Rutgers & the death of sportsmanship

[tgo]

www.parentstv.org/PTC/publications/lbbcolumns/2007/0921.asp

THE DEATH OF SPORTSMANSHIP

By L. Brent Bozell III

Rutgers University is known as the birthplace of college football, but in the last few weeks it’s seemed more like the deathplace of sportsmanship. On September 7, Rutgers hosted Navy’s football team. What respect was shown in the wake of the Midshipmen’s forthcoming service to the country and the approaching September 11 anniversary? The rowdy student fans of Rutgers hurled obscenities at Navy, thoroughly embarrassing their college and their town.

Rutgers won the game, but lost any sense of honor and decency. Navy was booed and peppered with "You suck!" chants when they stepped on the field to start both halves. When Navy kick returner Reggie Campbell came up limping after a tackle, students chanted, "You got f--ed up! You got f--ed up! You got f-ed-up!" Toward the end of the second half, Rutgers students in began to serenade an adjacent section of Navy fans and uniformed Midshipmen: "‘F-- you, Navy! F--you, Navy! F-- you, Navy!’"

...

The only defense of Rutgers – and this really is no defense at all – is that their vile behavior was certainly not unprecedented. A few years ago, the University of Maryland’s basketball fans caused trouble for ESPN by chanting "F-you" at Duke guard J.J. Redick. As Mark DiIonno, who broke the story of the Rutgers student misbehavior in the New Jersey Star-Ledger, lamented, "Booing, cursing, chanting obscenities, unfortunately, are now part of the game day experience. It's easily been three decades since fans across the country in all sports began spending more time and creative energy jeering the visitors and officials than cheering the home team."

[RDF]

Are they sure Imus visit with Rutgers was limited to the women's basketball team?

Will Martina Luther Stringer give another dissertation to the media that outlasted Martin Luther King's "I have a Dream" speech to their own students?

This is why I hate when schools get on a soapbox about things--look at the behavior of their students and don't cast stones when you live in glass houses.

[theexorcist]

Drunk Georgetown students have done the same thing to other schools. It wasn't really service academy specific. The same drunkards would have done it had they been playing UConn.

Cursing goes in on college sports, especially in big football stadiums where people come to booze.

When Steve Kerr was in college and playing for Arizona, some ASU students chanted "P-L-O" to reference the assassination of his father, who was president of the American University in Beirut. Sportsmanship died then.

[The Stig]

Georgetown students do go a bit overboard sometimes, but I think there's a different standard when you're playing a service academy.

A couple years ago Hoya Blue took a roadtrip to Navy (we had something like 5 buses). We certainly made our presence known and had some good back-and-forth with the Navy student section, but at the same time I think we were pretty respectful of the fact that we were playing Navy, not UConn. As far as I could tell a good time was had by all, and the Navy message boards the next day had good things to say about our behavior.