The UW-Madison Athletic Department held a press conference Monday to offer a solution for the problems with UW-Madison men's basketball season tickets. An error with the Athletic Department's software provider had excluded 625 students from the lottery.
Steve Malchow, UW-Madison associate athletic director of communications, said the 3,750 students who originally applied for season tickets will be asked to vote in a one-question survey for one of two options regarding the distribution of tickets.
One option would give 2,100 students, selected in a new lottery, season tickets at full price, while leaving out the remaining 1,650 entirely.
The other option would have 1,500 students receive season tickets at full price and have the remaining 2,250 receive complimentary four-game packages, two conference and two non-conference, on a first come, first-serve basis.
The students can vote at www.uwbadgers.com throughout the week. The Athletic Department will implement the option receiving the most votes.
The Athletic Department reached this decision after the press conference, where officials explained the errors and addressed student concerns.
Jamie Pollard, UW-Madison deputy athletic director, stressed how important the students are to the success of the Athletic Department and the long process the administrators went through to choose a plan of action.
\When you get out into the workforce you find out that stuff happens and then you have to deal with it, and that's what we're dealing with,"" Pollard said at the conference. ""There is no solution that is going to solve everything for everybody.""
As the crowd became more agitated and questions grew more confrontational, Pollard said he wanted everyone to know that a repeat situation would not happen in the future.
""We're going to work diligently not to be in this situation again,"" he said. ""Let's not make this even a worse situation than it has to be.""
Responding to the large increase of demand for season tickets this year, UW-Madison men's basketball Head Coach Bo Ryan, said he was proud of the basketball team for creating such excitement among students.
""I am proud to be coaching at a place where this is a problem,"" Ryan said.
Many students, including UW-Madison sophomore Eric Krueger, said at the conference they appreciated the efforts made to resolve the situation, especially the offer of free tickets, which will cost the Athletic Department $81,600.
""There's no way to make everybody happy,"" Krueger said. ""I had tickets from the first lottery and if I don't get tickets again, I'll be upset, but this is the fairest way. People are always selling tickets somewhere.""
