NEWS
This year at FAU we had our share of events that were good, bad, and even a few that made us say WTF? Here are those events.
The good: No more Lockhart
On-campus football stadium scheduled to open this year
By Ryan Cortes
Since its inception in 2001, the FAU football program has had to travel on I-95 and head south to play its football games at Lockhart Stadium in Fort Lauderdale. Through hard work from many people, that will change for FAU next season.
On Tuesday, Nov. 23, late into the night, FAU atheltic director Craig Angelos and his team finalized various documents and payments, and the fruit of their labor came in the form of a 30,000-seat on-campus football stadium.
The stadium is currently under construction and scheduled to open and host FAU’s first home game of the 2011 season.
Though FAU’s football program is too young by college football standards to be receiving an on-campus stadium, Angelos was able to secure it for the university.
“That’s now going to allow us to do something hardly any other college campus does at this time of their existence, which is to build an on-campus football stadium,” said Angelos.
Angelos began the process of getting and building an on-campus stadium by meeting in 2005 with then-FAU president Frank Brogan. The five-year process provided many moments of wavering faith, but Angelos believed it would happen.
“I never doubted that we would find a way,” said Angelos. “It was just a matter of when.”
Prior to the official documentation, FAU held its groundbreaking ceremony on Oct. 16, the second key phase of securing the stadium this past season. That day, 15 shovels went into the ground, symbolizing all the work that lay ahead.
Beyond being merely an attraction to lure potential students and athletes to plant roots in Boca Raton, the stadium served as something more immediate: a lifeline for the football program. Without the stadium, there was much doubt as to the future of the football team and whether a fan base could be built without an on-campus stadium.
“The one prize we really needed to stabilize [for] the football program was an on-campus stadium,” said Angelos. “There’s something that really unites a campus. It just really turns this place into a first-choice university.”
Another key element throughout this process was head football coach Howard Schnellenberger. At his previous coaching stops, Louisville and Miami, Schnellenberger also pushed for an on-campus stadium, but to no avail.
“After we were reasonably good at the University of Miami, I went to the president and told them that I thought in my judgment we needed a football stadium,” said Schnellenberger. “And his response was, ‘You’re right, coach, why don’t you go build one?'”
Although the journey was arduous, Schnellenberger met with less resistance in Boca Raton, and the football stadium is one of his proud achievements of his tenure here.
“I think it’s a great thing,” said Schnellenberger. “It’s the most important thing that’s happened here in football since football came here.”
The bad: Adding insult to injury
FAU fraternity suspended for a year due to hazing incident
Spring 2010 marked a new semester at FAU, but also the start of fraternity Sigma Phi Epsilon’s (SigEp) one year suspension.
SigEp was given a one-year suspension for a harsh hazing ritual that took place in November of 2009 that sent their fraternity brother, Nicholas Letteri, to the Boca Raton Community Hospital emergency room.
According to Letteri, he was kidnapped, tied up, and forced to drink beer and shots by SigEp brothers as he rapidly threw up and blacked out.
During their suspension, SigEp underwent membership review, disciplinary probation, a chapter reorganization plan, and monthly meetings and reports.
“We’re the strongest fraternity on campus. We have the highest grades; always number one in intramurals; always number one in sports; we always have the highest community service. This is not what we expected, and it’s not going to help out anybody,” said Jonathon Marquez, SigEp president, when referring to the suspension of the fraternity.
To make a bad situation worse for FAU fraternities, Nicholas Cady-Jantzen, a brother of the Pi Kappa Alpha (Pike) fraternity, was caught dumping more than 900 copies of the UP’s Feb. 23 issue, which featured a story that investigated and exposed Greek Life hazing rituals.
The story exposed fraternities like SigEp, Pike, and Sigma Alpha Mu for performing hazing acts such as sticking hoses up people’s rears.
[Monica Ruiz contributed to the reporting of this story.]
WTF?! Absolutely Ludacris
Ludacris reschedules his FAU concert and then shows up two hours late
Oct. 15 marked the concert of musical artist Ludacris at FAU, but before the contracts were even signed, he canceled to attend a Fast and the Furious movie photo shoot.
The Ludacris concert was meant to kick off the 2010 Homecoming Week. As FAU’s early onset of excitement saw flyers and posters litter campus, Student Government had a panic attack with the news that Ludacris was not coming.
“It’s devastating and you’re like, ‘Oh, my God, what are we gonna do?’ and you sulk about it and then, an hour later, you figure it out, which is what we did,” said Alicia Keating, the adviser to Program Board. “If we’re devastated and we’re like, ‘Yeah, this really sucks, this is terrible,’ then how is anyone else gonna be excited?”
Despite the fact that Student Government decided to start promoting a show that wasn’t 100-percent set, to their surprise, ticket sales rose by nearly 100 tickets a week after the news of the rescheduling.
With the mess of rescheduling resolved, on Nov. 10, Freakers Ball finally kicked off. However, Ludacris arrived two hours late for his scheduled 9 p.m. appearance.
The concert started on a slow note, getting passive reactions from the crowd as several opening acts desperately tried to delay the fact that the main event was very late.
“Despite being late,” said Student Body President Ayden Maher, “Ludacris really knew his audience and got people off their feet.”
[Gideon Grudo contributed to the reporting in this story.]
