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Bill Self crushed, Jamari Traylor targeted during Kansas State court storm (VIDEO)

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ESPN

There is nothing in this world that I hate more than an argument about court storm, but I will say this: I’ve been anti-court storms for a while now. It’s incredibly dangerous mixing fired up, drunk students celebrating a win with a group of athletes pissed off about losing a game, usually to a team they shouldn’t lose to and often times to a rival.

One of these days something really, really bad is going to happen on a national stage, something similar to -- oh, I don’t know -- the fight between New Mexico State players and Utah Valley fans last season.

Monday night’s win for Kansas State over No. 8 Kansas is another example of the risks involved in this tradition.

Let’s start with Jamari Traylor, who was targeted by a Kansas State fan:

Wow!!! The student went directly for him!!! RT @charliestroble: Jamari checked off the court... pic.twitter.com/0PswWJhPQv

— Rob Dauster (@RobDauster) February 24, 2015


What happens if Traylor retaliated to getting hit like that? And then there’s Bill Self, who found himself pinned up against the scorer’s table by the tidal wave of humanity that was Kansas State students storming the floor:

Does this look enjoyable for Self or Kansas State head coach Bruce Weber?:

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ESPN

There’s a simple answer to solve all of these problems, and it doesn’t get rid of court storms.

Make it a rule that if fans storm the floor before the visiting team has safely left the court, than the home team forfeits the game.

It’s really that simple.

No fans would be stupid enough to storm early if it would, ya know, vacate the win. But it also doesn’t eliminate court storms from the game, which actually are a fun tradition for college kids and for the teams pulling the upsets.

UPDATE: Via the Topeka Capital-Journal, here is what Self had to say about the court storm:

“I wasn’t nervous for me. There were several students that hit our players -- not saying like with fists, but when you storm the court, you run in, you bump everybody, stuff like that. This has got to stop.

“Court storming is fine, but surely, you can get security to the point where player safety is not involved like it is over here. The last several times they’ve won, they’ve stormed the court on us. That’s disappointing that that happened again, but we also allowed it to happen again by not playing well.

“It’s a ballgame. It’s not about chickenwinging somebody when the game’s over, stuff like that. That’s not what it’s about. Hopefully they can get that corrected, because it’s fine if you want to celebrate when you beat us. That’s your business. That’s fine. But at least it shouldn’t put anybody at risk from a safety standpoint, because we’re asking for big problems because somebody’s going to hit a player, and a player’s going to retaliate, and you’re going to have lawsuits and cases. It’s just not right.

“There’s just no place for it to be unsafe. If you do it, at least do it around center court. Don’t do it at the other bench.”