Maybe it’s just me, but there’s a really uncomfortable aura surrounding our school’s basketball program these days.

Of course, any time a program inks a new coach, there’s going to be a whirlwind of emotions for a bit. I’m not saying Kevin Broadus is not the right man for the gig or even that he’s doing a bad job. Something’s just peculiar.

I’m talking mostly about Monday’s ‘Meet the Coach Night,’ run by the BU Zoo in the Lecture Hall.

The crowd of a few dozen consisted of a handful of Zoo members, four Pipe Dream writers, a few administrators and two players ‘ seniors-to-be Mike Gordon and Richie Forbes. Although the program was entertaining and informative, this eclectic mixture made the situation eerily volatile.

Broadus sat relaxed in the front of the room as some members of the Zoo fed him a steady diet of loaded questions. Each query began the same way: a bit of nervousness, followed by a string of dangling optimism: ‘Coach, this team showed tons of untapped offensive potential last year ‘ or ‘Coach, we have some of the best defenders in the America East ‘

(My personal favorite? ‘Coach, do you plan to use your Final Four appearance as motivation for the team? I mean, the picture of you cutting down the nets is my desktop background right now ‘)

It was obvious that the fans in attendance believe our team is awesome and Broadus made it apparent that, although he recognized and appreciated all their optimism, he hardly agreed with it.

Meanwhile, Gordon and Forbes sat among the fans, absorbing a few good-natured jokes from Broadus about hard work and lateness.

But not everything was in such good fun. As he said in his introductory press conference, Broadus again reminded the crowd that, in light of their optimism, last year’s underperforming team ‘ Gordon and Forbes included ‘ was the reason he was brought in.

Ouch. (Nobody laughed at that one.)

Later, Broadus fielded a question about a particularly murky issue ‘ recruiting. He turned to the administrators sitting to his right: ‘Can I talk about this?’ The coach, in his first head coaching gig, similarly asked permission about scheduling.

When the discussion turned to playing teams like Georgetown and George Washington, both where Broadus has worked as an assistant coach, the awkwardness between realistic coach and hyper-optimistic fans reached levels usually reserved for mid-class sweatpants erections.

Yes, that bad.

Binghamton just hired a Georgetown assistant, but that doesn’t make us Georgetown. Our rabid fan base is accustomed to optimism, but they’re also accustomed to Al Walker. We brought in someone new ‘ and, yes, we’ll probably be better ‘ but we’re still Binghamton. On one hand, the Zoo thinks we’re going to be awesome. But one look at our 2006-07 schedule tells another story.

Broadus, too, is in unfamiliar territory, with this being his first head coaching job. Don’t think the Dave Simeks and John Hartricks of the athletics administration don’t sweat bullets when this man, who has just become THE face of their program, asks their permission to discuss recruiting publicly.

And if you think the fans, the coach and the administrators are confused, imagine for a moment you’re Mike Gordon. A coach plucked you from relative obscurity in Plainfield, N.J. Under him, you’ve grown from an undersized 12th man to (arguably) the best point guard in the conference.

Then, they fired him. (Or, sorry, he ‘stepped aside.’) His replacement says that ‘you are the reason I’m here right now.’ But next year, you’ll be a senior, with the weight of the team on your shoulders.

So they fired my coach because we ‘ I ‘ didn’t win. And I’m the leader now?

Fans bewildered, administrators nervous, first-year coach, a senior point guard without the one man he’s given his everything to since high school ‘ and one Pipe Dream writer who’s just as lost as all of the above.

This is going to be one fun year.