Panther Madness a resounding success

It was frightening.

Pulling into the Klotsche Center parking lot and getting a spot on the first floor, I was extremely worried that my suspicions would be correct – that the basketball teams’ Panther Madness would be put on in front of 25 students checking their smart phones for the score of the Brewers game.

I’ve never been so happy to be so wrong before.  On a stunning nightcap for Chancellor Mike Lovell’s big day, the Milwaukee Panthers put on an amazing show in front of 1,000 fans at the Klotsche Center, about 700 of which were students.

From the opening by the Rim Rockers to the close of the Dunk Contest, the Panthers put on a show that they never have in the history of the event – fun from start to finish.  Milwaukee Athletics gave away iPads like they were candy (thanks to the Student Association) and threw hundreds of t-shirts out to a crowd that had already been given free t-shirts at the door.

While the Dunk Contest that served at the main event followed the NBA protocol, the three-point contest was engaging and very tightly contested – instead of having one player shoot five balls from five spots around the arc, they pit the men’s and women’s teams against each other in a three-round shootout with each round having three players per side and two balls to shoot from anywhere around the arc.  The pace was frenetic and it was a lot more appealing than the typical three-point contest.  By the way, Paris Gulley is going to kill the Horizon League with his outside shot.

The best part of all was that the students got into it, including the awkward women’s basketball dance number and especially men’s head coach Rob Jeter’s cameo in the dance number by the men’s basketball and dance teams.  Hopefully they’ll be willing to hop on the buses and get down to the Cell for some men’s games and over to the Klotsche for some women’s games; I was impressed with the talent Sandy Botham’s team has brought in.

I took several videos at the event.  Pictures will come when I can figure out how to put them on the computer.

I would love to put up Part One of the Dunk Contest, but the video is eight minutes long and my phone isn’t able to upload a file that size to the internet.  Once I get it off my phone I’ll add it.

Here is the video put together by Milwaukee Athletics’ Sports Information Department (narrated by Tim Prahl):