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NEWARK, N.J. -- New Jersey officials denied Wednesday that racial or religious profiling had anything to do with the detention of five Muslim football fans at a New York Giants game in September, even as several of the men claimed they were singled out because they prayed at the stadium.

An FBI spokesman told The Associated Press the men were interrogated because they were congregating near the main air intake duct for Giants Stadium.

But several of the fans insisted they were singled out because they were performing daily prayers required by their faith, and said the experience humiliated them. One said other fans taunted them as security personnel grabbed the men and brought them to a room to be questioned during the Sept. 19 game against the New Orleans Saints.

Speaking Wednesday at a news conference in New York, Sami Shaban, 27, a Seton Hall Law School student who lives in Piscataway, said he and four friends had just gotten to the game when it was time for them to make one of the daily prayers required of all Muslims. They did so, then took their seats.

Around halftime, 10 security officers and three state troopers approached the men and told them to come with them, Shaban said.

"I'm as American as apple pie and I'm sitting there and now I'm made to feel like I'm an outsider, for no reason other than I have a long beard or that I prayed," Shaban said. "While we're walking, people are yelling out things like, 'I feel safer now."'

A team of FBI agents questioned the men for about a half hour, asking them things like where they worked and which mosques they attended.

Shaban said the men complied.

The men were then told they were free to go but had to go to different seats than those for which they paid. The FBI and the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority said the seats were closer to the field, but Shaban said they were roughly the same distance but in a different section.

Three security guards stood near them in the new seats, and insisted on escorting the men to their cars when they left the stadium, Shaban said.

Special Agent Steven Siegel, a spokesman for the Newark FBI office, said the men aroused suspicion because they were congregating near the main air intake duct. Former President Bush was on hand that night as part of a fundraising campaign he and former President Clinton were leading for victims of Hurricane Katrina.

"You had 80,000 people there, Bush 41 was there, and you had a group of gentlemen gathering in an area not normally used by the public right near the main air intake duct for the stadium, and a food preparation facility," Siegel said. "It was where they were, not what they were doing."

Shaban said he and his friends were unaware they were in a sensitive area; the site has since been fenced off and is no longer accessible to fans.

Sports Authority President George Zoffinger held a news conference at the Meadowlands to defend his staff's handling of the incident.

"We do not profile anyone that comes into our arena, stadium or racetrack on any basis," he said. "There was no profiling of our customers. I want to make that clear."

Zoffinger also said there were several instances that night of people taking photos in areas of the stadium deemed sensitive.

One of the detained men said none of those who were praying had cameras.

"It's kind of hard to take a picture when you're bowing down," said Mostafa Khalifa, 27, of Howell.