In UConn’s Jan. 6 game at Rutgers, the Huskies, then ranked No. 1, shot a better percentage from the field than the free throw line (49 to 48 percent).

That shouldn't come as a surprise.

College basketball has erupted into a smack-talking and belligerent cavalcade of noise. The Rutgers crowd seemed as loud and lusty as the Cameron Crazies (Duke), Rick’s Rowdies (Mississippi State), the Izzone (Michigan State) and the MarylandTwerps.

There is enough venom in some of these arenas to require a moat.

Pressure is part of sports, but if you want reasons why so many free throws roll off the rim or bounce away, the ratcheted up intensity is a wicked reason, not an alibi.

Coaches knock on the doors of fraternities and sororities and beg students to come to games and bring their longest, loudest, shrillest voices. The coaches ask the students not to cross a line, but kids, being kids, usually erupt into a frenzy.

Coaches know this, too.

Before the Maryland-North Carolina State game last week, Terps coach Gary Williams took grabbed the public address system microphone and said, “We can’t have obscene chants, we can’t have obscene shirts at games. We’re too good for that.

“It only hurts us with the officials and how we’re perceived throughout the country. It’s got to stop.”

It’s all for the home-court advantage and a chance to make the other team’s 19-year cry for help on the foul line.

Nine teams in the 13-team Big East make fewer than 70 percent of their free throw attempts. In the SEC, 7 of 12 are below 70 percent. In the Big 12, 8 of 12 are below 70 percent.

Now look around your local community. You’ll find high school teams that shoot 70 percent from the free throw line.

Does it mean high school players are better free throw shooters? Of course not.

It’s the environment.

“Environments can be a huge factor in free throw shooting,” Mississippi State coach Rick Stansbury said. “You talk about going late in games when these arenas start to vibrate from all the noise of the home court. It’s always stressful and intimidating.

“That’s the biggest thing about free throw shooting. It so much mental. All that noise is mental. It’s not doing anything physical ... it’s working on your mind.”

That intensity is why you have to admire someone like Michigan State’s Paul Davis. On the line at Minnesota this week he hit two free throws with 5.2 seconds remaining for a 79-78 win for the Spartans.

Al Behrman / AP file Kansas guard Aaron Miles puts up a free throw during practice for the Final Four. Miles is a decent free throw shooter, despite playing in noisy Big 12 arenas in usually in front of a national audience — something that's tougher to do than just about anything else in college basketball, writes NBCSports.com's Ray Glier.

Coaches do not condone tasteless jeering from their fans — Duke’s Mike Kryzewski scolded his fans when they berated former St. John’s coach Mike Jarvis.

But coaches do light a fuse so they can get a politely frenzied atmosphere.

“My first few years, my number one objective was to get the students involved,” Stansbury said. “The rest of our arena has fed off our Rick’s Rowdies … the atmosphere has changed over the years. No longer is it just a basketball game. It’s entertainment. We developed one of the more difficult home-court advantages right now.”

Stansbury is not asking Mississippi State students to be ruthless or unsportsmanlike. He is trying to get the same home court advantage for his players that they face on the road.

Georgia Tech coach Paul Hewitt, whose team has revived the atmosphere at Alexander Memorial Coliseum that was present under former coach Bobby Cremins, said he spoke recently with NBA scouting guru Marty Blake about the combative tone in the game. Blake told Hewitt college basketball games are much more intense these days then they were 10 years ago.

“I asked Marty if he thought kids played harder these days and he said ‘Yeah, because of TV and the coverage; it makes every game a brawl,’” Hewitt said.

The intensity on the floor fuels the intensity in the stands. An opposing player can get hung with a bull’s-eye and the fans, particularly the student sections who have been deliberately placed close to the floor, can get ruthless.

But the loud arena is not an alibi for kids who do not work on free throw shooting or the mid-range game.

Just go to a college practice. Coaches know what is important; they are incredibly savvy about the game. They know the talent level is so close among teams that free throws win or lose a game.

Teams practice free throws and form constantly. Thirty minutes after a game, a coach can tell you exactly why a player missed a free throw. It’s something you could never see from your seat, much less television. But the coach has it picked out immediately.

Georgia Tech’s Hewitt, however, said there is “an element of truth” to the argument that the three-point shot has hurt free throw shooting. The mid-range game, that area near the free throw line, has suffered with so many threes because that’s what kids practice.

What do the kids say? Most simply shrug and say the noise and intensity is part of the game — and they love it.

But when they miss, they can’t love the groans from the home crowd or the derision from the road crowd.

“Some people tend to get tighter, some tend to get better,” said Pittsburgh coach Jamie Dixon, whose team shoots just 62 percent from the line, but seems to make every crucial free throw in close games. “Crowds can have an affect on the road, but kids have to try and stay with their same form.”

So yeah, it's tough to make free throws in a college game, but look at the trend of free throw shooting percentage in college basketball.

It’s creeping up.

In 1994, free throw percentage in Division I hit a 33-year low of 67.1. It stayed in the 67 percent range for the next five years.

But in 2002, free throw percentage in Division I was 69 percent. In 2003, it was 69.4.

The NCAA mid-season report released this week shows the free throw percentage at 69.4 percent for all 326 Division I schools.

But now look at the free throw percentage among the schools in the Big East, which I think is the best Division I league. They hit 67 percent from the line, below the national average. SEC teams shoot 68 percent from the line, still not the national average.

It stands to reason, then, that free throws in the big conferences, in the bigger arenas with more bedlam, are tougher to make, especially late in games. That’s not a surprise.

College coaches and their administrators have achieved their goal. They have created a home court advantage for their squad. Some of these advantages are borderline unsportsmanlike.

Which isn't good for the game, so let's offer a solution.

It’s time to move the students back off the floor. Let’s see how loud they can yell from 20 rows up. Get the pom poms out from behind the basket. A Division I commissioner told me coaches are doing too much to ratchet up the pressure and that it needs to stop.

I’m all for competition — it’s part of life. But do schools have to work so hard to apply so much pressure to the opposing player?

I don’t think so.

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