Rylan Howe

ESPN broadcaster Digger Phelps adjusts his tie before the “College GameDay” pregame show, while KU fans, cheerleaders and dance team members wait for the broadcast to begin. Kansas’ Saturday night game against Texas at Allen Fieldhouse marked the second installment of the show, which premiered with the Connecticut-Pittsburgh game last week.

Hundreds of dedicated campers showed up, bright and early, at Allen Fieldhouse Saturday morning for their opportunity to be a part of ESPN’s “College GameDay.”

Some fans showed up with painted faces, others held homemade signs in the air, while others simply screamed at the top of their lungs, giving the east lobby of Allen Fieldhouse a rock concert atmosphere.

“This was definitely worth camping out for,” Brad Gillette, Chicago junior, said. “The show was great. To have ‘GameDay’ here is just unbelievable.”

Gillette stood near the back of the crowd, flashing a sign that of an upside down Longhorn crying. He was positioned in prime view of the television cameras, directly behind ESPN analysts Rece Davis, Digger Phelps and Jay Bilas. His sign, along with several others, could be seen throughout the broadcast.

Not every fan was lucky enough to be in the general viewing area. The Kansas trophy case blocked people to the left and right of the set. That didn’t seem to matter to the faithful KU fans, though.

“We didn’t come to get on TV. We’re here for the atmosphere,” said Brad Jurgensmeier, Marion, Ill., freshman, who was standing to the far left of the television set behind the trophy case. “This is just awesome.”

The show featured interviews with Bill Self and Danny Manning and a profile of junior forward Christian Moody that Self said was one of the best pieces he’d ever seen. But the main focus was the mass of Kansas fans.

Before the 10 a.m. show began, Phelps addressed the audience and told them that for the next hour the show was theirs. He said this was their chance to show America why Kansas has the best fans in the country.

The already raucous crowd reached new heights at that point, and began the rock chalk chant minutes into the show. It got so loud at one point that the noise registered a decibel reading of 117, six decibels higher than last week’s taping at Connecticut.

“I love it here,” Bilas said. “This is one of the great venues in all of sports. To be able to be here all day and show people what it’s like, all around the country, it’s an honor for us.”

Bilas, who played basketball at Duke, said he nearly committed to Kansas when former coach Ted Owens recruited him. Though he is a former Blue Devil, he said he could not choose Cameron Indoor Arena over Allen Fieldhouse. He said the Phog was to college basketball what St. Andrews was to golf.

“It’s too close to call,” he said. “It’s like the difference between Yankee Stadium and Wrigley Field. I mean what’s better? You get a special feeling when you go into each one of them that’s unparalleled.”

One of the reasons that the ESPN crew loved it so much was because they were treated like A-list celebrities all day.

Even Phelps, who received boos from a number of students because he picked Villanova to defeat Kansas last week, appealed to the crowd. He said the small doses of heckling didn’t bother him, and he continually waved to the crowd to rile it up and gave the “horns down” sign during a commercial break.

“Fans are entitled to their opinion. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that,” Phelps, a former Notre Dame coach, said. “You’ve got to just tell what you feel is out there. Last week I felt Villanova beating Kansas and went with it. I smelled Curtis Sumpter to have a break out game, and he had 25. That’s what they pay me to do.

“That’s why I knocked off seven number one teams while I was at Notre Dame, because I have a feel for the game and coached the game. Coming from where I was in the past I am able to take that over and give it to the fans that want to watch me on TV.”

Davis was the most popular anchor, though. After Phelps and Bilas chose Oklahoma State as the most dangerous team in the NCAA, Davis looked at the crowd and said, “Well, I like Kansas.”

“Was I thinking about shameless pandering to the crowd before hand?” he said with a chuckle. “I was just trying to have a little fun with the crowd. I do like Kansas, though.”

He also said that the basketball version of “College GameDay” was going to be a success because of the spectacular fans he had seen so far.

“We’re going to let this show grow and develop its own personality and have its own interaction with the fans,” Davis said. “Largely because of the two student bodies we’ve seen so far, the show is off to a great start.”