ago
        I agree with everything you said, but if you watched the last shots of the game (as the buzzer was sounding and immediately afterward), you'd see it was far, far more than a "few out of thousands" who threw the debris. I could see dozens just from a section of hundreds who were throwing (mostly cups). This is not what the school is supposed to represent. The students are on camera throwing debris - they should be harshly punished. Yell at the refs all you want, insult their moms if it makes you feel better - but don't stop a game by throwing crap on the court or at people. That's not okay at any level.
      • Chad
        Chad 3 months ago
        Here, here to both Dean and Nathan. I was disappointed in my fellow BYU fans this go around (whereas I was pleased with our sportsmanship toward Baylor).

        St. Mary's is a better team than BYU right now so BYU needed to be firing on all cylinders, which we haven't been doing from outside for 4 games now.
      • Swissh
        Swissh 3 months ago
        Sorry, disagree with Nathan.
        I think most everyone was talking about debris DURING the game. Yes, agreed, LOTS of students were throwing stuff at the buzzer and after. But "dozens" of students were NOT stopping the game. That was only a few students--and if you watched you could see many other students in the student section trying to stop them.
        Wins, lose or draw...officiating that is dangerously poor DOES need to be exposed. It's exactly the reaction of the usually classy BYU student section (not to mention Coach Rose) that makes this game's poor officiating all the more obvious.
    • Swissh
      Swissh  •  Alpharetta, Georgia  •  3 months ago
      I think the posters here all miss the point. There's not a person I know who doesn't think the better team won and there are very few who would support the individuals who threw stuff on the floor (though I am amused that a few people in 22,700 throwing stuff is labeled horrific when at other schools ENTIRE student sections chant FCC-banned words...what gives with that?). I watched the entire game and the officiating really WAS bad. In scenario after scenario, identical situations resulted in fouls against BYU and not a corresponding foul against SMC. That always happens a few times...no big deal. But this happened way more than a few times. Note that the photo in the story is from 12 minutes left in the game! There's no whining that some bad last second call "ruined" the game. This was obvious for a lengthy portion of the game. Maybe worse, the refs then seemed to make a series of make-up non-calls late in the game when BYU was becoming very physical in it's press and the game was coming close to getting out of hand. That is poor officiating and must be reviewed.

      No doubt the best team won but no one should act like this is not a legitimate issue that needs to be reviewed. And the fans had every right to be irritated by the sub-standard reffing.
      • Denny
        Denny 3 months ago
        The better team won, convincingly, on the road. My point was, regardless of the officiating, we would have won. Thanks for your ref rant.
    • BlueHusky
      BlueHusky  •  Surfside, California  •  3 months ago
      SMC has a great team this year. Even last year with Fredette and Emery, BYU barely beat them. This year, without Fredette and Emery, the Cougar backcourt is simply not good enough. This is the worst shooting backcourt I've seen at BYU ... maybe ever. It will be a struggle this year. While the refs made a few bad calls, the team took a lot of bad shots. No doubt a lot of the frustration of BYU fans was against their team. For me, I was really impressed with SMC. They could play a few games in the dance this year.
    • Hoost
      Hoost  •  San Jose, California  •  3 months ago
      SMC has BYU's number. Whatever Dave Rose has been doing to be successful and win games, Randy Bennett has figured out exactly how to stop it. Neither game this year was even close. Hat's off to SMC for great defense and knocking down big shots in the MC.
    • Herman
      Herman  •  Orem, Utah  •  3 months ago
      Saint Mary’s outplayed, out-hustled, and most importantly, out-shot BYU en route to a decisive victory over a vitriolic home crowd in Provo on Saturday. More significantly, the game marked an important milestone for the Cougars in their new league – the honeymoon is officially over.

      http://www.planetbyu.com/2012/01/the-honeymoon-is-over-for-byu-fans-and-the-wcc/
      • Don
        Don 3 months ago
        lets act better next game ok
    • Chris Chase
      Chris Chase  •  3 months ago
      irrelevant: isn't that in the iPhone's notepad app, not a text?
    • A Yahoo! User  •  New Berlin, Wisconsin  •  3 months ago
      The athletic program and the fans of the athletic program are supposed to be most visible 'missionary tools' the school has, they acted like idiots tonight throwing debris on the court...
      • A Yahoo! User 3 months ago
        Don't be stupid. Nothing like that has ever happened in the Marriott center in recent history, to suggest it was just a particularly bad crowd is idiotic. The refs were more than a little bad. "Worst refs ever" was a very apt phrase. There was a moment when #4 literally pushed a cougar on the floor and it was called a defensive foul. I did not throw anything onto the court, but I wanted to do so much more.
    • Denny
      Denny  •  3 months ago
      The better team won. Period.
     Post a comment

    Yahoo! Sports Authors

    Regular Contributors:

    Ryan Greene, Mike Kromboltz