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Effective for Saturday’s football game against Ohio State, University of Wisconsin students will be assigned a seat and given a ticket just as they were in 2007, officials said Tuesday.

This will end the wristband system announced last spring, which was used in the Aug. 30 game against Akron and the Sept. 6 game against Marshall.

Problems arose in each of those games that Senior Associate Athletic Director Vince Sweeney said he didn’t want to see repeated this weekend or against Penn State on Oct. 11. “With two night games upon us, it really wasn’t the time to dig our heels in,” Sweeney said. “We’re ready, willing and able to call an audible, and that’s kind of what we’re doing here.”

In the Akron game, Sweeney explained that most rows were under-filled — some rows, supposed to hold 40 people, were holding as few as 32.

It did not create a problem since roughly 1,800 student ticket holders did not show up, but the Athletic Department was concerned it could be a problem in the future.

To counteract that concern, police and Per Mar staff were more direct about where patrons needed to sit, slowing the seating process.

This created a backup in the concourse and then outside the stadium.

“We had people waiting 20 minutes that were there on time; they did everything we asked them to do,” Sweeney said. “And they were very frustrated, rightfully so.”

Sweeney said the wristband system could have worked, but it didn’t seem worth risking another problem.

“I think if we had stuck with it, people would have understood the process a bit better, both students and staff,” Sweeney said. “But we’re ready, willing and able to do this. And there was a lot of feedback that said ‘Why can’t we just go back to what it was?'”

UW junior Logan Hulick, the representative to the Athletic Board for the Associated Students of Madison, said alternatives were looked into, but the old system has “been proven so far to be the best way.”

“We thought about leaving wristbands and increasing the number of Per Mar and getting them to regulate it more,” Hulick said. “But I think leaving more up to Per Mar was a bad idea. It’s hard for them to control everything.”

Staff will attempt to make sure that all portals at the student section entrance will be open at all times, something that was a problem in the Marshall game.

Sweeney said signage outside the stadium will be improved as well. If Section O is more than half full and Section P is less than half full, new signs will signal this to students.

“We think we can kind of try and deal with some of that migration from one section to another if we try and provide a bit more information as they’re trying to decide what chute to enter,” Sweeney said.

Both Hulick and Sweeney said the system will be looked at again in the future.

“We’d love to have a system that everybody’s happy with, where there are no complaints,” Sweeney said. “But we’ve yet to find that system.”

Gates will still open 90 minutes prior to kickoff. Sweeney stressed students should arrive early if they want to see kickoff and support the team in an important game.

“If everybody arrives 10 minutes before kickoff by the thousands, then they can expect a slight delay, just like any other gate around the facility,” Sweeney said.

Kickoff for both the Ohio State and Penn State games is 7 p.m.