Hoosier Hoopla

At Monroeville, a whistle stop on Indiana's frozen countryside, a bonfire crackled and popped. The celebrating went on until 3 a.m. At Portland, two counties away, the townspeople snake-danced around another bonfire. It was the same way at Crawfordsville and Jasper. All Indiana seemed to be aglow. Indiana's 37th annual high-school basketball tourney was on.

The natives called it "Hoosier hysteria" or "Hoosier hoopla." All but three of Indiana's 782 public high schools--from little Raub High (student body: 18) to Indianapolis' Arsenal Tech (student body: 4,578)--were entered. The grown-ups took it more seriously than the kids. Farmers stopped working. Storekeepers closed up shop and went gallivanting off to watch their local heroes perform. Indiana's excitement was matched in Illinois, Wisconsin and Minnesota, where other state tourneys are in progress. In the Midwest last week it was easy to prove that basketball, the poor boy's game, plays to larger crowds than any other U.S. sport (1,241,594 people paid to see last year's tourney in Indiana alone).

The Sweet 16. Last week, only 16 teams--known by Hoosiers as "the sweet 16"--were left. Then it was their turn to battle it out in the semifinals. Monroeville, accompanied by the prayers of the home folks, went down to Muncie and got smeared, 49 to 38. There was sorrow among Monroeville's 896 citizens. Portland High fared better, getting by Chester Township, a hotbed of basketball on the Eel River in Wabash County, only to be humbled later in the day. In last week's semifinals, all the small-town schools (the smaller the town, the higher the fervor) were eliminated. It was enough to quench bonfire celebrations all over the rural districts, where farm boys spent most of their spare time, between milking and other chores, shooting basketballs through hoops on the barns.

The frenzy narrowed to four schools: Evansville, Muncie, Lafayette and Anderson. "The fieldhouse four," as they are called, will travel to Indianapolis this week for the finale in Butler University Fieldhouse. Despite the size of the gym (capacity: 15,028), not a ticket could be bought. Sponsors guessed that they could easily sell another 50,000 tickets. There was little or no ticket-scalping, because as one Hoosier put it: "It's just like selling your auto. Where're you going to get another?"

Thirty Broadcasts. When the big hour arrives, 30-odd Indiana radio stations will describe every play to stay-at-homes in every corner of Indiana. The only calm & collected people in the house will be college coaches from such faraway places as North Carolina State and Tulane, in town to size up prospects. Indiana is a prize marketplace for basketball players.

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