Before every athletic event at Ohio University, or any Mid-American Conference school for that matter, fans hear this:
The Mid-American Conference and Ohio University promote good sportsmanship by our student-athletes
coaches and fans. We request your cooperation by supporting the participants and officials in a positive manner.
It continues on to specifically prohibit profanity, slurs and other similar behavior.
Basically it is to remind people that sportsmanship is an expectation at any event said Derek Scott, Ohio assistant athletic director for external affairs.
To remind people is the main tool for curbing misbehavior among sports fans at Ohio. Outright censorship is a last resort, not only because an athletic department's removal of a fan for profanity is constitutionally questionable, but also because, in the end, a little bit of heckling is not all bad.
It's that fine line
Scott said. You want a great home-field advantage
but you don't want to be treated poorly on the road
so you have to try and remember that when you're at home in how you treat the opposition.
Ohio, however, has not had the pressure of national media attention for its student behavior at games. Last winter, University of Maryland students were heard on ESPN chanting vulgarities at Duke basketball guard J.J. Redick. They also wore shirts that read Fuck Duke when the Atlantic Coast Conference basketball rival visited.
The incident predicated a temporary buzz on first amendment issues at sporting events. The line to be drawn is not clear, but Howard Wasserman, assistant professor of law at Florida International University, recommended colleges err on the side of being proactive in an essay written for the online First Amendment Center (http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org).
A state university may not formally punish -even via non-criminal sanction such as removal from the arena -those students who depart generally accepted norms
he wrote.
In response to its student fans' behavior, Maryland officials turned to proactive efforts such as suggested cheers and shirt exchanges for fans wearing shirts bearing inappropriate comments.
Ohio takes a similar approach with its student fan section, the O Zone, Scott said.
Bird Arena assistant director Marcus Marazon said the same about Ohio Hockey.
One effort Maryland made, however, has not been made here. In September, a sportsmanship committee at Maryland recommended the song Rock and Roll
Part II no longer be played at athletic events.
Ohio hockey fans are likely more familiar with the song, simply known as the Hey! song, as it is played after every goal scored by the Bobcats. The song has no lyrics, but fans far and wide know a chant with a couple mild vulgarities to go along with it.
It was enough for Maryland to shy away from the song, but Marazon said he does not receive complaints about fan behavior at games at Bird Arena.
A rowdy crowd is generally known as part of the hockey atmosphere, but Marazon said the line is drawn at personal attacks.
We don't mind any cheering here
as long as it does not single out someone based on sexual orientation
gender
race
