DESTIN, Fla. — The SEC appears to be moving on from trying to completely stop field and court storming, but it has adjusted its fines and clarified when fans can enter the field of play in an attempt to better manage postgame situations.
Commissioner Greg Sankey said during conference meetings Thursday that the conference will issue a $500,000 fine for all field- or court-storming violations, instead of recent years’ escalating penalties, but that the school will not be subject to a fine if it prevents any fan contact with opposing players and staffers or officials.
Two years ago, worried about the safety hazard of crowds celebrating big wins by rushing fields and courts, the SEC ratcheted up its fines, starting the penalty at $100,000, then increasing to $250,000 for a second offense and $500,000 for the next one. The conference also added a twist: The fine would be paid not to the SEC but to the opposing school, which had been on the losing end of the game and victim of the field/court storm.
The result: Storming continued unabated. Multiple schools incurred enough offenses to owe an opponent $500,000.
But along the way, the SEC hopes it stumbled on a cross-sport solution. This past basketball season, schools not wishing to pay bigger fines devised a system. When a big win seemed near, an announcement was made that fans would be allowed to storm the court 90 seconds after the buzzer, giving the opponent and officials time to get to the locker room. Vanderbilt and Ole Miss, set to owe $500,000 the next time they were fined, were the schools that suggested it mid-season, and the conference signed off.
“In a way the pressure to get it right worked well,” Sankey said Wednesday.
When Georgia basketball was on the verge of upsetting Florida in February, football coach Kirby Smart, who was sitting courtside, worked with athletic director Josh Brooks to tell fans to wait until the Gators had left the court. Then-Texas A&M coach Buzz Williams also took to the microphone to explain the need to wait as the Aggies finished off a big win.
“If we can have that kind of education to let celebrations take place and get teams off the field, I think that would be a really healthy direction,” Sankey said.
So something like the 90-second rule may be applied to football. The question is whether the concept will work in a more spread-out environment. Sankey was clear that the league will make an effort, especially to get the visiting team, cheerleaders and officiating crew off the field.
“Some of the things that happen in football, you’ve got officials on the opposite end of the field trying to swim, climb their way through,” Sankey said. “I’ve watched video all the way through to count the eight (officials) get off and you just lose sight of people. We have to be continually attentive on those matters.”
Arkansas incurred a $250,000 fine after it beat Tennessee last October, and as the crowd swarmed around him, Razorbacks football coach Sam Pittman told ESPN he didn’t care about the fine. Reminded of that moment Wednesday, Pittman sounded a little regretful.
“I was happy after the game, and so I said on the TV I didn’t really care. At the time I probably didn’t,” Pittman said, with a chuckle. “But now that you think about it, the safety part of it is probably going to have to override all of it.”
Several memorable wins last football season led to field storms around the league. Ole Miss was fined twice after its win over Georgia because fans rushed the field when they thought the game was over. (That money went to Georgia.) South Carolina forked over $250,000 to Texas A&M. Oklahoma owed Alabama a $100,000 payment after its November win. Vanderbilt also took a $100,000 hit after its win over Alabama, then another two fines in basketball.
Brooks was on the SEC committee that devised the fines. He pointed out Georgia has yet to be a violator but also seemed to accept that stopping the storms wasn’t realistic.
“I’m not going to pretend we’ve got it all figured out. But hopefully we’re going to keep working with our students to where they know that becomes the new standard,” Brooks said. “Hey, look at the clock and then they get to go on the court. Because ultimately they just want to have that viral moment, go on the court and celebrate or whatever.”
Pittman doesn’t think schools are just disregarding the fans and accepting the crowd storms.
“I don’t think so because the money’s getting so high,” he said. “So I’m all for the safety. If we could just have a time period where the opponents could get out of there, the coaches, opponents’ players, and all that, and then come down there, to me you could have the best of both worlds at that point.”
(Photo: Dale Zanine / Imagn Images)
