Jay Bilas on court-storming: Fans do not belong on the court ever

Fans have stormed college basketball courts for much of the sports’ history. Many say the celebration is a big part of what separates the college game from the NBA–the passion of the fans. On the Saturday (Jan. 27) edition of ESPN College GameDay — Jay Bilas took a very strong stance against fans being on the court at all.

“Fans do not belong on the court ever.”

Agree or disagree with @JayBilas? 🤔 pic.twitter.com/7st6UgrL85

— College GameDay (@CollegeGameDay) January 27, 2024

Jay Bilas shares his strong feelings on court-storming

“The passion of it is great. I like the passion. Fans do not belong on the court. Ever,” Bilas said to a chorus of boos from the ESPN College GameDay crowd on Saturday morning.

“And players don’t belong in the stands. Remember years ago when Marcus Smart went into the stands and everybody had a conniption fit over it. Players don’t belong in the stands. Fans don’t belong on the court. And in the Southeastern Conference, the conference has deemed that a violation that will cost you a fine of $100,000. South Carolina stormed the court and the President Emeritus ran out and promoted him running out on his own social media channel,” the ESPN college basketball commentator continued.

“They don’t care. We’ll pay it just for the visual and we’ll put the pictures up in the locker room and all that stuff. For recruiting. We love it (ESPN). We put it on TV at the end of every highlight we’ve promoted. All media companies do. When somebody gets hurt, we’re gonna get serious about it. But until then, they don’t do it. When was the last time you saw court storming in an NFL game. Field storming in an NFL game? The NBA? Major League Baseball. They don’t do it. They protect the players and we don’t do it in college,” Bilas finished.

ESPN College GameDay is headed to Duke-UNC next

ESPN has announced the next live location for its ever-popular College GameDay show and it should come as little surprise. The crew is headed to Chapel Hill, N.C., to watch Duke take on North Carolina.

Traditionally one of the biggest basketball matchups of the year, this year’s contest figures to be no different.

Both programs are on an absolute tear right now, with North Carolina leading the ACC with an 8-0 conference record and Duke not far behind at 5-2. The Tar Heels have won nine straight games since a loss to a ranked Kentucky squad, while Duke has won nine of its last 10 games, stumbling only once against Pittsburgh.

The ESPN College GameDay crew will be live on location for only the second time this season, having gone to Fayetteville, Ark., for an Arkansas-Kentucky game as the first matchup highlighted this season.

North Carolina has gotten where it is so far this season with a simple formula.

“At the end of the day, you need your dudes to step up,” coach Hubert Davis said. “I mean, you just need your big-time players to make big-time plays. It’s just as simple as that. So, for us to win whoever we play, you know, we need Cormac (Ryan) and Armando (Bacot), and we need RJ (Davis), we need Harrison (Ingram). We need those guys to play well.”

They have all done just that. All four are averaging double figures scoring, with Davis leading the way at 21.0 points per game. Bacot is averaging a double-double with 14.1 points and 10.3 rebounds per game. Ingram isn’t far behind at 12.3 points and 8.2 rebounds per game.

They’ll go up against a Duke squad that hasn’t quite reached its potential in 2023-24.

The Blue Devils are led by big man Kyle Filipowski, who is currently averaging 18.2 points and 9.0 rebounds per game. Duke has five players currently averaging double-figure scoring.

If not for a trio of players missing for the Pittsburgh game, Duke may well be on a 10-game winning streak currently. The team dropped that contest 80-76, missing Jeremy Roach, Mark Mitchell and Christian Reeves in the contest.

On3’s Thomas Goldkamp also contributed to this article.