Students fleeing
- Thread starter bac2therac
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If you listen to this board rutgers football isn't about the students, it's about a bunch of fifty something's coming to games and complaining about every thing
Students came to game, left when they knew it was over.
Whiners gonna whine and starting a thread like this shows just that.
Next home game complaint thread will be about the students that don't show up for the game.
Gives on a purpose in life to some RU fans, find something to whine about and:
Whiners gonna whine and starting a thread like this shows just that.
Next home game complaint thread will be about the students that don't show up for the game.
Gives on a purpose in life to some RU fans, find something to whine about and:
Don't think The corners of the end zone are part of the student section. Student section was great at kickoff and 1Q. Icant blame the students for leaving early. There was not much to watch. Flood conceded the game in the3rd Q with the play calling on offense. If he showed some fight, more fans wouldve shown some too.
Back I love your posts but you are in total denial. Those sections were full by the 2nd quarter and have been filled for sold out games before. I never said the school needs to support underage drinking but sicking the cops on most student tailgates to subtly force them out of the grass lots and onto their front lawns on CA campus was a horrible idea that you could see a mile away. The people who were pounding their chest last year and this year about it need to own it. Destroyed a darn good student section.
To be fair, I don't think Flood conceded the game. I think he thought....rightly....that running the ball was our best chance to score or move the ball at all.
If we were 6-0 and ranked the place would have been packed 30 minutes before kickoff like Louisville in '06. We're 3-3 so only people like most of us on this board will be in early and stay late. If you expected anything else you're either stupid or naive, or both. Only winning will cure this.
we are not losing fans. If the team wins students will come back as alums..I guarantee it.
Students came to game, left when they knew it was over.
Whiners gonna whine and starting a thread like this shows just that.
Next home game complaint thread will be about the students that don't show up for the game.
Gives on a purpose in life to some RU fans, find something to whine about and:
I didn't start this thread to whine. I am not complaining about the students actually. I thought they did a great job. I started the thread as an observation when I was at the game. The amount that got up and left all at the same time was striking to me considering how many were there and how little were left.
Sections 132 thru 143 (the entire south end zone except for one section each in the northwest/southwest corner) are all part of the student section. Section 131 is for young alumni, and I think 144 is for general sales and/or visitors?
The center six sections or so usually fill up with students by kickoff. But the rest take a quarter or so to fill up, if at all. It's not about sponsoring underage drinking. It's about using the middlesex county sheriffs to drive around the lots and badger every single young-looking tailgater (of age or not) for ID and choice of drink. It is a giant and continuing F.U. To the students and young alumni, who are the future of Rutgers football fan base. Instead, many now pregame on College Avenue in houses and dorms, then come late or not make it to the game.
The atmosphere in both the lots and stadium has suffered as a result. This will become more apparent when we are not playing top-5 teams in 8 p.m. games. Also, the argument about winning teams attracting fans despite it all doesn't hold water when the team IS NOT WINNING. If people want to be selfish because their own tailgates are unharrassed, then fine, but don't complain when the former happens.
There are solutions to this, many of which have been proposed.
the students who love football and want to support the team are there. Those interested in partying are the ones who sit in the corners and are the fringe fans. If you want to be there, you are. If not then they are more interested in drinking than going to the game. The same dynamic existed before and existed back in the 90s.
I don't care if we're 3-3. The students should be able to arrive on time for the #1 and #4 ranked teams.
That's a loser mentality excuse.
No ones saying they haven't been there. What we're saying is they've been arriving late.
so what, they arrive late. Does it matter. Did it matter last night. If the product on the field was better, the student section would be cheering right until the end. They did it vs Michigan, Penn State and Michigan State. They wont do it when the product is mediocre. I agree that they will not be in there in big numbers for Nebby and Maryland but they will not be the only ones, attendance will be down big time for those two games if RU is 3-6
To be fair, if we were allowed to put a 6-pack into that sling, the stadium could be packed 30 minutes prior to kickoff!Oh my God, you lazy ass millennial! lol
The administration proposes carrying the students in these to get them into the stadium, one by one.
If we want to act like the big boys then it does matter. I was at the PSU game this year and 99% of the students were in the stands before kickoff.
