No sports movie is complete without a game-winning touchdown that leads to fans storming the field, but the group celebration is a major point of debate in the real-life college football world.
The Florida faithful is no stranger to this conversation. The general consensus is that Gators fans are above it. No team that’s been to the mountaintop before needs to act like winning is something new, even if players come and go in 3-4 year cycles.
And that rule doesn’t just apply to the gridiron. When UF fans stormed the court in O’Connell Center after a February 2022 win over Auburn from the men’s basketball team, it was the first time it had happened in nearly 35 years.
“It’s just not an act of celebration Florida fans engage in,” Ethan Budowsky wrote for The Independent Florida Alligator.
Traditionalists will be happy to learn then that the SEC is considering rule changes that would heavily penalize teams from storming the field after a win.
Commissioner Greg Sankey appointed a group last November to tackle event safety, according to Sports Illustrated, and they are set to hear proposals for a new policy that would replace the fine structure that no penalizes schools whose fans rush the field.
Some of the proposed policies include forfeiting the game after a field-storming incident or losing a home game from a future schedule as punishment. The former is unlikely to get any serious consideration, but the latter isn’t totally ridiculous.
The threat of playing a rivalry game on the road for three-straight seasons would keep fans off the field, and the goal is to scare off the impulsive types who might be willing to instigate a crowd. The SEC is prioritizing fan safety, even if it appears to be at the cost of fun.
Fans have been seriously maimed and injured while storming the field, and there is no way to keep everyone safe when such chaos ensues.
Whatever changes come to the rules will likely be broken, but a conference administrator told SI that it would take just one incident for the hammer to come down and scare the rest of the fanbases into compliance.
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