By Michael Phillips

United Spirit Arena (named after a grocery store) is the home of Texas Tech basketball and it's love-him-or-hate-him coach, Bob Knight. On Saturday, Jan. 20, the Red Raiders hosted the No. 5 Kansas Jayhawks. The seven inches of slush and ice kept away a good number of fans, but the 11,469 in attendance cheered the home team to a five-point victory and stormed the court afterward.

	Although these Red Raider fans were primed to see Bob Knight's 880th win, most Texas Tech fans still wear football-themed shirts to the games. AP
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It became painfully obvious that the fine people of Lubbock (Lubbockians?) had no clue what to do with the snow. Knight made reference to the fact that people were stocking up on groceries in advance of the storm.

"It's only snow. You can drive through it," he said. "Guys tell me, 'Now coach, we're going to go hunting Saturday and it's going to be cold.' I told them, 'Cold my ass. You don't know what cold is.' People down here have no concept of cold. I think I'm going to buy a store and start rumors about snowfall."

With that out of the way, here's how the arena stacks up...

Attire

The students are given prime seats in the corner, offered on a first-come, first-served basis. The front rows were the diehards, with painted stomachs and coordinated outfits. The remainder of the section wore black and red, but many of the shirts had football themes to them. It is Texas, after all.
Score: 5

Volume/Disruptability

When Texas Tech took a double-digit lead in the second half, the crowd went nuts. When they sealed the game with a Martin Zeno dunk, the arena shook. Other than that, the noise was loud, but not disruptive, for most of the game. The wide-open layout of the arena made it hard to create intimidating levels of noise, but the students came through in the game's final minutes.
Score: 8

Venue

The United Spirit Arena is one of the most modern facilities in the conference. It's a two-story, NBA-style arena with luxury suites in between and a four-sided jumbotron hanging in the middle. If a pro team played there, it would get a 10 easily. It detracts from the collegiate-ness of the place, though, to have people sitting so far from the court.
Score: 7

Chant/Sign quality

At a school where Bob Knight is the coach, you'd expect the chants to be about him. Whenever the coach argued a call, the students would chime in with "Bob-by, Bob-by" in a very Jerry Springer-esque fashion. There weren't a lot of signs, and most of them played off of the letters E, S, P and N. If Knight was in charge of the sign-making effort, he would have sent it back for a do-over.
Score: 4

Student Body

The game was the largest student turnout ever at the school, as 4,150 came out to watch. Knight thanked them after the game, saying they played a big role in the victory. The student section was into the game the entire time and seemed knowledgeable about when to cheer and which calls to jeer. Perhaps that's what happens when a school keeps its fans sober (the sale of beer is banned in Lubbock).
Score: 9

Total: 32 out of 50