Vanderbilt defeated Georgia Tech today in old Memorial gymnasium.  Watching the game on the tube today brought back memories.  I grew up in Middle Tennessee in the 70's and remember the first time I saw Atlanta Fulton County Stadium from the inside.  The grass was the greenest green and the seats the bluest blue.  I remember the first time I saw the inside of Neyland Stadium and the approximately 80,000 seats it had at that time and picking up about 100 souvenier cups after the game.

But in Memorial Gymnasium it wasn't the sights I took home with me, but the sound.  In case you haven't been there, the building is unique.  It is not round, or square.  Instead each side of the court has a wing that rises up behind it.

When dad took the five of us to that game naturally our seats weren't the best to see from.  We didn't have much and I am so thankful that he scraped up the cash for the game or scored them from a friend at work or whatever.  I didn't care how he got the tickets.  All I cared about was that we were going to a Vanderbilt basketball game.  Sure, I liked Tennessee better, still do, watched them score a big one against Memphis the other night, Go Vols, but I have yet to actually see them live.

In our world basketball ruled.  Sure we liked football and baseball better but our elementary school did not play football or baseball.  We played basketball.  The school colors were blue and white until we changed them to, you guessed it, orange and white.  In our little gym with a stage at one end and two rows of seats squeezed in on each side, the sound remains as well.  A lonely ball bouncing and the sound vibrating off the walls, the squeak of cheap tennis shoes like Red Ball Jets and PF Flyers, and the sound of one awesome rare female coach still vibrate in my memory.

Today Vanderbilt scored a big one against Georgia Tech and once again I could here the sound.  The cheap seats we had that night were near the top of one of the ends.  Sound that would normally be loud was louder because it didn't spread around the gym, it bounced off the three walls immediately left, behind and right of us.  Not just when Vandy scored, but everytime they touched the ball the old gym roared.

At Memorial the teams, including the coaches sit at the end of the gym.  You see, getting room for the fans to see the game and the press is more important than where the coaches and players sit at Vanderbilt (imagine that).   But the Vandy coach doesn't mind.   It's a home court advantage Vandy should never change.

When the opposing coaches team is on the opposite court, his team can't here him, they actually have to play the game on their own, like we used to, when coaches got a "T" if they simply stood up and there was none of this working the referee (read whining) stuff.  Vanderbilt's players know this, and are smart enough to handle it.  Vanderbilt's fans know it too, and they keep the noise level up without needing to have artificial applause, music or sounders pumped in.  The old gym still roars.  It did today.  Ask Georgia Tech.

From the Vanderbilt web site:

12/9/2006 MBB Tops #25 Georgia Tech, 73-64 Shan Foster scored 25 points and Derrick Byars added 18, and Vanderbilt snapped a nine-game losing streak against ranked opponents with a 73-64 victory over No. 25 Georgia Tech on Saturday.