How the Fans Defend Free Throws in College Basketball

Foul shots are called “free” throws, but they aren’t.

Fans guard the line as best they can, deploying a variety of distracting, defensive tricks far beyond ear-popping yells and waving arms.

“Last year at Syracuse, somebody threw an orange at me,” said Georgetown guard Mark Tillmon. “It was really wild.”

Fan participation raises questions about where school spirit ends and bad sportsmanship begins. Big East Commissioner Dave Gavitt this season ordered cheerleaders to stop pounding megaphones at courtside during free throws. Georgia Tech now prohibits students from waving multi-colored cards behind the basket.

But, the game inside the game goes on. Distracting opponents is serious business, an expanding art form. Some students try posters of scantily clad women to shake up shooters. Others use optical illusions.

According to Art Hyland, Big East supervisor of officials, rules prohibit pep bands from playing while the ball is alive. Another rule outlaws objects being thrown onto the floor. Nothing prohibits waving arms or flashing posters.

“We’ve heard stories of flashing camera lights from the student section,” said Hyland. “That’s not allowed. But on the one hand, we don’t want to do anything to discourage fans from supporting their team and doing everything they can to be enthusiastic.”

Georgia Coach Hugh Durham thinks cheerleaders, bands and others officially associated with a school should not be involved in guarding free throws.

“I think that’s poor taste,” said Durham. “I think the fans can do pretty much what they want to, as long as it’s not throwing anything. Shaking posters, shakers . . . that’s just part of the game.”

Duke Coach Mike Krzyzewski agrees.

“To try to eliminate it would be a mistake. Kids are conditioned to shooting free throws with people waving their hands and doing all sorts of things. The real good competitors can’t think of anything better than to hit one when all that’s going on and silence everybody.”

The more noise the better, goes prevailing thinking. But Abe Lemons, coach-comedian for 34 years, suggests a radical alternative.

“What gets you is total quiet,” said Lemons, back at Oklahoma City after stints at Pan American and Texas. “Kids love to play with noise and a full house. That’s the reason we didn’t play well at Rice. There was never anyone there.

“Try total quiet a few times. After having the noise reverberating in your ears all game, all of a sudden, it’s quiet. That’s tough. As smart as the Duke crowd is, I’m surprised they haven’t thought of that. They ought to try it a few times, waste a few early in the game and see what happens.”

Duke fans, unofficial national champs of innovative behavior, aren’t quite ready for that.

“Staying silent would be hard to get everybody to do,” said Glenn “Baskethead” Coleman, a Duke student who wears half a basketball, a rim and net on his head to games.

“And we wouldn’t want to take the chance of wasting any early in the game. Those are the ones that come back to haunt you at the end.”

Crowd enthusiasm comes in imaginative ways. A sampling of tactics around the country:

Duke possesses a veritable arsenal of ploys. “Baskethead” says they never start in one place.

“It’s random people,” he said. “Anybody can do it. We love it. And a lot of players love it. But I’ve seen some teams who have never been here before look at us with a strange expression, like, ‘What are those people doing?’ Then, they try to pretend we’re not there.”

One of the Blue Devils’ most creative acts is an attempt to upset a shooter’s equalibrium. Fans behind the basket stand up, raise their arms and lean to one side. The intent is to make the shooter think he is off balance.

At other times, fans rotate their fists in unison to mimmick an official’s walking call and create a hallucinatory effect. They also use what they call the “whippoorwill.” Fans behind the basket raise their arms and swirl and dip their bodies to create a whirlpool look. Other times, they stay eerily quiet until the shooter is ready to release the ball. Then, they erupt.

The latest trick is jingling keys. It’s a distracting sound. They used to spin multi-colored umbrellas behind the basket, a practice quickly outlawed.

“I miss a lot of the things they do,” said Krzyzewski. “But my wife and daughter will write things down for me. On the way home from the game they’ll say, ‘Here’s what they said’ in a certain situation. I’ll say, ‘You gotta be kidding me. How did they come up with that?”

Stunningly, Duke opponents shoot better in Cameron Indoor Stadium than they do at home (69.5 to 66.4).

“I’ve seen a few guys rattled, like a guy from Notre Dame,” said Coleman. “But it’s not whether it works or not. It’s if everybody enjoys it. It’s all about having fun.”

