Scenes from Big Blue Madness camp: A birthday, knitted Christmas presents and fewer tents
Neither this week’s downpours of rain nor the prospect of an online ticket order being mere fingertips away nor the rare diversion of an unbeaten and ranked football team could dissuade Kentucky fans from camping out for tickets to this year’s Big Blue Madness.
Thanks to last month’s exhibition games in the Bahamas, this year’s Big Blue Madness even lacks the lure of a sneak preview. It all made no difference to UK basketball fans who began pitching tents near Memorial Coliseum at 5 a.m. Wednesday.
Marsha Poe, a retired postal worker who is camping out for the 14th year, had a ready answer to why there were clearly fewer tents in place Wednesday. UK allotted less space for fans, she said. Signs reading “No camping” dotted the west side of the building and half the south side along the Avenue of Champions.
“There would be more tents if there were more space,” Poe said. “We haven’t lost interest. It’s just that UK has cut it back, cut it back, cut it back.”
Controlling the camp out is probably “a pain in the neck” for UK officials, Poe said. In announcing the dates for the camp out, UK encouraged fans to order tickets online.
School spokesman Guy Ramsey said UK had reduced space for camping for a couple years now to “keep clear high-traffic student pedestrian routes to and from class “
Mary Hensley, 73, said she’s a UK football fan before dismissing the 4-0 start to the season as a factor in limiting the size and scope of the Madness camp out.
“I like football, too,” she said. “Anything with Kentucky, I like it.
“But there ain’t nothing as exciting as the basketball team. There’s nothing that compares to them. No football. No nothing.”
Judging by comments campers made, the games in the Bahamas stoked interest in Big Blue Madness rather than robbed it of the chance to get acquainted with the latest batch of star freshmen.
“I think they’re going to be great,” Hensley said of the UK team for 2018-19. “We’re loaded with talent, which we are every year anyhow.”
A woman sat in front of a tent about 50 feet from the Memorial Coliseum ticket windows. She passed the time by knitting Christmas presents, which she said she also did the other five times she camped out for Madness tickets.
The woman, who said her name was Jessie James, came from Greenup. Asked if she was related to the famous outlaw, she smiled and said, “If I am, I don’t know it.
“I get teased a lot about it. My husband, when he was living, I’d say, ‘I’m Jessie James.’ He’d say, ‘I’m Frank.’”
James, 81, laughed. She said she was one of 11 children and named for a neighbor. Having a punch line of a name dawned on her only when she and “Frank” applied for a marriage license. She was 16.
When the young couple gave their names, the clerk giggled, James said. “I hadn’t thought I’d be Jessie James.”
Hensley, a retired convenience store manager from Williamsburg, was accompanied at the camp out with her daughter, Jackie Defevers, grandson Josh Defevers and his wife, Kati.
Wednesday was Kati’s 27th birthday, which her husband celebrated on Monday by giving her a ring adorned with her sapphire birth stone. That sapphire is blue and thus fitting the occasion was not lost on the family.
Kati exuded something less than rabid UK fan enthusiasm on this, her first camping experience.
“I’ll be fine as long as I get a shower,” she said. “That’s my main concern.”
Kati did not watch Kentucky’s games in the Bahamas. “He didn’t have it turned on,” she said of her husband.
To which, Josh declared, “she is a terrible fan.”
Guilty as charged, Kati said.
“Yeah, that’s pretty accurate,” she said. “I’m busy. I have other things to keep up with.”
Kati and Josh have three children: Caitlin, 14, Claire 6 and Tucker, 5.
A lack of sleep may have affected Kati’s enthusiasm. She said she’d slept four hours the night before: Two across the street from Memorial Coliseum and two at the camp site.
“This is the first time I’ve slept outside,” she said. “I hope no bugs flew in my mouth.”
At the other end of the spectrum was Poe, who first camped out when the late Mike Casey got her tickets. She suggested the camp out serves as an extended family reunion of UK basketball fans. The players, perhaps unwittingly, are members of this family.
“We automatically look at them as ours,” Poe said putting emphasis on the last word.
This annual rite of passage puzzles some UK students, she said. The campers sit in chairs across the street for several days awaiting UK’s call to cross and set up a tent.
“Students ask, ‘Why are you here?’” Poe said. The campers say they are there for tickets.
“They think it’s for a big event,” Poe said. “I wouldn’t dare tell them it’s just a practice.”
Important upcoming dates
Oct. 7: Pro Day
Oct. 12: Big Blue Madness
Oct. 21: Blue-White Game
Oct. 26: Exhibition vs. Transylvania
Nov. 2: Exhibition vs. Indiana-Pennsylvania
Nov. 6: Season opener vs. Duke at Champions Classic in Indianapolis