With less than two seconds left in the game, Wake Forest fans young and old could feel the exhilaration of impending victory. The Demon Deacons were about to take down the then-No. 8 Duke Blue Devils in an epic second-half comeback for their 15th home win. 

The Joel (Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum) was vibrating as students prepared to storm the court to celebrate one of the greatest upsets in Wake Forest basketball history. This is what college basketball is all about. That day would be remembered as the day the mighty underdogs took down a nationally ranked team. Media headlines would praise the players and the thrilling energy of the home win. 

At least that’s what I thought.   

The coliseum collision

You cannot search for Wake Forest basketball on Google without seeing the endless headlines about the Filipowski incident. With 1.8 seconds left on the clock and a two-possession game, it was clear that the game was over even before the buzzer sounded. It was no surprise that students were going to rush to the court. 

Four Duke players — Tyrese Proctor, Jeremy Roach, Jared McCain and Mark Mitchell — cleared the court quickly as fans ran toward Wake Forest’s power five. However, there was one Duke player left standing on the court. 7-foot center Kyle Filipowski lingered at midcourt as a wave of students rushed the court. As Filipowski slowly walked off the court, he collided with a Wake Forest fan, allegedly causing an injury to Filipowski’s knee.    

But who was at fault? Was it the excited Demon Deacon fan or the seven-foot Blue Devil player? 

I have seen multiple shots and angles of the incident at various speeds and still can’t decide who initiated contact. An overhead shot of the incident leads some fans to believe Filipowski stuck his leg out in front of the Wake Forest fans to intentionally trip them. 

If Filipowski did try to trip the fan out of anger, I doubt he tried to cause any serious harm. Now, I can understand why Filipowski may be upset and embarrassed enough to trip a fan after losing to the unranked Demon Deacons. I wouldn’t like it either if Hunter Sallis dropped a whopping 29 points on my sorry team.

However, could Filipowski have taken a page out of former Duke player Grayson Allen’s dirty playbook? Allen played for the Blue Devils from 2014 to 2018 and had several documented incidents of tripping opposing team players. 

After Filipowski and the storming Wake Forest fan collided, Flipowski was seen being carried off the court limping and wincing in pain.    

Flopowski disguises bruised ego with knee injury

Filiposwki did not hesitate to play the victim and tell the world that he suffered a knee injury in the violent court storming at LJVM. But Duke’s Head Coach Jon Scheyer said it was his ankle. I am pretty sure Filipowski would even have to think about which part of his leg he pretended to hurt. Here lies my biggest gripe against Duke and Filipowski — they milked the injury to overshadow an embarrassing loss to an unranked team. 

In an interview with WFMY news, Filipowski addressed the events of Saturday’s game. He said, “I felt a bunch of hits on my body. This was one of the worst of them. Like I said, it’s really ridiculous how the situation was handled.”

Drama queen! 

First of all, Filipowski was merely tapped on the back by one fan. To say that he suffered multiple blows all over his body is quite dramatic. Secondly, if he truly did suffer a serious career-ending injury, he would not have played 30 minutes in the game against Louisville four days after the alleged injury. The Louisville game further demonstrated that the injury had no impact on his game — as his stats were above his average. 

To hear Filipowski retell the incident, you would think he was Mufasa and the Wake Forest students were the wildebeest stampede in “The Lion King.” The only thing that was hurt was Filipowski’s bruised ego after such a big loss. He couldn’t admit defeat without making the Wake Forest win about himself. 

Hypocritical Blue Devils

In a post-game interview, Scheyer said that courtstorming needs to be banned as it puts players at risk. 

“How many times does a player have to get into something where they get punched or they get pushed or they get taunted right in their face?” Scheyer asked. 

Scheyer did emphasize that the incident should not take away from the Wake Forest win; however, he contributed to Filipowski’s sob story by insinuating the center was “punched” and “pushed.” Duke does not understand what it is like to be an underdog on their home basketball court. The fact that Duke has just now decided to show concern over court storming when a lower-ranked team has beaten them is hypocritical. 

Duke was in Wake Forest’s position this past fall when they beat Clemson in a football upset at home. There was no concern for the safety of the opposing team when Duke stormed the court after their great win. 

Court storming needs to stay 

To be fair, court storming does have its risks. While I don’t think Filipowski deserves to be the poster child for anti-court storming by any means, I do think the tradition needs to be made safer. There is a risk when the barrier between the stands and the field or court is broken. But how often do court stormings happen and how often are players injured? 

The small chance that a player gets injured should not lead to the complete eradication of this event. Rules should be put in place to make sure the other team can clear the court. Of course, no one wants to see anyone get hurt, but court storming should not be banned.

The people calling for court storming to be banned are announcers, journalists and former players who haven’t rushed a court in decades. Court storming exemplifies what college basketball is all about — the electric connection between the players and the fans.  

While it is hard not to look at college players with millions of dollars in NIL deals as professionals, at the end of the day they are students. They are our classmates and friends. When our team wins a game, alumni and current students feel as though we played and won the game ourselves. Again — the bond between the fans and the players is a part of what makes college basketball so unbelievably special. 

As a student who attended the game against Duke, I can confidently say it will be one of my most memorable moments as a college student. Getting to storm the court was one of the best feelings in the world. I took pictures with my friends surrounded by players and the student body. I called my dad and uncle who are Wake Forest alumni, and we were all beaming with pride. Seeing the quad adorned in toilet paper still makes me smile thinking about it. These are the memories people will tell their kids about years into the future. 

While Scheyer and grumpy older basketball fans think it is time for court storming to end, I sure as hell don’t agree.