The scenes are familiar, and at this point, fairly exclusive to college sports. Field and court stormings — long a part of the passionate fabric that makes these events timeless — have a modern issue and potential new consequences.

Among the tapestry of high-level issues on the table at this week’s SEC spring meetings, field of play incursion is getting at least some of the Destin oxygen. A few dangerous episodes last year helped spur the conversation led by athletics directors from those on the losing end of a few of these high-emotion moments.

Alabama AD Greg Byrne is helping lead that conversation to strengthen league penalties last updated at the SEC spring meetings in 2015. Originally passed in 2004, the fines were increased eight years ago that starts at $50,000 for a first offense, $100,000 for the second and $250,000 for each that followed.

With SEC athletics department revenues passing the reaching the $200 million mark, even a cool quarter of a million isn’t batting eyes in most circumstances.

“Fines don’t work,” Byrne said Wednesday. “Nobody is sitting in the stands saying ‘Well I’m not going on the field today because the university is going to get fined $250,000.’ Fans don’t care. I get it. But there has to be steps that are taken. Until you go through it yourself, and I have been on the field for a few stormings and it’s not fun. It’s dangerous. We’ve had some very scary situations that could have escalated even further.”

Pandemonium followed both Alabama road losses last season, extending the streak of field stormings when the Tide lost to SEC rivals. Each of the last seven resulted in wild scenes with fans on the field leaving the 2010 loss at LSU the most recent on the road that didn’t include a storming.

Tennessee famously solicited donations (tongue in cheek) to pay the $100,000 SEC fine and replace the goalposts after ending its losing streak to Alabama last year.

There was also an incident where Alabama receiver Jermaine Burton appeared to strike a Tennessee student as he worked through the sea of revelers en route to the Tide locker room.

And three weeks later, LSU fans celebrating a win over the Tide accosted Evan Van Nostrand, Alabama’s assistant director of player development as he attempted to leave the field.

Tennessee coach Josh Heupel was obviously on the better end of the celebration Oct. 15 in Knoxville. He had a perspective on the matter Wednesday.

“I think the dialogue around keeping fans and players and staff safe is a real one,” he said. “I think we have to navigate that space. I think there’s a two-edged sword on that side of it.

“If you try to stop everybody from storming the field there’s a safety issue there too. So how do we keep everybody safe before the game, during the game and after the game … certainly the pageantry and passion that is college football is what makes it college football. It’s a unique endeavor and the greatest sport in my opinion. So navigating that space the right way is important.”

Solutions are tricky as no security outfit is equipped to stop the number of people in spaces as vast as college football stadiums.

Byrne had a suggestion while acknowledging the required majority might not be ready to go that far.

“There’s been some discussion about, do you lose a home game?” Byrne said. “I don’t know how much support that has. Is there a way to do some more fines in a little more creative way? Some of those things are being discussed right now that maybe would get everybody’s attention. I think there’s better education we could do.”

As of 2021, Alabama was one of four schools never fined by the SEC for field/court storming along with Georgia, Florida and Mississippi State.

Byrne cited the effort in Starkville to bring cowbells back to home football games after a ban on artificial noisemakers was lifted. There was an educational component for fans.

“That didn’t completely eliminate cowbells at inappropriate times,” said Byrne, a former athletics staffer at Mississippi State, “but they did a lot better job with it and it stuck pretty well.”

SEC commissioner Greg Sankey had another example from the basketball side of things. Vanderbilt beat Tennessee on a buzzer-beating shot and the court was stormed.

“That ball was in the air when the clock expired,” Sankey said. “Add 0.4 to that, the ball goes through, there’s time and everybody rushes the court, we have a problem. That is one level of problems created by fans rushing the field.”

Sankey said he expected “lively debates and sophisticated conversation” on the matter this week in Destin.

“It’s interesting,” he said, “if one fan runs onto the field in the third quarter, you know what happens? They get tackled and arrested. A bunch of the fans rush the field after the fourth quarter, we don’t do that.

“I’m not suggesting we start tackling people but we’re going to have to figure out.”

Michael Casagrande is a reporter for the Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @ByCasagrande or on Facebook.