Gameday at Redbird

[3rd Gen Redbird]

Long time visitor of RBF, first time poster.

I have been to 2 women’s games this year and the progress on the court is noticeable after not going to any games during the previous era.

The Redbird Arena experience, however, is still maddening. They really don’t seem to care about the fan base. Let me give some examples.

I don’t like the clear bag policy but I get it. We had a student security worker tell my wife she couldn’t bring her small clutch which has been allowed into every home game into the last women’s game on Friday. He finally relented after he realized he was wrong but no apology.

$1 hot dogs and they are out at halftime.

There was a group of unsupervised kids running around the floor of the arena during the 2nd half behind the media side. Not a thing was done about it and it was clearly frustrating a couple of them.

This is not a customer service thing but both games have had issues with the folks operating the scoreboard.

And I will point our AD sat in a corner of the lower bowl while all this was going on, talking to a single person the entire 2nd half...

 

[TIMMY]

The kids running around thing bothered the hell out of me as an AD. I hated it and stopped it. This of course made me the bad guy. Not so much with the kids, but with their darling parents who enjoyed having the little rug rats out of their hair. The sense of entitlement is amazing.

 

[Birdswin]

Sense of entitlement maybe - but, I think it is these parents were not disciplined by their parents, thus, they have no sense of instilling discipline to their kids. Same thing occurs are Church - drives me nuts. My wife and I had four kids - rarely missed Church. If you do not make your kids act appropriately at home, how in the world do you expect them to act any differently in public?

Do not even get me started on proper appearance - from grooming, clothes, language, and so on. Uncalled for in almost all cases and disgusting in a majority.

 

[PK88]

Long time visitor of RBF, first time poster.

I have been to 2 women’s games this year and the progress on the court is noticeable after not going to any games during the previous era.

The Redbird Arena experience, however, is still maddening. They really don’t seem to care about the fan base. Let me give some examples.

I don’t like the clear bag policy but I get it. We had a student security worker tell my wife she couldn’t bring her small clutch which has been allowed into every home game into the last women’s game on Friday. He finally relented after he realized he was wrong but no apology.

$1 hot dogs and they are out at halftime.

There was a group of unsupervised kids running around the floor of the arena during the 2nd half behind the media side. Not a thing was done about it and it was clearly frustrating a couple of them.

This is not a customer service thing but both games have had issues with the folks operating the scoreboard.

And I will point our AD sat in a corner of the lower bowl while all this was going on, talking to a single person the entire 2nd half...

I don't really know where to start with this. You create an account, seemingly to post a thinly veiled complaint about Larry Lyons, and start off with the bolded quote. You attended zero games in the Barb Smith era and two this year, meaning you've been to a total of two of the last EIGHTY-SEVEN home games and feel that is the appropriate sample size to claim "they really don't seem to care about the fan base." How is it possible you'd be able to give an accurate reflection of the cares of the fan base when you've never been to a game?

Your examples posted, if taken seriously, are minor inconveniences and in no way reflect a department "not caring" about a fan base. You got stopped by a student worker trying to enforce a policy... and? What is the problem? An hourly worker was trying to do his job to the best of his ability? What do you think should happen? They should fire a student worker because you were stopped for an extra couple seconds?

An affordable menu item was sold out... by Sodexo. Not an ISU Athletics thing. Do you post every time anything is sold out that you want anywhere? Why is it a problem that Sodexo sold out of hot dogs because you didn't go in the first half?

When you saw this "unsupervised" group of kids running around on the floor and seemingly bothering "a couple of them" what did you do? Did you report it? Tell an usher? Ask for help? It seems you just watched this happen and then decided to talk about it after the fact. If it was really bothering anyone, wouldn't it have been stopped?

The scoreboard had issues. What issues? What happened? Score was wrong? Clock didn't run? The only thing that happened on Friday was the shot clock didn't start and there was a 3 second reset at the start of each half. Is it really that big of a deal to post about it?

Finally, the Larry Lyons comment... what does it matter to you? What should he do? Shake everyone's hand in attendance? Grab all the kids running around? In your perfect world, what does he do? Run the shot clock? Make the hot dogs?

ISU Athletics receives a great deal of criticism on this website, the majority of it rooted in some sort of truth or facts, but this comes off as complaining, whining, and nonsensical.

 

[TIMMY]

Sense of entitlement maybe - but, I think it is these parents were not disciplined by their parents, thus, they have no sense of instilling discipline to their kids. Same thing occurs are Church - drives me nuts. My wife and I had four kids - rarely missed Church. If you do not make your kids act appropriately at home, how in the world do you expect them to act any differently in public?

Do not even get me started on proper appearance - from grooming, clothes, language, and so on. Uncalled for in almost all cases and disgusting in a majority.

From 1980 to 2015 in my gym alone I saw many changes throughout the years. From respect for my gym floor to respect for my coaches, teachers, admin, security.
And officials!?! The folks doing that job for the chump change they make... Idiots making fools out of themselves over a call in a freshman b team basketball game. It'll make a good book when I get around to it.

 

[cpacmel]

The clock issue was a very minor thing and happens everywhere. Not just ISU. It was corrected very quickly.

 

[Reggie Redbird]

The clock issue was a very minor thing and happens everywhere. Not just ISU. It was corrected very quickly.

Bottom line: the product in the court has tremendously improved. There is a golden opportunity to take the reins of the conference with what we put into WBB.

Spot on Mel. The lead official asked to re-jump the ball to start the game, so that’s what caused the reset there.

As far as the game day experience, have you considered getting in touch with game day operations staff, Sodexho, or marketing? Unless they’re reading this thread, will they know they didn’t have enough hot dogs? Would they have a chance to address the kids running around? If you’re a donor, reach out to Sean Johnson. He has been phenomenal at listening to and responding to feedback. He can’t fix everything but he’s always responded quickly.

 

[JHBird]

If kids bothered you running around on the floor, why not just move back 10 rows? There's plenty of open seats. On Friday night we were blowing out Evansville. There were a group of cackling kids messing with Reggie Redbird on the floor....it was funny to me.

 

[Redbirdwarrior]

I was not at the game, but you need to treat Women's basketball (and all women's sports) with as much respect as you treat any men's sport. If we had an ESPN3 men's game and had 5 or 6 kids playing tag behind the media desk, Mr. Lyons would be on them IMMEDIATELY - and rightfully so. When my daughter gets iffy at games, I take her up to the concourse and play a game of running to the corner door (usually SE) and then back to me by the upper deck steps. It runs some energy out, then I get her a pretzel and we enjoy another 25 minutes or so of basketball before we do it again.

The key is to make sure these kids are

A- Supervised
B- Not distracting to the game day atmosphere

You may call it "family friendly", but I call it bush league. We are a fan base that complains that nobody takes us seriously nationally (or even regionally). This kind of stuff isn't helping anyone take us more seriously than any local high school team.