I'm skeptical of the claim that last year's complaints about raves which pushed students out of the blue lot is the reason that students are late to the game. The student section holds 10,000 students. There is no way that 10,000 (or even 2000) students were tailgating in the blue lot last year. There just wasn't room for them. Even with a very high-side assumption that there were 10 raves with 100 students each (in the 10 foot by 10 foot space behind a pickup) that is only 1000 students. The other 9000 students were somewhere else pregame last year.
The issue is not just concentrated in the Blue Lot; tailgating students and young alumni are scattered among the Yellow, Black, Purple, and even Scarlet Lots. Sure the majority of fraternity and 'rockstar' tailgate parties used to be in the Blue Lot, but you're discounting those at smaller individual tailgates throughout the Busch Campus lots. As has been described before, groups as of as little as two to five younger-looking people with Solo cups in hand but otherwise minding their own business and not disturbing their neighbors in any way are repeatedly approached, asked for ID, and not only ticketed but very public shamed if found to be underage.
Rutgers' policy of using police to crack down on even perceived underage drinking (which several posters have admitted to being the case), has driven the vast majority of current students and even a sizable portion of 'legal' young alumni who got tired of unnecessary harassment from the lots entirely, which amounts to several thousands of people. In my opinion, the number is roughly commensurate with the portion of th south end zone showing up late for big games, or absent for the more meaningless ones.
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For whatever reason they decided to give students about 5 rows behind the band forcing the band to squish down. But, the corners of the student section were not filled at any point for either OSU or MSU. That change was a bad one.
I haven't seen any of the crackdown on underage drinking, but I can certainly understand how that could have a chilling effect on student turnout.
But the theme of comments in this thread is that the people who complained last year are to blame for the poor student turnout. From what I remember, no one complained about underage drinking. They complained about 100 people raves trying to fit in the space behind one or two trucks and spilling over to neighboring tailgates in the Blue Lot. And those complaints, and the subsequent crackdown on stopping raves before they start certainly did not affect student attendance at kickoff. Those raves only contained about 1000 students at most and the raves didn't end prior to kickoff so the ravers could get into the stadium (assuming they were still sober enough to walk to the stadium).
No one last year complained about individual tailgates with 5 or 10 underage students behind a car.
If your contention is that the crackdown on raves is what lead to the crackdown on underage drinking in all tailgates, then don't blame the people who complained about the raves; blame the people who threw the raves.
The PSU students also were all tailgating at their dorms and fraternities which are a 30 minute walk away. They didn't seem to have a problem with it.
Of course not, but a lot of them were on Busch campus. The year prior they had them all roped off in a section by the Green lot, which was an abysmal failure. I have been repeating this like a broken record but you cannot force someone to go where they don't want to go. The school kept trying to create these designated tailgate areas that failed. Finally, the students just started staying home on College Ave last year after Michigan. It's the same thing this year. In the past, the late arriving students who realized the game had started had to walk 10-15 minutes to the stadium from the various Busch campus lots. Now those kids have to travel 40 minutes from CA to the stadium, some say screw it and stay home. It's only going to get worse. I have had this argument with the same people for 1.5 years, making the same prediction every time I post and it's come true. But as long as their tailgate setup wasn't affected, they didn't seem to care, or want to notice that our student section was getting shaved down every game. Wait until Nebraska. Can't wait to see the "silver out" in the student section.
I see it before every game; all you have to do is walk around the lots and watch who the police actually approach and tickets are given out to. At this point I have first-hand accounts from fellow young alumni and student friends about experiencing police harassment during tailgates, and been told by them that it's the exact reason why most are staying away from the lots and game attendance has been spottier.
I personally don't really care about who is to blame for the sequence of events leading up to the overall crackdown, but rather am pointing out that it's having negative effects on on the tailgating atmosphere, game attendance for students/young alumni, and as a result overall fandom. On top of that, thru October we haven't had a home game where the weather was anything worse than a tad chilly and played two top-5 teams, so those cannot be used as excuses for late-arriving students and a less-than full southend zones.
I care most of all about solving this problem. The 'raves' got themselves kicked out of the Blue Lot after several seasons of great parties (some of which I personally partook in) due to drunken participants idiotically stealing, fighting, pissing where they are not supposed to, and disturbing neighboring tailgates after unrealistically buying only 1 or 2 parking passes. However, that is no justification for systematically harassing a given age group out of the lots. How about we either give them a realistic designated area to pay for and set up their own parties, or have the police calm down and be limited to removing disruptive individuals/tailgates from the lots. I make it a point to exercise personal responsibility and be courteous to others, unless given a very good reason not to be, and have faith that many other people are capable of doing the same.
