In my days of being a professor and being in charge of athletic bands, one of the more unfortunate sights was attending a women's basketball game at home during the regular season.  It was unfortunate because the crowds were never that large, and thus, the level of excitement was lacking.

Now, I've gone on record as having problems with collegiate athletics, the NCAA, and many similar things, and I stand by those comments.  That being said, with the love our country has for college basketball, it was sad that only the men got the fans.  Some of the most entertaining games I attended were women's games.  And if you take the college aspect out of it, it would have been nice to see more support for the ladies in any form.  It shouldn't be a gender issue.

But then, incidents like the one between UNLV and Utah State in early January occur, and you see that other parts of the country do take women's college basketball seriously...perhaps too seriously.

During the game in question, a fight broke out between two players that led to eight total ejections.  It was during the third quarter when UNLV's Katie Powell and Utah State's Antoina Robinson got into it.  Not only were those two ejected, but three other members from each team were ejected for leaving the bench, totalling four ejections per team.

According to the post-game interviews, Powell went on record claiming that Robinson was playing dirty all game.  When one of Powell's teammates was fouled, she had finally decided to tell Robinson to tone it down, which led to Robinson instigating the fight.  If you get a chance, watch the video since it tells it all.

I'm not making excuses for any of the ejected players, but there are a few things to take from this fight...

First, unless there was something else unreported, this fight is clearly Robinson's fault.  I don't know this lady, but the fact that she would play dirty, then follow up with a fight shows what type of character she has.  She should be ashamed of herself.

That's not to excuse Powell, who probably could have handled things better.  But if you are looking to dissect the incident, place the blame on Robinson, not Powell.

Further, it's tough to criticize the ejected players for leaving the bench.  UNLV coach Kathy Olivier said it best post-game when she said she never taught her players not to leave the bench in such incidents because she thought they simply wouldn't occur.  Olivier took blame for that, but she should be lauded.  To accept the responsibility of something that should have been a non-factor is admirable; to hope that these situations would never arise is worthy of a tip-of-the-cap for optimism.  I'm sure there is an ensuing counterargument that says Olivier should have taught this to her players, but the big picture says otherwise.

Finally, the big goat in all of this is Utah State.  In researching the incident, UNLV made their players and coach available for comment regarding the incident.  UNLV's web site (for their women's basketball team) even included the unfortunate incident in their game wrap-up.  In short, they didn't hide from it.

Utah State, however, did.

There was no mention of any interview with any Utah State personnel.  What's worse is that Utah State's corresponding web site did not even remotely infer the incident occurred in their story about the game.  It was as if it never happened.

Journalistic failure?  Or embarrassed school?  You decide.

As if college football wasn't insane enough with its money grabbing disorganization and exploitation of student athletes, we have yet another example to remind us of the absurdity of giving any credence to collegiate athletics.

Did you happen to read the stories surrounding the Russell Athletic Bowl between Miami and West Virginia?  Regardless, let me answer some questions you might have.

First and foremost, yes...the Russell Athletic Bowl is a thing.

It's as useful as the ficticious PapaJohns.com Bowl about which Carl sings during his rendition of "I'll Be Home For Christmas" on the Aqua Teen Hunger Force holiday album, "Have Yourself a Meaty Little Christmas."  The lyrics properly describe the onslaught of each of these bowl games and how they are never competitive or worthy of our viewership:  "Florida State leads by 28...so why is Rutgers attempting a field goal?  It's 4th an 17!  You gotta go for it, then you get the on-side kick!"

These bowl games that the FBS division of the NCAA provide us multiply each year.  If you're not familiar with sports and need an analogy of what this is like, this is the equivalent of Disney acquiring LucasFilm and churning out a new Star Wars film each year.  Everybody and their mother new that the canon of Star Wars was just fine how it was, but the chance to make more money with a new trilogy and anthology films was too tempting.

Secondly, yes...I am a nerd.

Okay, back to the topic on hand.

Prior to the Russell Athletic Bowl, there was a children's charity event that hosted both teams.  Unfortunately, members of both teams began to get chippy with each other, culminating with a threat to put a player's draft stock in jeopardy, inferring intentional injury on the field during the game.  It never dawned on those present to consider the fact that the event was meant to be entertainment for children for charitable purposes.  It never occurred to them that the purpose of the event was bigger than football.  It just doesn't enter the minds of these athletes and their adult superiors that they are the priviledged ones who have the opportunity to do things like play sports with the potential future of continuing at the professional level.

During the game, another incident occurred in one of the bathrooms at the stadium.  A fan of each team got into a heated argument.  The West Virginia fan, who, and this is not a joke, only has one leg, threated to urinate on the Miami fan, which resulted in the Miami fan punching the West Virginia fan in the face.  A chase ensued between the two, followed by the one-legged West Virginia fan screaming at the Miami fan about how he, and I'm paraphrasing, used to have sexual relations with similar people while in prison.

Wow.  Anybody else need another beer?

If you're looking for the full description, just search for it...the search results will give you everything you need.

I sound like a broken record when I analyze these events because they are becoming more and more frequent and the solution is the same simple answer.  How many more of these things do we need to report and expose as ugly marks on our society?  What else needs to be done to get people to grow up and respect each other, regardless of their team/fan association?

This is where I would offer the usual solutions to these problems, so use your imagination to figure out what goes here and what you can do to prevent these incidents from occurring in the future.  Here's a hint:  the solution is obvious.