And it’s coming with the same controversial season-ticket policy that the Athletic Department introduced last season.

We reported earlier this week that Penn was likely to stick with the 2008-09 policy. But at the time, senior associate director of athletics Allanna Shanahan said that there would be an “internal battle royal again in the next week or two” as the internally-divided Athletic Department made a final decision.

Now that decision seems even more set in stone; earlier today, Penn offered its first official announcement about The Line. The student-ticketing policy is bolded within the release:

Students must participate in “The Line Announcement” and “The Line” in order to sit in the lower-level Red & Blue Crew sections. …

The student sections are at the end court on the western side of The Palestra. The section will be split into two general admission areas, a lower level (sections 119, 120, 121) section and an upper level (sections 219, 220, 221).

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Some of you have asked in the comments section about Penn’s contract with Nelligan Sports Marketing. For a bit of background reading, you may want to check out the DP’s story from when the deal was first announced last year.

UPDATED at 7:20 p.m. on Sept. 23.

Today’s story on Penn’s  new Athletic marketing initiatives pointed out that the founders of the Fire Glen Miller blog are working with the Athletic Department to revamp the Red and Blue Crew.

Today, Fire Glen Miller offered its take on the ironic situation. Interestingly, as originally written this morning, the post expressed an uncertain future for the blog. Yet by later in the day, the final paragraph was altered to all-but-announce the disbandment of Fire Glen Miller. Justin Chang wrote in an e-mail that “the paragraph was later changed after careful thought and discussion about whether the blog was actually needed now that we were representatives of Penn Athletics.” He also said that there was never any discussion of trying to merge the blog and the Red and Blue Crew.

Full text of the Fire Glen Miller post, as it stands now, after the jump.

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Along with the story about the Athletic Department’s marketing initiatives that I wrote for today’s paper, there was an important but brief sidebar that did not make it online. (As always, PDF here.)

The Athletic Department is likely to continue the controversial season-ticket policy it introduced last season. Student seats behind the west-end basket are general admission, with the lower level reserved for participants in The Line.

“We still occasionally have internal discussions,” senior associate director of athletics Alanna Shanahan said, “but at this point, we’re still holding to the fact that hopefully, long term, this will pay dividends.”

Shanahan added that the Athletic Department is internally divided into two opinions. She declined to say where Athletic Director Steve Bilsky fit, or if he straddled both.

“There’s always a camp of people that say, ‘Lets set the standard and hold to it, and if our basketball program is as successful as we all hope, then we’ll be happy that we did this,’” Shanahan said. “Then there’s the other camp that says, ‘Wow, isn’t it painful? We have only maybe 50% of that section filled. Wouldn’t it be nice to allow, maybe five minutes into the game, studnets who are sitting in the upper level down to fill that section.’

“I think there are merits to both. And we’ll probably have that internal battle royal again in the next week or two. And that’s why I say it’s always a tough discussion.”

For now, though, it looks like the policy isn’t changing.

“If you had to ask me today,” Shanahan said yesterday, “I think we would hold to the protocol that we put in place and hope that the interest grows once again, the team success grows and once again, we have that section packed.”

Expect more coverage on The Line as the date — Oct. 9 — draws nearer and as Penn makes its decision final.

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My colleague Noah Rosenstein reported last night on men’s basketball recruit Cameron Gunter.  The 6-foot-8 forward/center has spoken with the Philadelphia Inquirer and confirmed to them that he is, in fact, headed to Penn.

It’s not often that we link to 34th Street, the DP’s weekly entertainment magazine. But Thursday’s “Ego of the Week” was basketball forward Justin Reilly. We’ve already written about (and parodied) his poetic talents. But Street’s Q&A provides a nice glimpse of his personality. It’s a quick but good read.

Villanova announced its men’s basketball schedule earlier today, with the Wildcats hosting Penn on Monday, Nov. 16.

As Zach Klitzman previously reported, it’s the first time since the 2000-01 season that this matchup will take place outside of December.

The rest of Penn’s City Six schedule was already known. All games are at the Palestra:

• Drexel, Nov.24
• Temple, Jan. 13
• La Salle, Jan. 20
• Saint Joseph’s, Jan. 25