Due to the insanity that occurred last weekend as University of Arizona students rioted angrily in the streets after their loss to the Badgers in the Elite Eight game, the Tucson Police Department decided to take action by seeing how other campus police officers handle the post-game action. The TPD sent an officer from its command staff to four cities total: Mansfield, Lexington, Gainesville and Madison. The officer in Madison was able to observe how our campus police handled the action on State Street.
After Wisconsin defeated Arizona last week, angry students flooded the streets at the University of Arizona as their team’s hopes of a NCAA championship were shattered. Rioting students were especially angry about a certain call that went against Arizona in the final 2.3 seconds, giving Wisconsin the ball and a sure spot in the Final Four.
According to the UA newspaper, The Wildcat, the police declared the mass of students, “an unlawful assembly” and set about dispersing the crowd. Numerous sources, including the Associated Press, ESPN and Fox News provided details and eyewitness accounts about that night. However, unlike the calm behavior by our police on State Street, the Arizona police, possibly preparing for the worst, arrived in riot gear and found it necessary to clear the streets, reportedly using pepper spray, pepper canisters and pepper balls. A video of an officer “knocking down a young woman merely walking with friends” has circulated, no doubt causing the TPD untold grief and angering students and citizens. In all fairness, some of the Arizona students threw beer and sparklers at law enforcement personnel creating a more violent and hostile environment than we experienced here. Nobody died, but injuries and arrests happened.
It was a different story in Madison as more than 10,000 Badger fans erupted out of different venues and campus locations and headed to State Street to celebrate the team’s first qualification to the Final Four in 14 years. All of those students and probably a few non-students arrived and not one sign of violence, not one arrest, not one serious injury occurred; only some citations were handed out. University and city police were on hand and visible, but our police chose to handle the situation in a much more peaceful and, compared to TPD, passive manner.
As a student who went to celebrate on State Street, I can honestly say that “amazing” describes the sight I saw. Everywhere you looked there were ecstatic, cheerful students celebrating a victory. I observed police exhibiting concern for student safety as they cleared people off of the overhead construction walkways. When the celebration began to wane, the local authorities used bullhorns and general comments to clear people off of the street and send them home.
And even though the Badgers could not pull out the victory this past Saturday, the sights on State Street that night did not even come close to the scenes in Arizona last weekend. Although students did make the trek to State Street Saturday, and some minor incidents occurred, overall the scene was calm. Even though the masses did not go to celebrate, and anger and disappointment were tangible, the majority did not let those feelings result in violence or anything that would require the police to take action (such as gathering around a burning couch, as the victorious Kentucky fans did following the Elite Eight victory).
I have come to the conclusion that we, Badger students and fans, simply have too much pride to stoop down the levels of fans that treat games more than what they are and let a loss affect our maturity and sanity. Of course, we would have loved to see a championship, but we have made it clear that, as Wisconsin fans, when we win, we do so with class, and like on Saturday, we lose with dignity.
Nolan Beilstein (beilstein
