Fans wait to see team at airport gate
UK guard Jon Hood high fives fans and holds the West Regional Championship trophy after returning to Lexington following UK’s Elite 8 victory over Michigan on Sunday, March 30, 2014. Photo by Michael Reaves
March 31, 2014
By Will Wright
Watching the UK Basketball team arrive at the Blue Grass Airport and greet the hundred or more fans was a nice break from the wildness of State Street for accounting freshman Emily Allen and her two friends.
“We went to State Street and we wanted a change of pace,” communication freshman Jordan Ondrof said. “(We’ll be back) when they win the national championship.”
Ondrof and Allen were among a crowd of mostly families and other non-student Cats fans waiting to meet their team, who had just beat the University of Michigan in the Elite-Eight round of the NCAA tournament.
Debra Lucas came to the gate of the airport with her daughter three years ago, and Sunday night she brought her younger daughter, Ashley Lucas, a sophomore at Woodford County High School, to continue the tradition.
“We’re just letting them know that we appreciate how hard the play,” Debra Lucas said. “We want them to feel the love as soon as they get back in the Bluegrass.”
Players came up to the fence and high-fived the fans before getting on a bus and driving through the crowd.
“This is why we come,” Debra Lucas said. “Because they love us back.”
