Gettin rowdy in Durham

[Schism55]

https://twitter.com/CFTalk/status/1092500997786779648

[KPSUL]

https://twitter.com/CFTalk/status/1092500997786779648

The player in the picture, WR Neil O'Connor is a graduating senior and was not involved in the incident. If the actual incident was anything like the news story the three players involved will never play football again at UNH. One was a two year 2nd Team All Conference LB, the other two have not seen much significant playing time.

[cx500d]

The player in the picture, WR Neil O'Connor is a graduating senior and was not involved in the incident. If the actual incident was anything like the news story the three players involved will never play football again at UNH. One was a two year 2nd Team All Conference LB, the other two have not seen much significant playing time.


dumbassery at work

[Go Green]

It's no secret that our jails would be less crowded if someone invented a time machine that would allow people to re-live those fateful 15 minutes and make better decisions...

[CenMEBlackBearFan]

Here is the link about the arrests, I would think the LB will certainly be a substantial loss to the team.

https://www.fosters.com/news/20190201/u ... house-riot (https://www.fosters.com/news/20190201/unh-football-players-charged-in-frat-house-riot)

[LU808]

Frozen brain syndrome.....significant reduction in brain function.

[FormerPokeCenter]

Returned with a large group of people, but only three people are arrested?

The black kid, who's an all conference football player, needed the milquetoast white kids pictured as backup?? Seriously?

Yeah, there's more to this than meets the eye...

And that whole "was asked to leave" thing is a little too polite, nice, and tidy for my taste. I'm guessing there's more to it than that...


In the spring 1984, on a Monday night, I kinda was the ring leader in the procurement of the hand-drawn Kappa Sigma flag, flown over the Tiki Huts erected around the pool of the local chapter's fraternity house in observance of their South Sea Island celebration. We could see the flags from the jock dorm. A couple of the Kappa Sigs had walked-on and they were nice guys...we all had classes together...so..we were bored and it was supposed to be a one time deal...No real harm intended. We thought it would be kinda fun.

We stole the flag, and then flew it off the Jock Dorm....you'd think they'd have been flattered, but NOOOOoooo.....

So, the next day, through back channel rent-a-nerdy-friend/jock communication networks, they let it be known that they were going to guard the next iteration of the flag. It was almost like saying "come and take it" really....so....we let them stand guard till about 3 am, and then snuck back over and stole the second flag...they were all inside the house, with the front doors open, watching some porno flick..

So...we called....."Hey Guys! How's the movie...

Answer: "Man, it's awesome...Why aren't y'all here. Oh wait. Who is that?

Me: "Never mind that. It's not important...How's the Flag?"

Answer: "it's still out there. They won't steal this one."

Also Me: "Are you sure??? Maybe you should check again right now, just to be sure..."

Answer (after some scurrying around and cursing): "Man, **** you, you're an asshole."

Me: "True enough, but...look at it this way, now your first flag won't be lonely. <CLICK>."

The belligerent rhetoric about posting armed guards was all the buzz at school the next day. Several of their guys were in ROTC. They plotted insurgent retrieval missions to take the flags from the 3rd floor roof of the jock dorm.

We just smiled. And in Biology class, with three or four jocks and about five Kappa Sigs, the battle lines were drawn. I was told there was no way in hell the jocks could get the flag a third night in a row...I just smiled some more. But, later that evening, I told the Flag Thief Regiment that we'd just set our alarms for 5 am, and then see what the status of their patrols and sentries looked like.

All was clear, and that was actually the easiest night of the three...

All the Frat guys parked at their houses and walked across the intramural fields to get to class. Those were directly across the street from The Zoo, which is what Ziegler Hall was affectionately called since it housed all the athletic teams. Small groups of frat guys assembled across the street, staring at the three flags flying from The Zoo, taking heatedly amongst themselves and I'm reasonably sure that there were declarative statements about marching up the stairs, beating our asses in the dorm and retrieving the flags. Yet, curiously, nobody entered the lair ;)

That day, there was a definite chill in the air betwixt the jocks and our frat friends in The Ranch, as the McNeese student union is called.

I had a date that night, so I told the guys on the FTR to wait until I got back, and then we'd reconnoiter and figure out the best way to proceed...As an upper classman, one sort of feels obligated to nurture and guide the younger players, in order to help them reach their full potential.

I came back from my date about midnight or so, to the rather unexpected and disturbing sight of a crowd of mixed sport athletes walking back across the street, backlight by the revolving blue lights of the local police department. I think I saw one guy carrying a 2 x 4 and another one had a lead pipe.

Two of the officers were talking to a Kappa Sig big shot who'd been a walk-on for a while. Nice guy, could probably even have contributed. His son would actually earn a scholarship to McNeese about 25 years later. Apparently a second group of jocks had decided to get in on the fun and were over nosing around the Kappa Sig house right after sun down. A defensive tackle stuck his head over fence around the pool and damn near had it taken off by a beer bottle and a couple of racial epithets thrown his way. His response was to grab the top of the fence and rip a 10 foot section down. A small free-for all ensued, with fairly predictable results, until one of the ROTC guys came out of the frat house with a carbine loaded with blanks and fired up in the air, scattering everybody. The police arrived shortly thereafter and the one name that all the frat guys would agree on was the DT. He was sitting in the patrol car, so.....I went over and chatted with the Kappa Sig guy, and one of his fraternity brothers who'd been a basketball player at one time...after my personal assurances that I'd retrieve the flags from whoever had them and get them back to the Kappa Sigs and that I'd make sure that nobody else ****ed with them for the remainder of the South Sea Island thing, they agreed not to press charges against our DT.

Everybody went their own way, no harm, no foul...

