Who's to blame for court-stormings? Everyone. And NCAA is too feckless to act — per usual.

Courts are still getting stormed and great players are now getting hurt — Caitlin Clark of Iowa four weeks ago, Kyle Filipowski of Duke on Saturday — and it’s time to point fingers. Maybe that’s why the human hand has five, because we’re going to need every one of them. Court-storming is the fault of conferences that tolerate it, schools that allow it, fans who do it and television networks who glorify it. And it’s the fault of the NCAA for never, and I mean ever, writing legislation to stop it.

Say this for the folks at the NCAA offices on West Washington Street: When there’s a storm on the horizon, they’re really good at hiding under the stairs.

College athletes have always deserved two things — a portion of the fortune they generate, and the chance to transfer without sacrificing a year of their athletic life — but the NCAA cowered until the rains came, and now it’s too late. The combination of NIL and the transfer portal has turned college sports into chaos.

News: Duke's Jon Scheyer calls for court-storming ban after Kyle Filipowski injury

Doyel in 2022: NCAA has allowed NIL, transfer portal to disfigure college sports

Another day, another catastrophe, and the NCAA is providing no leadership or guidance, which makes you wonder what the NCAA — whose job is to provide leadership and guidance — does over there on the White River. Thanks for the Final Four every five or six years in Downtown Indianapolis, NCAA. Appreciate that, even if Indiana businesses and taxpayers did pay for those with the $50 million in incentives that brought you here in 1999 from Overland Park, Kansas.

Could you do something about the court-storming before someone gets hurt?

Sorry: Before someone else gets hurt?

Purdue, Caitlin Clark, Kyle Filipowski, who's next?

This will feel like low-hanging fruit to lots of you, the media getting angry about court-storming after Caitlin Clark was run over after the No. 2 Hawkeyes’ loss Jan. 21 at Ohio State, and after Kyle Filipowski was slammed into after the No. 8 Blue Devils’ loss at Wake Forest on Saturday. Pretty easy to write now, isn’t it?

Maybe you’d feel better about this story here, about the media overall, if I reminded you of a story on Feb. 16 that urged the Big Ten and NCAA to “stop this court-storming nonsense before someone gets badly hurt.”

Wait, did I say Feb. 16? Sorry, not clear enough. That was Feb. 16, 2023.

Last year.

I’m the one who wrote it, because it was obvious. Purdue had just lost at Maryland, and because Purdue gets court-stormed almost every time it loses on the road in the Big Ten — nine times in its past 10 such losses over the years — Purdue coach Matt Painter gave Maryland’s Kevin Willard a signal with two seconds left in the game, asking for mercy, and Willard nodded:

Purdue skipped the handshake line and disappeared down a tunnel with two seconds still on the clock, Fletcher Loyer throwing the ball into Mason Gillis and then both following their team off the court. Purdue having to stop playing after 39 minutes and 58 seconds was so shocking, such a wake-up call, that this happened:

Northwestern fans stormed the court after beating Purdue four days later.

Doyel in 2023: Stop the court-stormings before someone gets hurt

Doyel, four days later: Purdue just got court-stormed again?!?

Enough was enough then, but nothing happened. Well, nothing beyond fans mocking me for being a killjoy. The court-stormings of Purdue kept happening, and Painter spoke eloquently about the inherent danger of it Jan. 9 after being stormed by Nebraska fans, but nothing happened. Well, nothing beyond fans mocking him for being a killjoy.

Now we have the only thing the NCAA understands: A perfect storm. Caitlin Clark is the most important player in the history of women’s college basketball — yeah, she is — and Duke is the most successful program in the last half-century of men’s college basketball (ditto), and now something will be done.

Right?

Why do we act out? Because we can.

Conferences have instituted rules against it. Some of them, anyway. SEC schools are fined $100,000 the first time its fans storm a court, escalating to $250,000 for a second offense and $500,000 for a third. Pac-12 fines are $25K, then $50K and $100K.

The Big East fine is a flaccid $5,000, but that’s a real stiff one compared to the Big Ten, which yawns the first time a school lets it happen and has a cocktail the next time, fining a school only after a third offense. No wonder Purdue gets stormed so often. No wonder Caitlin Clark was run over at Ohio State.

The ACC has no fine at all. No wonder Kyle Filipowski was smacked on Saturday.

About that Filipowski incident:

Fans on Twitter, where intellectually dishonest people go to distort the truth until the lemmings believe the lie, are saying Filipowski stuck out his leg. He made the contact with the Wake Forest fan, not vice versa. An overheard image shows it!

Here’s what I see: A 7-footer with size-XXL shoes walking off the court, that foot going where a size-XXL foot goes, when a fan runs into his leg. Never mind common sense, though. The distortion about Filipowski was so prevalent Saturday night — his fault — that noted Duke tripper Grayson Allen was trending on Twitter.

Doyel in 2016: Grayson Allen, you're a lot like I am ... and we have to change

This is a sad little world, sometimes — and college kids, this is also your fault. Yes, for sure, the NCAA has no backbone and conferences follow its gelatinous lead and schools are unprepared and ESPN makes the whole thing look fun every time it shows the kids frolicking on the court.

But college kids, grow up.

This is where we are today, though. College kids see people rushing the court all over the Big Ten, and next thing you know, Purdue is losing at IU in 2022 and the IU student section is storming the court, stupidly paying the ultimate compliment to a school it likes to call Little Brother:

We can’t believe we just beat you!

Doyel in 2022: Assembly Hall erupts after having to wait years to beat Purdue

Doyel in 2024: Taunting Zach Edey is weird. Especially after he just demolished your team

We’ve already been through this in college football, with field-stormings and goalpost teardowns so common, so dangerous, that a Ball State student was paralyzed after a goalpost fell on him after the Cardinals’ upset Toledo in 2001. Now some college fields have erector-set goalposts that are dismantled by security before the kids get onto the field.

But the kids still get onto the field, because they want to be on the field and you can’t stop them. This is who we are as a society: We do things not because we should, but because we can. High school basketball players taunt opponents with the too-small gesture because they see it in the NBA and college. This is bigger than sports, of course. We riot in the streets or become bullies on social media or purchase machine guns because that’s what we do.

We storm the court for the same reason. Because we can.

Losers, all of you. No, wait, let’s be more precise.

Losers, all of us.

Find IndyStar columnist Gregg Doyel on Twitter at @GreggDoyelStar or at www.facebook.com/greggdoyelstar.

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This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: We allow the court-stormings of Purdue, Caitlin Clark, Kyle Filipowski