Said Lemons, “Nobody’s ever figured out free throws or how to stop them. The good shooters will make their free throws. I don’t think crowd noise is much of a disruptive factor. Taking the crowd out of the game, that’s something Al McGuire started. That’s a bunch of bull. Icing a guy at the line by calling time? That doesn’t work. The way to ice a guy who can’t shoot is let him shoot. People don’t work on their free throws. They’d rather have a 360 miss than a wide-open shot.”

New Mexico State fans use props they call hypno-dots, green paper squares with a large black dot in the middle. When a foul shooter looks to the basket, fans behind the goal wave the cards back and forth to fog his sightline.

Facing 700 black-and-green dancing cards, Cal State Long Beach shooters went 15 for 27. A local car dealer got excited. Hoping for an advertising bonanza, he donated white cards with a red “S” for fans to use. UC Irvine ate them for dessert--21 of 26.

State’s tactics might be working overall. Opponents hit 63.2% of their free throws at New Mexico State. They shoot 65.2 in their own gyms against State.

Georgia Tech stopped using dots because operations manager John O’Neill decided the cards came too close to violating a coliseum rule against noisemakers and signs. O’Neill felt they approached the limit of good sportsmanship. They also weren’t working. Duke made 23 of 31 free throws and won in Atlanta.

Pictures of girls in bikinis are popular. Some schools even have used pictures of obese women in bathing suits.

At Maryland, fans unfurl a wide poster of a bikini-clad beauty on her side. It’s eye-catching. Opponents shoot six percentage points worse at Cole Field House than at home. Maryland students take their defensive role seriously. When doors open for general-admission seating, many race past midcourt to the end zone.

Loud yells are a staple. Some have a special message. When Georgetown’s Alonzo Mourning went to the foul line at Madison Square Garden recently, St. John’s fans chanted, “Just say no! Just say no!” That was a reference to Mourning’s friendship with a reputed drug figure.

Despite probation, Kentucky has drawn its wildest and loudest crowds. The noise apparently is having an effect. Opponents shoot 69% in Rupp Arena and 75% at their gyms.

Clemson can turn up the volume. It holds opponents to 64.8% at Littlejohn Coliseum. They shoot 10 points better when Clemson visits their place.

At Missouri, where the antics of a group of students called the Antlers are legendary, opponents are barely bothered at the line. Students are stuck on the side of the court because boosters who have acquired end zone seats over the years refuse to relinquish them. The Antlers have creative yells (“Save the whales” for overweight players). But they’ve been known to yell at their own fans behind the basket for not making noise.

Three innovative disruptions no longer exist.

Stanford’s floor is built on springs. According to spokesman Bob Vazquez, students found if they stomped their feet enough, the floor vibrated. Two years ago, when Arizona’s Sean Elliott went to the line late in a game, there was a whole lot of shaking going on. Arizona Voach Lute Olson was so upset, he complained to officials. The Pac-10 told Stanford to stop.

“We haven’t had any problems since,” said Vazquez. “We’d like to do it, but we can’t.”

Before Wake Forest’s coliseum was remodeled, students sat on the floor near the base of the basket. When an opponent was at the line, students would kick the base, causing the rim to shake. Officials often made the shooter wait until the rim stopped vibrating.

At Texas-El Paso, fans mourn the passing of the Miner Maniacs. They were a group of fanatics who wore Viking hats and carried plastic swords. When an opponent went to the foul line, the Maniacs would charge down an aisle behind the basket, waving their swords and yelling their battle cry.

Overcoming distractions is simply a matter of concentration, says an experienced foul shooter.

“You just block everything out,” said Kansas State’s Steve Henson, a career 89-percenter. “We talk about that as a team, keeping everything between the lines and not letting anything outside the court affect you. I always talk about concentrating on one thing.”

Supporting Lemons’ logic, Henson says it’s easier when the crowd is loud and the shots mean the most.

Two years ago, Henson set the Big Eight record with 48 consecutive free throws, including 17 in a row at Iowa State. In that game, he showed how a shooter can silence a crowd.

After an altercation, K-State was awarded eight technical free throws. The crowd was in a frenzy. Henson made one, then another, then another. By the time he hit the eighth, the crowd was silent.

Call it the shooter’s revenge.