Unfortunately, some of the baseball players on the third floor had gotten the flags and I was having a little difficulty in retrieving them. Nobody wanted to fess up to having them now that the police were ancillarily involved.

So, I was in front of the dorm, talking to some of baseball players trying to get to the bottom of the flag thing - and was actually really close to a resolution - when a bunch of Kappa Signs drove by in a little Chevy pick up, flying yet another Kappa Sig flag out of the back of it...About four or five guys were in the bed of the truck drinking beer (gotta love living in the South, ya know?) anyway, as they passed one of them decides to throw beer bottle at us, which considering he was a frat guy was a fairly accurate throw, but just not with any real velocity and it hit the dorm wall, harmlessly shattering. But, still...it was the whole idea of the fact that we had a truce in place and the little mother****er threw a beer bottle at us.

SO...a baseball player runs up stairs, grabs a flag, comes back down, we hop into my hatchback and fly the thing out the back and then go drive around Frat row, slowing down just enough to let the Kappa Sigs think they could grab it, and then speeding up just as they got close...I felt like the old guy in the waders with a fishing rod....."Oh! Almost had it. You gotta be quicker"...

After a few minutes of having proven my point, I decide it's time to shut her down and stick to the original agreement...So, I go park and ask the baseball player to go get the other flags...He does, but apparently he was still pissed off about the beer bottle thing, so he goes to his truck, and pulls out a small gas can, then walks out to the middle of the intramural fields with the gasoline and the flags. The Frat guys are all out watching to see what's gonna happen next and he starts dousing the flags with gas, pulls a lighter and sets them off...

Frat row empties on to the intramual fields...probaly 30 to 40 frat guys....about 60 guys from various sports in the jock dorm run out to meet them followed immediately by Campus Security, the Lake Charles City Police, the Calcasieu Parish Sheriff's Department and personnel from the local Louisiana State Police troop...It's important to note that I did NOT get out there on the intramural fields and I didn't hit anybody. I did sorta plan most of it all, and I did sorta incite things with the trip through frat row, but nobody got hurt and I was actually pretty well behaved...

So, I thought it might be a good time to head back inside. I figured the baseball player with the gas can was on his own. I'd tried to resolve things and the Kappa Sigs had broken the peace, first, so all was good as far as I was concerned. I soon found out, however, that I was wrong. About 15 minutes after the incendiary agitprop event I'm at my desk, studying, when there's a knock on the door and in walks the Head Coach, the Athletic Director, the Dean of Men, the President of the University and the local police chief....they just pointed at my roommate and the door, and he abandoned me without even a parting word! ;)

Apparently the ONLY name anybody remembered from ANY of the skirmishes was mine. Nobody remembered who tore the fence down, nobody remembered who threw the beer bottles, nobody remembered who discharged the firearm. Nobody remembered who had the 2 x 4 or the pipe. Nobody remembered who set off the incendiary device.

EVERYBODY, though, remembered that I drove the PsyOps Agitation Vehicle...

So, the ONLY reason I didn't get kicked out of school was because I had no other infractions and was more or less a good kid; plus I was rehabbing from a complete knee reconstruction, so they were quick to blame it on boredom or stress or some other knee-related issue...

I got put on double secret probation. Seriously, I did. I was on probation until I graduated. In fact, I was on double secret probation until AFTER I graduated. I'm not making this up, two years after I graduated, I finally got a letter from the Dean of Men telling me that my probation period had ended that week, and that they considered the matter closed. Two whole years after I'd moved on and was living in another state.

So...the point of all this was to say that knowing a little bit about how campus riots between frats and athletes work, I'm guessing that there's a LOT more to this story than is being reported.

It'll be interesting to see how it turns out ;)

[WeAreThePride]

7 years for a fight? What happened to the old days, where the cops would box them over the ears and toss them in the drunk tank for the night.

[CenMEBlackBearFan]

FormerPokeCenter, I don't know what is more amazing the story itself or the fact you can still remember and retell it from 35 yrs ago. Thanks for sharing fun read for surexthumbsupx

[KPSUL]

Returned with a large group of people, but only three people are arrested?

The black kid, who's an all conference football player, needed the milquetoast white kids pictured as backup?? Seriously?



They haven't revealed which of the three players was the one who was denied entry into the party and then rounded up friends to return to the frat. They are scheduled for a court appearance this Thursday, we might know more then.

[FormerPokeCenter]

FormerPokeCenter, I don't know what is more amazing the story itself or the fact you can still remember and retell it from 35 yrs ago. Thanks for sharing fun read for surexthumbsupx


LOL, as you can imagine, I've told it a time or two through the years...Generally, alcohol was involved!;)

[RootinFerDukes]

7 years for a fight? What happened to the old days, where the cops would box them over the ears and toss them in the drunk tank for the night.

I agree. Those prison term lengths seem severe for a regular fight without weapons and only minor injuries. One year tops.

[RootinFerDukes]

I get that it said more arrests may come, but unless it was just the three football players beating up frat members and they didn’t return any licks, how are more not arrested? Don’t let the frat boys off just because they’re not on the football team.

[Bisonoline]

I get that it said more arrests may come, but unless it was just the three football players beating up frat members and they didn’t return any licks, how are more not arrested? Don’t let the frat boys off just because they’re not on the football team.

Here's the deal. The players left and came back which shows a boat load of premeditation. Plus the frat is on private property and they were asked to leave.
The players dont have any defense that I can see.

[KPSUL]

I get that it said more arrests may come, but unless it was just the three football players beating up frat members and they didn’t return any licks, how are more not arrested? Don’t let the frat boys off just because they’re not on the football team.

I haven't read anything yet that suggested more arrests could be made.

[RootinFerDukes]

I haven't read anything yet that suggested more arrests could be made.

The fosters article provided earlier in the thread said there may be more arrests as they investigate.