SAN ANTONIO ? Uplifting strains of a mariachi band at a Friday afternoon pep rally gave way Friday night to the sour notes of a lopsided loss for Kansas University fans in southern Texas.
And with the 80-64 setback to the Illinois Fighting Illini, the Kansas Jayhawks were sent packing from this year’s NCAA Tournament.
“It’s disappointing when you lose the big one, and this is the big one,” said Fred Bosilevac, a KU basketball letterman from the 1930s.
Bosilevac, of Mission Hills, was among a throng of disappointed Kansas fans who made their way out of the Alamodome after Friday’s regional semifinal.
Their tournament activities began Friday with a pep rally that opened with a three-piece mariachi band.
And why not? Most everything in San Antonio has a Mexican feel, from the food on the River Walk to the downtown architecture.
But there were no Southwestern pastels at this fiesta. It was all Crimson and Blue, and it left KU fans proud to say, “I’m a Jayhawk.”
Or, perhaps, “Yo soy un Jayhawk.”
Hundreds of KU fans gathered in Travis Park across the street from the players’ hotel to rally around the Jayhawks before their Sweet 16 game against Illinois.
Although the Jayhawk mascot was present, another animal was almost as prevalent. After coach Roy Williams let players knock a stuffed monkey named “Stank ‘Em” off his back before last week’s victory over Syracuse a symbol of the team’s inability to advance past the second round of the NCAA Tournament in recent years monkey memorabilia was a common sight among Jayhawk fans.
At Friday’s pep rally, there were stuffed monkeys attached to KU flags, monkeys perched on shoulders like parakeets and a fan in a gorilla suit.
The most monkeys per capita might have belonged to the Cohlmia family from Wichita. After family members arrived in San Antonio, they purchased seven toy monkeys from a store called Wonders of Science, which was going out of business.
“This may put them back in business, though,” Jerry Cohlmia said.
The purchase drew some strange looks from the cashier, who didn’t even know the NCAA Tournament was being played in San Antonio.
“KU fans know what we’re talking about, though,” Matt Cohlmia said.
Kustore.com, which is operated by the athletics department, sold between 1,200 and 1,300 T-shirts featuring “Stank’ Em” from a table in the team hotel lobby. Only a few youth sizes remained Friday evening.
“Frankly, we probably could have sold more,” said Pat Warren, associate athletic director for external relations. “With the sale cycle being so short, we didn’t want to order too many.”
As it happened, the Jayhawks’ run in the tournament also was on a short cycle.
In Lawrence, it wasn’t until the game clock ticked past the three-minute mark that reality set in and the KU fans who packed themselves into Molly McGee’s sports bar, 2429 Iowa, began to deal with their disappointment.
“They just outplayed us,” Tad Lewis, 22, Lawrence, said of Illinois. “They made a lot of shots and they made their free throws we didn’t. Ku didn’t play like they were capable of playing. They haven’t moved the ball around like Illinois.”
Paul Wath, 26, a 1997 KU graduate from Lawrence, agreed. He also noted that KU couldn’t make its free throws, and that played a major role in the loss.
“They knew what they had to do to win and they did it,” he said of Illinois.
Fans quickly began leaving the bar as the final buzzer sounded.
Nevertheless, many shared the thoughts expressed by Boselivac in San Antonio: “We’ll come back next year.”
Staff writer Mike Belt contributed in Lawrence.
