It honestly wasn't that long ago that many of us winced at the idea of the games our kids play inside a casino. Hey, I whined once, too, perhaps not realizing at the time that the gaming floor is mostly awash in the ping-ping-ping of slot machines and not, you know, pole dancing.

We live, we evolve.

Turns out that Mohegan Sun is the greatest blessing ever rendered upon high school sports in Connecticut. The annual state basketball championships get better with each rendition, evidenced this past weekend with record total attendance just south of 22,000.

Throw in the 3,000 fans the Eastern Connecticut Conference championships drew in late February and 25,000 people watched high school basketball at Mohegan Sun within three weeks.

The kids get the thrill of playing inside a professional arena before thousands of fans. The New London girls and Waterford boys combined to play before 12,000 fans alone in their two games. They rocked the place.

The Sun, which does not charge rent for the facility and feeds the kids and coaches, benefits from patrons in all the shops, restaurants and on the gaming floor. Mostly, though, they benefit from being a good neighbor.

Other observations from the weekend:

• A shout out to the arena security staff, whose patience and mettle was tested early Saturday. Student sections from all 18 schools were reminded not to rush the floor and to remain in the stands. Eight of the nine winning schools listened. Turns out the lads and lasses of New Canaan, who do what they want, when they want and how they want, had every intention of ignoring the rule. They left their seats as the Rams were about to win the Division IV boys' title.

They approached the floor behind the basket, close enough that some security personnel had trouble standing their ground with some pushing and shoving around them. It was dangerous and unnecessary. But then, you just don't tell entitlement what to do, apparently.

• Whoever spawned the idea at CIAC to play Unified games at halftime of the championship games should go to the window and collect. Tremendous. Congrats to Waterford coach Colleen Lineburgh, who has been called the "Jim Calhoun of Unified Basketball" once or twice.

• The whole school of choice thing was a more popular conversation topic than ever. Let me just remind everyone of this:

Trinity Catholic (attracts kids from multiple towns and two states) defeated Canton (274 girls from one town in the entire school) for the Class S title. Trinity Catholic also defeated small public schools Thomaston, Gilbert and Housatonic en route to the championship.

If you are unwilling to acknowledge Trinity Catholic's competitive advantage, you aren't part of the problem.

You are the problem.

Let's start here: Rather than engaging in whether schools of choice belong in their own division, how about we begin by banning them from Class S in every sport?

Small public high schools are the most vulnerable against schools of choice. It's more obvious than a roadside billboard.

• Congrats to Eastern Board officials Tom Sullivan, Bill Bono, Kathy Allen, Cheryl Kraft, Tony Nocito, Dave Cruz, Rob Bono and Sergio Lewis. They were this season's designees to call championship games.

Congrats as well to longtime Eastern Board ref Tony Gigliotti who is retiring after this season. The CIAC honored Gigliotti during a ceremony Saturday morning at Mohegan Sun. We'll miss him.

• Best student section: Farmington. Kids were crazy watching their school win its first state boys' title. Utter joy.

• Best student section sign: The kid from Lancer Nation who sported, "If you are reading this, warm up your bus."

• New Britain High band: awesome. Even if the Hurricanes don't make the finals next year, I say we invite the band back ... just because.

• Many thanks to Joel Cookson, Matt Fischer and the gang at CIAC for a very positive media experience. We appreciate stats done for us and timely postgame access to the kids and coaches.

• Best answer to any question posed over the weekend comes from Waterford coach Bill Bassett.

He was asked whether he thinks the CIAC will move Waterford, despite its modest enrollment, to Division I next season.

"I think we can play at our town hall if we have to. My kids will adapt," Bassett said. "If it's Division I next year, we will come out and play. Give me a court and a round ball and we will come out and play. I try to worry about things I can control."

The Lancers, in spite of two straight titles and 41 wins in 42 games, don't belong in Division I. Even now, they're not better than East Catholic or Windsor. They lose six seniors after losing seven last year.

But why do I get the feeling none of that will matter?

This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro