Maryland, Under Assault, Finds Hooliganism Is Not Cool After All

In a classic twist of fate, after the big football win at Georgia Tech, Maryland's band
was subjected to some physical abuse by some moronic Tech fans.
We are on
record as being solidly against thuggish fan behavior and hooliganism, since
Duke fans have been subjected to it consistently at Maryland, and we take no
pleasure in the fact that the members of the band were abused. We find it funny,
though, that they sent an e-mail to local media outlets to decry their
treatment. We don't recall them expressing indignation when the shoe was on the
other foot.

We went back to look at what the local media around Maryland said when Mrs. Boozer suffered a concussion
("it wasn't a glass bottle," the Post's Sally Jenkins brightly told us, as
if a plastic bottle filled with water wasn't about the same thing as a brick). So here
are some Maryland sentiments, and we'd like to challenge the University, and
Sally Jenkins, to keep to their previous standards now that their fans are the
ones who are being assaulted:

• "We ought to grow up and not be so oversensitive about [the band playing Rock and Roll, Part II]. The band might not play it, but the students might sing it...I just think this is being made into something because this is Duke and Duke complains. This is being made into something more than it is....a couple of people went overboard. It won't happen again. We're doing everything we can not to let it happen again."
  Gary Williams, after the violence in College Park last season.
• "I'm tired of all the crap about our fans. They're great fans. This is overkill, what's going on right now. Everybody should shut up. They're good fans."
  Gary Williams
• My door is always open to students. Someone's got to take up for undergraduate behavior around here, and seeing as how I'm a champion of it myself, I guess the task falls to me.
  Sally Jenkins, who presumably will keep her door open to Tech students.
• The first point that needs to be made on behalf of the Terps' student body is, they threw water bottles at Duke, not Molotov cocktails, okay?
  Sally Jenkins
• The Terps students have refused past entreaties to give up their hooliganism -- because they have suffered their share of abuse at the hands of other student bodies and understand its value.
  Sally Jenkins, celebrating the value of intimidation and victimization.
• "It was a riot mentality," said the Theta Chi frat house philosopher known as "Lord Of," who spoke on condition of anonymity. "When we beat Duke, we riot, and when we lose to Duke, we riot. The police should accept it."
  From The Washington Post, after the Final Four.
• Here's a really [funny thought]: Anyone from Duke complaining about student
  behavior. Sally Jenkins, and we hope she will say the same thing now about
  Maryland students complaining.