Storming the field

What a great day in East Carolina football history. The Pirates nail two top 25 teams in two straight weeks to start a season. That had never been done in Pirate history.

Here it is mid-week and the athletic departments finds themselves trying to figure out what went a muck after the game.

The first hint was the interview with Coach Holtz following the game on ESPN. The lone state trooper assigned to guard coach Holtz could not hold back the throng of eager Pirate fans who had stormed the field and who wanted to be on-camera.

The one of the ESPN experts back in Bristol, Ct. made a comment that went something like "that poor cop didn't have a chance against that mob."

If they only knew that all those poor cops were being over run everywhere on the field.

Regardless of whether it is N.C. State tearing down a goal post or ECU celebrating a major upset, fans are warned during the game that they are not allowed on the field.

I know it is the "college thing" to do to run to mid-court or sprint to the 50-yard line just to say you were there, but once there, what can you do. Get hurt is all!

My only time to try to enjoy Times Square on New Year's Eve, I found myself jammed up against 300,000 people and none of them I knew. We were shoulder-to-shoulder and I think I was the only sober person there.

I thought 'You know, if I fall down I will be trampled to death and nobody will know who I am.'
It was certainly not what I thought it would be.

All that running around - several people were knocked down and scuffles broke out among the security there.

Today, those who were trespassing want to file charges against the security people for doing their job.

I hear that there are pictures of officers using force against several of the rowdies, but, of course, nothing of what they did to incite the officers. Not even that they were trespassing while this was going on.

What has happened to our society? We now punish those during their job while the guilty run free to run on another basketball court or football stadium next month.

If we are not going to let security secure the area, then don't have any next home game - just let them tear up the field.

You know, it got so bad Saturday that Coach Holtz made his players leave and go to the locker room until order was restored and then he let them go back out to sing with the band.

If the home team felt threatened, how do you think the West Virginia players felt?

I guess you have heard of the game in which the University of Washington quarterback ,who scored on the last play of the game, threw the ball straight up in the air about 10 feet and got flagged with a celebration penalty.

The only problem was his touchdown made the score 28-27 and Washington needed the extra point to send the game into overtime.

It became a 27-yard extra point, which it was blocked.

All the expert commentators were furious with the referee who threw the flag. They forgot to tell you that it was the poor blocking when the extra point was blocked.

We have become a society of lets blame anyone except the guilty.

Paul Harvey, my favorite newsman, says that "self-government will not work without self-discipline."

Friday night when you head to Rose High School, there will be a reason that you go through a metal detector before you can enter. If it wasn't checked someone would bring a gun.

I realize some of the officers panicked, but they were there in the mob.

The rest of us were in the stands where we were suppose to be or at home safe in front of the TV.
None of us know what they felt and I have a hard time blaming them if they delivered a bloody nose or two.