There is no shortage of memes to be had when a team named Colgate participates in the NCAA Tournament, but Arkansas Razorbacks head coach Eric Musselman took the wordplay to a new level today when he rallied his team for their game against the Raiders by proudly squeezing a full tube of toothpaste all over the carpet of the locker room.
“We gotta squeeze Colgate,” Musselman told his players, according to a video put out by the program’s social media team.
https://t.co/ZlNvOxQF4Y pic.twitter.com/XwEeSawyaw
— 3 Seed Arkansas Razorback Basketball (@RazorbackMBB) March 19, 2021
While Musselman’s motivation tactics are questionable here, it is admittedly a nice dunk on Colgate. The school brought up old memories by tweeting at Bucknell, which eliminated Arkansas in 2019. What’s one person’s trash is another’s treasure, as they say, and Musselman’s bizarre pregame speech became a viral clip.
Fortunately, it’s all good for a laugh now that Arkansas beat Colgate, but it also would have been fascinating to see how players responded to that toothpaste stain on the floor of their locker room postgame if they had indeed lost. Picture walking in after being upset big time, and you see the remains of your coach’s performance art in the middle of the room while the pain of the loss is still settling in. Could have gone either way.