By Michael Kennedy
It’s 2012, and students are camped out to get the best tickets to the University of Louisville versus University of Kentucky basketball game. But the game isn’t being played at Rupp Arena; it’s at Louisville’s downtown arena. If the Student Government Association has its way, this could become a reality.
SGA President O.J. Oleka has made this the goal, hoping for U of L to add student festival seating—a general admission area without seats—to its basketball games. Scott Ruhlig, SGA’s student athletic director, would like to see it for next season. While the details are still unclear, the section could be similar to the eRUPPtion Zone at UK or it could encompass the entire student section.
Kevin Miller, executive senior associate athletic director for U of L, said a state statute has been in place since the 1980s, regulating festival seating after 11 people died in a stampede at a Cincinnati concert. Miller said he had heard that the statute has been “loosed up a little bit,” but that he’s still unsure about the restriction on festival seating at the new arena. The arena is owned by the Commonwealth of Kentucky and is managed by the Kentucky State Fair Board.
“Even if that [statute] does change, we’ve got to make the decision,” said Miller. “How do we want to set up the seating at the new arena?” He said the athletic department will meet with SGA to discuss how to set up the student section.
Harold Workman, president and CEO of the Kentucky State Fair Board, said festival seating could be implemented at the new arena. But he could not comment specifically on U of L’s situation since he was not aware of U of L’s plans.
“It can be done, because there are festival seating at other venues, even in Kentucky,” Workman said. “Obviously we know what the laws are on that, and the laws don’t outlaw festival seating, but they put a variety of restrictions on it.”
This would not be the first time U of L had experimented with general admission student seating. Miller said U of L tried it for one season a few years ago, but the response was mixed. He said U of L had 1,000 general admission tickets in the front of the student section, with student season ticket holders behind those.
“We tried this on a first-come, first-serve basis several years ago and it did not work…” Miller said. “We have tried this in the past few years, within the guidelines of the state. What happened was…the students that wanted festival seating did not come to the games. They only came to the games that were high-profile games. But when they came to play a non-conference game in December, they didn’t show up.”
Miller said there was one Big East game where 700 of the 1,000 general admission tickets were not sold. This looked particularly bad on television, he explained, since the seats were so close to the floor.
“I have plenty of faith in the fact that U of L students care about their sports,” said Ruhlig. “But there are definitely concerns.”
He acknowledges that student turnout was low at some games this season, but he said he thinks the new arena and new recruits will help student turnout in the near future.
“I don’t worry about it for the first year at the new arena, because the new arena will just fill the seats—people wanting to check it out, take in the atmosphere…” said Ruhlig.
“Students obviously want to see a good product on the court, but I think just from a student spirit perspective, I think that students do have it in them…and I think [festival seating] is something that will help them release it.”
Adding a standing-only area could increase the capacity of the arena. The student section at the new arena will contain 2,300 seats for students and all these seats will be behind one goal. At Rupp Arena, in order to make the eRUPPtion Zone, officials removed 482 permanent seats and put in standing room for 675 students and 75 band members.
“From day one, students loved it,” said Carl Hall, director of arena management for Rupp Arena. He said the only people who had negative feelings about the move were the 482 fans with permanent seats in the area. Their seats had to be relocated to make room for the eRUPPtion Zone.
Ruhlig said he didn’t know if he wanted to make all or part of the student section festival seating.
Miller agreed, saying it would take the cooperation of several groups to come to a conclusion on the matter.
“What we have to do is go in and evaluate as a department, bring the SGA leaders in, explain what we’ve been through, and then make a decision,” said Miller.
As SGA, the athletic department and the Kentucky State Fair Board discuss festival seating at the new arena, there will be plenty to talk about. How big will the section be? Will it meet Kentucky’s legal requirements? And will students actually use the festival seating?
“Obviously there are some sorts of unanswered questions, like ‘How does this impact tailgating?’ – which I think are good questions which we’ll have to answer,” said Oleka. “But I think it’s a good idea. I think it’s at least good to look into, to see what we could do to increase fandom here. Anything that could do that, I think we should at least look into.”
