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Months of planning paid off in an Illini (fan) victory yesterday, as the Orange Krush (plus Kelby, Dan, and I) invaded Carver-Hawkeye Arena. Illinois beat Iowa 57—49 as the Krush chanted “This is our house” as time expired. Iowa fans are understandably bitter…

(There’s more coverage online from Hawkeye Insider and the Cedar Rapids Gazette; also, check out this YouTube playlist and the rest of the pictures in the gallery.)

The Orange Krush tries to travel to an away basketball game every season. By this point, the Big Ten ticket offices have realized that it’s not such a good idea to sell blocks of tickets to anyone with an Illinois address when the Illini are coming to town. Unfortunately for Iowa, I no longer have an Illinois address.

Kelby traveled in Europe with Matt, the Orange Krush president, last summer, and they came up with the ingenious plan. When tickets went on sale, Matt called the Iowa ticket office, planning to have them ship the tickets to my in-state address. He asked how many tickets could be purchased in a block, and the rep told him 150, situated along the sideline in the upper area of the stadium. While they usually only bring 100 people, he wanted to sit behind a basket, and so pushed a little bit and asked for 160. They were excited to sell the tickets, so they acquiesced. The Krush was nice enough to pick up Kelby and my tickets in return for getting my address blacklisted.

Kelby and I were sworn to secrecy, lest the story get out. I admit that we told a few people—Zipp came along, after all, and Mom and Dad met Dale and Marsha in Iowa City as well. But otherwise, despite dying to spread the word, we kept our mouthes shut.

Due to some wrong turns by their busses, we ended up arriving before the other 158 Illini fans in the block, so we sat by ourselves as we waited for them to arrive. Playing along with the ploy, we wore black and pretended to support the Hawkeyes. Finally, with about ten minutes to spare, the students arrived and the section started to fill up. 

To keep up appearances, we jeered and booed the Illini during warmups. Still, I think the Illini players had an idea something was up, not least because most of the Krush members sit behind the basket and on the floor at Assembly Hall during every home game. We revealed our true identities right after the starting lineups were announced, to the joy of the Illini players and fans in attendance.

We were clearly louder than the home crowd throughout the game. Watching on TV, one could hear our “airballs” chants, mocking Cully Payne for his not one, but two airballs. We sang Illinois fight songs, maintained Illini traditions, and tried our best to undermine the Hawkeye home court advantage.

At one point, the refs called a very questionable foul call on what I thought was a clean Mike Davis block. As I yelled my disagreement, an older Iowa fan yelled, “That’s bullshit, you know that was a foul!”  I told the 65-year-old woman that she needed to watch her mouth.

Kelby, Dan, and I made it on TV on a number of occasions. Sitting behind the north basket in the third row (the front row of the always-standing Krush section), the cameras caught us during free throws, fast breaks, during breaks, et cetera. All of us received a number of facebook messages and text messages during the game.

The game was closer than it should have been. We were up eight at halftime, but the Hawks cut the lead to three in the last couple minutes of the game. Luckily, we managed to stay strong, and made some plays (and free throws) down the stretch, finishing with the same eight-point margin.

After the game, we hung around Carver-Hawkeye Arena, waiting to congratulate any players who decided to come back out. Brandon Paul, Mike Tisdale, and Bubba Chisholm all came out to great acclaim. Coach Weber and Demetri McCamey both pointed out the Krush after the game, and Mike Davis pointed in our direction after a fast-break dunk.

Highly-rated recruit Chasson Randle was in attendance as well, and we chanted “We want Randle” and “Come to our school” for his benefit. Our presence could not have reflected well on the state of the Iowa program.

Finally, after exiting the arena, we did a bit of post-game tailgating. Marsha, John, Marsha’s colleague Jessica, Mom, Dad, Dan, Kelby, and I hung out outside our cars and enjoyed a celebratory brew. Unfortunately, Dale had to head back to Cedar Falls, as he had an early meeting the next day, but the rest of us hung out until the parking lots had emptied.

The secret planning, deception, and intrigue paid great dividends, and our schadenfreude was complete. Go Illini!