Want To See Tyler Hansbrough Play Hoops In A Thong? Me Neither

Jeff Rabjohns has a great piece today on Notre Dame's Ben Hansbrough. Of course, any great story on Ben Hansbrough has to include the influence of older brother Tyler along with a look back at the competitive battles they waged growing up which helped mold both players into the relentless on-court players we see today.

But this time, I think we learned a little too much information. Father, Gene Hansbrough gave up the goods on some details of those backyard battles, including broken dunk hoops, crotch kicks and a general level of violence on the Hansbrough's backyard court. Losing had consequences and stakes became a little, well, too revealing as Dr. Hansbrough explains.

"It was brutal," Gene said. "Sometimes they would have a contest where the loser would have to go in the backyard wearing a thong and shoot a basket.

"The last time that happened, Tyler had to put the thong on. He ran into the backyard, shot the basket and Ben locked the door so Tyler was stuck in the backyard wearing the thong. I thought he was going to rip the door off. It sounded like an elephant was out there."

Oh, boy. I don't happen to have a thong laying around my house, but does everybody else in America? Also, the phrase, "the last time that happened" seems to indicate this was common wager until Ben upped the ante by locking the doors and leaving Tyler, ahem, hung out to dry.

So many questions.

Was the thong bought just for the backyard games? Was the idea influenced by Sisqo's Thong Song back in the day? Did the song play until the loser "paid" his debt? Who took care of the thong? What color was it?

Wait. On second thought, I don't want to know. The mental image pops has provided has been more than enough for me on this topic.