I believe the student section WAS filled. It is just that they
don't sit in their seats. They stand in the back where the
concession stands are.
don't sit in their seats. They stand in the back where the
concession stands are.
The students pack into the 2 middle sections which are always over the designed capacity. They pack almost 8,000 students into those two sections. When the corners are full, the section is holding way more than 10,000. The students are not the problem. They stand the entire time and cheer loud for the team. If anything the problem is the season ticket holders who sold their tickets so that OSU could bring 10,000 fans. The other problem is the lame geezers who get mad when you stand up and who also don't participate in any of the cheers. This is part of the reason why I go sit in the student section half of the time because at least they participate in the cheers and show some energy.
I agree with that. Eliminating raves does not require a harsh crackdown on underage drinking. And, yes, underage drinking is illegal, but I don't think it requires the crackdown that is reported here. There is underage drinking in dorms, frats, and college apartments, but that doesn't mean the cops walk door-to-door to crackdown there. Same think with tailgating. As long as the college kids are discreet and under control, it is one of those things where you look the other way. Unfortunately, last year the raves were neither discreet nor under control, which may have prompted the crackdown. Hopefully a year of eliminating the rave culture may allow Rutgers to swing the pendulum toward the center, and ease up on the crackdown.
As far as setting up an area for students, I thought they tried that in front of Weblin and the students didn't go. It seems that the groups that want to host tailgates want to be in the regular tailgate lots. Which should be ok, as long as they aren't throwing raves. But also realize that unless they are ponying up the thousands of dollars it takes to get into the Blue Lot, they'll end up in Light Blue.
1. Everyone squeezes in the middle section.
2. Blue lot has nothing to do with student turn out.
3. Move the band to the corner of the student section.
4. Turnout for the last few games was fine. Complain about the coach sucking not the students who continue to show up and support a team who they know is led by a head coach in over his head.
2. Blue lot has nothing to do with student turn out.
3. Move the band to the corner of the student section.
4. Turnout for the last few games was fine. Complain about the coach sucking not the students who continue to show up and support a team who they know is led by a head coach in over his head.
I can agree with your first paragraph in its entirety, assuming that will be the case going forward next season.
The designated student area by Werblin was destined to fail because it was mandated "dry", and if already harassed in the middle of busy lots imagine what sitting ducks students with drinks would be in an isolated yet wide open area like that for police.
The "Hamsterdam" section that was used two years ago was a better concept in letting the students do their thing and policing the perimeter, but that failed because it was in a poorly chosen location (if I remember correctly northwest of the Green Lot) where visiting fans parked at the Greek church were walking through a sh*tshow and basically adjacent to several private backyards whose owners rightfully complained.
I personally think that the now roped-off triangle in the northwest corner of the Blue Lot (where nobody has been allowed to park anyway) would be an ideal location. With maybe a temporary physical barrier between the area and adjacent donating parkers, it would be just isolated enough, yet equally walkable to the stadium. Rutgers should charge market-rate prices for frats and/or other student organizations to set themselves up in that area every game, which will pay for the necessary port-o-potties, emergency services, etc,
This. If we were undefeated and ranked, we would have more support, of course, and nobody would be talking about the students.
I get that some believe this so called driving the underage drinking off the lots has hurt attendance. I don't buy that. It may make it a little more inconvenient to get to the game, but those who want to be there will.
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The buses from Brower were a disaster Saturday night. Some system to keep order & the flow of people & buses more organized (like the fences over at Johnson Park) will be needed in the future. The "line" devolved into a huge crush of people just approaching the one entry point from all directions with 2 bus company supervisors unable to control the crowds. Caused big delays.
Did it take anyone else 20 minutes to get inside the stadium? We got in the line near the Audi club entrance a half hour before kickoff and it was a zoo. Cops just inside the gate pulling random people off to the side for "inspections." Very slow moving otherwise. A half-dozen ticket readers for a sell-out crowd.
I'm sure some still would, but if this was done correctly then police would only be intervening and ticketing idiots for fighting, public urination, and/or making a nuisance of themselves as needed. If the crackdown/ticket dollars generated for the P.D. are deemed important enough for the cops to continue indiscriminately asking everyone for ID, then my idea is a non-starter and most students/new alumni will continue to stay away from the lots, with game attendance/atmosphere suffering as a result.
At the game it seemed like those watching at home left too early.
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