SUNY Brockport homecoming weekend

"You shut down the bars, we shut down Main St," Mark Henry wrote on Twitter along with photos of a large crowd in the street during SUNY Brockport's homecoming weekend early Sunday morning, Sept 21, 2014.

(Twitter | @_MarkHenry)

Homecoming weekend at the College at Brockport: State University of New York turned into "one crazy night," a SUNY Brockport student told WHEC in Rochester.

According to Time Warner Cable News, at least a thousand people were in the village's streets early Sunday morning when the Brockport Police Department ordered the bars to close an hour early at 1 a.m. over safety concerns.

Police Chief Daniel Varrenti told the station on Monday that large groups of people outside two bars were preventing officers from getting in and out of the police station. He also didn't want to see visibly intoxicated patrons served more alcohol.

The majority of the crowd was believed to be students celebrating the school's largest crowd ever at a football game for Courage Bowl X on Saturday against St. John Fisher. The Democrat & Chronicle reports a sellout audience of 9,320 saw St. John Fisher beat Brockport 36-20 at Eunice Kennedy Shriver Stadium, crushing the Upstate New York college's previous record of 6,918 fans in 2011.

When ordered to exit the village bars, people flooded the streets and started shouting "U-S-A!" and "Let's Go Brockport," according to the Rochester newspaper. More than 30 cops from 13 different departments arrived at the scene, prompting students to start calling it a "riot" on social media.

But Varrenti insisted no fights ever broke out, and said police showed restraint while dealing with drunk people.

"I want to make this clear. At no time was this a riot," he told TWC News.

Police arrested 28 people, at least three of whom were students.

"In the future if something like this does happen again," Varrenti told WHEC on Monday. "I will recommend to the village board a local law to make the village dry."

Katy Wilson, vice president for enrollment management and student affairs at SUNY Brockport, told the D&C she doesn't expect it to happen. "I would wish him luck in doing that," she said.

But WHEC reports it's definitely a possibility. Nine towns in New York state are completely dry and 33 are partially dry.

Business owners worry about how prohibiting alcohol could hurt their revenue. Paige Whittier of Perri's Pizza told the television station that they see significant sales during after hours.

"At 2 o'clock, bars shutdown, we come in, the college kids come in, we rack up our slices and it wouldn't be the same," she said.