The moment when the air temporarily left the PMAC was palpable.
When third-seeded Penn State grabbed a nine-point lead late in the first half of Tuesday’s duel with No. 6-seed LSU, déjà vu appeared inevitable for the Lady Tigers.
Whether it was a reminder of last season’s brutal 90-80 NCAA Tournament ousting at the hands of the Lady Lions or five years of regression-then-inconsistency since five straight Final Fours, the relatively sparse crowd of 3,055 was sucking wind.
An hour later, the crowd was holding its breath. The silence eventually erupted into cheers as a squad of seven secured the Lady Tigers’ first Sweet 16 berth since 2008.
While the crowd was certainly loud — especially any time Penn State had possession in the waning minutes — it was the smallest of LSU’s 10 NCAA Tournament games in the PMAC, according to the announced number.
That’s hardly a surprise, though, given that the PMAC becomes a surreal version of LSU’s familiar home court during the NCAA Tournament.
Several rows of seats are pushed well away from the court along the sides to make room for a minor horde of media members and NCAA officials.
A middle-aged home crowd mixes with the die-hard fans and traveling family of the visiting side.
The sideline seats appear mostly full on television — and they are, but only in the lower bowl.
Behind the baskets, it’s much closer to a mausoleum, with discomfort broken only by the intermittent vigor of the bands in each corner.
Whether it’s the Penn State band chanting “Huey Long” and other oddities at free-throw shooters, Cal Poly bringing a leprechaun-green cheering section or the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay’s band entering with its cheesehead “rally caps” on, NCAA Tournament games in the PMAC are spectacles filtered through purple-and-gold glasses.
“I could see our team really taking in the atmosphere here, and it was a great atmosphere, especially for our seniors, knowing that this is their last game at home,” said LSU coach Nikki Caldwell. “We just appreciate the fans who have stayed the course with us and who continue to believe in us when things looked a little bleak.”
But the visiting squads that largely bring that contemporary wackiness and fan urgency felt slightly forced by the postseason label, as an imposing but aging sect dominates the home crowd.
As an example of the youth disinterest, LSU students could get in free to both the first- and second-round games.
In the Lady Tigers’ victory versus UW-Green Bay on Sunday evening, approximately 60 or 70 students were in attendance. That number wasn’t significantly higher for the Penn State matchup.
There hasn’t been a homegrown, sure-fire star like Seimone Augustus or an athletic freak like Sylvia Fowles in the last half-decade to appeal beyond the Lady Tigers’ core fanbase.
LSU hasn’t been a captivating draw, and that’s why Tuesday night’s improbable short-handed win could be a turning point for a program that isn’t necessarily rebuilding, but redefining itself.
Basketball success is typically predicated on a few talented stars, but the “Seventh Heaven” story the Lady Tigers used to exact revenge on a Penn State squad littered with individual accolades creates a compelling team dynamic going forward.
That team dynamic can create a stronger bond than the lure of a few stars, and it already showed in how fervently LSU fans — in attendance or not — embraced the Lady Tigers’ feat during and after Tuesday’s 71-66 victory.
After the crowd caught its collective breath and exhaled, senior guard Adrienne Webb — fresh off her career-high 29 points — took in the PMAC crowd as the clock expired and let out an enormous sigh of relief.
It looked like a breath of fresh air into the program. The crowd’s roar followed, and the whole team joined in gleeful unison, the women unleashing shrieks of their own.
With moments like Tuesday night, Caldwell and the Lady Tigers could get used to that pattern.
