Some thoughts from a long time UCF fan

[Orlando_Man]

First, I will say that my trips to Raymond James weren't all that notable.  We got into a heated discussion in 2007 with a USF fan in the south endzone but it was a clean "discussion."  I wouldn't say our experiences there were any different than any at any other school.  NC State sticks out as being a lot more rude and crude.

That said I have heard lots of second hand accounts of behavior like that described in the media. 

Here is my perspective as a long time UCF fan.  The off-campus venue and alcohol sales.  It seems like when the venue is easily accessible and has lots of available parking for the public that you get more of the non-campus associated crowd showing up.  These are people without ties to the university, they didn't go to school there and they aren't current students, staff or faculty.  These are usually the people causing problems outside. 

Three years ago when we had the cop killed outside of the CB he was breaking up a fight started in the student lot by a non UCF student.  These people are trouble, they are young they drink way too much and they have no regard for the university.  I've seen fewer of them since we have been playing on-campus, although they did seem to show up in greater numbers when we played USF.  You probably have a lot of these cancers showing up now that USF games are a place to be seen.

I'm not sure what the tailgate rules are at USF but you can curb some of this problem by distributing student parking passes on-campus and strictly monitoring these lots to ensure that only students park there.  It's not a perfect fix, but its a start.

The alcohol sales seem to fuel problems inside the stadium.  This one is a definite.  We've seen far fewer arrests and fights at UCF games since we've moved on-campus and eliminated alcohol sales to the general public.  I used to watch people just get annihilated on $5 beer at the CB and fights and people tumbling down the stands were a common sight.  It's a painful measure to implement especially for the majority of people who dont abuse, but eliminating alcohol sales in your general seating areas may help to calm things down a bit inside.

[BULLSHTR]

Nice post. Probably the classiest i've seen from a ucfer. However, i don't agree with your last statement. I think eliminating the sale of alcohol in RJS would only encourage heavier drinking before the game to maintain a buzz. Plus, it will also encourage more people to sneak in a flask of the more potent stuff.

[TheBullies]

Nice post. Probably the classiest i've seen from a ucfer. However, i don't agree with your last statement. I think eliminating the sale of alcohol in RJS would only encourage heavier drinking before the game to maintain a buzz. Plus, it will also encourage more people to sneak in a flask of the more potent stuff.

Plus, I really don't think students -buy- that much in the stadium... they either sneak it in, or are discouraged by the high prices!

[KB]

I appreciate you coming on and giving your advice, but UCF has it's own problems.  If your OCS is better than the OB, then the OB must have been a complete disaster.

Your student mall was a trash can.  Drunk kids everywhere.  Students passed out.  Trash everywhere.   Broken pop up tents.  Broken chairs.  Profanity yelled at us as we walked through.  

And your fans were obnoxious.  Walking in and walking out (after they couldn't buy beer in the game).  Don't think they aren't drinking during the game by sneaking bottles in.  

I understand you are trying to help, but it's not like UCF has figured it out.

I noticed a lot of USF kids partying with UCF kids before the game, which I thought was nice to see.  It looks like our students learned how not to act at a game and carried over to the Kansas game a week later.

Don't take this post as a slam to you and it was a classy post by you, but that's what my friends and I noticed at UCF and we didn't report it to the Tribune or Sentinel.

[BULLSHTR]

I really don't think it's the students who are acting up anyway. Like Orlando Bull said, it most likely is non-USF affiliated fans who don't care about embarassing the university.

[BULLSHTR]

I appreciate you coming on and giving your advice, but UCF has it's own problems.  If your OCS is better than the OB, then the OB must have been a complete disaster.

Your student mall was a trash can.  Drunk kids everywhere.  Students passed out.  Trash everywhere.   Broken pop up tents.  Broken chairs.  Profanity yelled at us as we walked through.  

And your fans were obnoxious.  Walking in and walking out (after they couldn't buy beer in the game).  Don't think they aren't drinking during the game by sneaking bottles in.  

I understand you are trying to help, but it's not like UCF has figured it out.

I noticed a lot of USF kids partying with UCF kids before the game, which I thought was nice to see.  It looks like our students learned how not to act at a game and carried over to the Kansas game a week later.

Don't take this post as a slam to you and it was a classy post by you, but that's what my friends and I noticed at UCF and we didn't report it to the Tribune or Sentinel.

KB... unnecessary roughness. I really enjoyed the UCF gameday environment.

[Orlando_Man]

Nice post. Probably the classiest i've seen from a ucfer. However, i don't agree with your last statement. I think eliminating the sale of alcohol in RJS would only encourage heavier drinking before the game to maintain a buzz. Plus, it will also encourage more people to sneak in a flask of the more potent stuff.

You're right about the flasks coming in.  But, its a numbers game the number of people who bring in flasks is not 5% of the number of people who were buying and drinking alcohol at the CB. 

Trust me, I was worried that a lack of sales would hurt our attendance and it definitely hasn't.

[BullBlood]

So build a tin can on campus and our problems are miraculously solved??  It sounded like things were much worse at the UCF/USF game than they were for kansas.  Limiting parking to students is an interesting idea, but building the campus on-stadium does NOT discourage local fans from showing up.

[Bulls 8_va]

I agree with most of what you are saying, except for the last part.

Sure, if you eliminate alcohol sales in the stadium less people will drink. 

BUT I can guarantee you that people will:

A. Drink more before the games, having the risk of fights go up earlier in the game.

B. More people will sneak in Alcohol. (I've been to many "Dry" stadiums in the SEC and such and would get absolutely SHOWERED with bourbon at games at LSU, and I wasn't even in the Student section!!!)

C. I used to sneak in Vodka - when I was in the band - in water bottles.  Yes, even the band drinks. 

Alcohol will always be present, and you will have to deal with the problems.  However, you get rid of the riff raff, then the problems will go down.  Which is why I like the rest of your post.

Thanks for the info.

GO BULLS!!!

[Velcro]

The advice in the post is sound... thanks for posting O_M.  I don't think that alcohol will be taken away from general seating people, at least not at this point... but should things get worse, it isn't out of the realm of possibilities.  Some people on here just seem to take this whole situation too lightly, and the long term effects could mean dry games and dry tailgating.  (i don't think it will ever get to that...but if it ever were to get bad enough... anything is possible)