While UW-Madison fans were met with a quiet and respectful student section at Saturday's football game at Northwestern, UW-Madison Chancellor John Wiley cited concerns about unruly fan behavior at Camp Randall.
Dismissing the often vulgar chants that permeate the stadium, he said he is more concerned about treatment of visitors.
\It's not the chanting during the game. It's other kinds of very disrespectful, abusive, sometimes violent, extremely nasty behavior towards the visiting team,"" Wiley said. ""It's the antithesis of sportsmanship. It's the antithesis of what a football game is supposed to be about.""
Wiley said he received numerous letters of complaints in regard to behavior at the Ohio State game Oct. 11, including one from a father who, along with his seven-year-old son, had a trash can and beer bottle thrown at him.
Wiley said such student actions also strain alumni relations. Sitting in the UW Foundation box during football games, Wiley stated many donors have turned to him in disbelief of fan behavior.
""It isn't helping at all in raising that scholarship money,"" he said.
In response to growing concerns of fan behavior at intercollegiate football and basketball games during the previous season, the Big Ten Conference released a set of initiatives at the beginning of 2003-'04 athletic season to ensure safety and security for visiting teams, fans and officials.
""The Big Ten Conference is taking a very serious step forward to monitor crowd control and fan behavior in and around our venues,"" Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany said in a press release. ""In some cases, unruly behavior has overshadowed the games and, at times, threatened the welfare of student athletes, coaches, officials and fans.""
Potentially, home teams could be charged with a penalty for an overly loud or obnoxious crowd. However, that would only be implemented in extreme cases and made by game management at each school, said Big Ten spokesman Scott Chipman.
Such drastic measures have yet to take place at UW-Madison, according to Assistant Athletic Director for Communication Steve Malchow. Yet Malchow said it is often hard to distinguish the difference between creating an intimidating atmosphere and one filled with animosity.
""We definitely want the crowd to be an intimidating factor in the game, but you don't want to cross that line and it's very hard to determine where that line is,"" Malchow said.
""I think we need a culture change in terms of fan behavior,"" Wiley said.
