College Basketball Game Ends With BYU Win, Arizona Apology

On Saturday night, the Brigham Young Cougars traveled to Tucscon to take on the Arizona Wildcats. The visitors won a close game by the score of 96-95. Unfortunately for the home team, losing to a local rival wasn’t the only source of frustration for the Wildcats. In the aftermath of the game, Arizona’s Director of Athletics, Desireé Reed-Francois, had taken to social media to apologize for the conduct of some Wildcats fans.

ESPN’s Myron Medcalf reports that some of the home fans opted to engage in a chant containing an expletive and the word “Mormons” after the game concluded, an insult directed at BYU’s religious affiliation.

“Following tonight’s men’s basketball game, it was brought to our attention that an unacceptable chant occurred,” Reed-Francois said in a statement posted to social media. “On behalf of the University of Arizona Athletic Department, we apologize to BYU, their student-athletes, coaches and fans. The chant is not reflective of who we are and should not have happened.”

As Medcalf noted, the game had been an especially contentious one even before the Arizona fans decided to take out their frustrations on an entire religious group. The final seconds of the game saw fouls called on both BYU players and Arizona players, leading to the home team briefly taking the lead via two free throws before BYU took the lead and the win, also via two free throws.

“They scored 93 points up to that point on our home court. That’s the problem,” Arizona coach Tommy Lloyd told ESPN of the calls that ended the game.

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There isn’t much to say beyond that. There’s a long history of sports fans heckling the opposing team, and countless instances of a point where someone (or several people) crossed a line in their remarks. It’s one of the reasons why Premier League teams periodically ban fans in the wake of those fans’ racist behavior. We’ll see if any subsequent punishment comes for the Arizona fans who took things too far on Saturday night.