It’s been a tough week for college basketball, as two separate incidents highlight the bad behavior of players and fans alike. Marcus Smart of Oklahoma State University pushed a Texas Tech “superfan” at the end of a hotly-contested game in Lubbock, and two University of Oregon staff members (an assistant basketball coach and a trainer) were spit on by an Arizona State University student at a basketball game in Tempe.
The silver lining is that no tragic consequences occurred in either situation. The fan Smart pushed did not fall and hit his head and suffer serious brain damage. The other fans did not jump Smart and cause a riot. The men who were spit on by the student (who has had his season ticket privileges revoked by ASU) did not charge into the crowd after the student. Remember the terrible events at the “Malice at the Palace?” That didn’t happen at either site, but it could have.
Of course, concerns about crowd control are nothing new in college basketball. As in anything else in life, the challenge is not so much identifying the problem as it lies in fixing the problem. I think reasonable-minded people would conclude that no matter what the Texas Tech fan yelled at Smart, there could be no justification for Smart’s physical response. We can all speculate at what drives a middle-aged man with a responsible job to feel the need to insult a young man who is performing for the fan’s entertainment, but sport provokes intense emotions and at times those emotions result in behavior we’re not proud of. It’s the flip side of what Nelson Mandela often talked about regarding sports, namely, the ability of sports to enrich us as people.
The Texas Tech fan has acknowledged calling Smart, “a piece of crap” as the two men were within a few feet of each other. It’s easy for us to say Smart should have simply ignored it, but not so easy to do in the final seconds of another loss for an OSU team whose season is spiraling away from preseason talk of potential Final Four capability. Nonetheless, there can be no excuse for Smart’s conduct.
Just how much freedom does the purchase of a ticket buy a fan? Does the ticket allow a fan to say whatever he wants to whomever he wants, even if his words make those around him uncomfortable? What is fair comment and criticism these days when every player’s personal life is easily explored online? What I might consider witty you might find seriously offensive, or vice-versa. What expectations should players and fans reasonably have regarding the decorum (or lack thereof) surrounding the event?
The worst situation I was ever involved with as commissioner of the West Coast Conference involved a fan at a women’s basketball conference tournament game many years ago. His actions were clearly inappropriate and a coworker and I asked him to please calm down. He then replied that he had a gun in his car and would shoot us if we persisted in annoying him. We contacted the local police who escorted the fan out, and I never learned if in fact the fan had a gun. By the way, kudos to the West Coast Conference, which has implemented a number of strong sportsmanship initiatives in the last few years.
Basketball is especially challenging for game managers because of the proximity of fans to participants. In addition, college basketball unfortunately sometimes involves the aspect of alcohol consumption by students prior to the contest, making for a potentially combustible mixture of youth, emotion and intoxication. Not a good combination in terms of reducing possible conflict, but an unfortunate reality that adds to the challenge of game managers nationally.
It’s easy to second-guess Texas Tech, given that hindsight makes us all smarter. I’ve read that the fan pushed by Smart has a history of volatile conduct, so one wonders if perhaps the institution should have had him sit further from the court. The bigger question, of course, is whether we’ve simply crossed the line collectively into a zone where lack of civility becomes the accepted norm. My fear is that the more that bad behavior is on display (and it will be on display given the constant presence of television and phone cameras resulting in more online content) the more that young folks will see that bad behavior and model that behavior. Maybe the next fan pushed by a player will respond with force and, God forbid, a concealed weapon.
Maybe we should simply expect and accept that the passion we love about sports will occasionally manifest itself in bad behavior, and trust that the common sense and decency of the majority of fans will carry us through these occasional moments of craziness.
Thoughts? Please contact me at mgilleran@scu.edu. Thanks.