Are Viewers Tuning out UConn Dynasty

[Nuyoika]

In my view, it's terribly shortsighted of Geno not to be scheduling UTenn and rebuilding that rivalry
Especially now that Notre Dame is apparently significantly weakened.

The result of the final was a foregone conclusion in the nations psyche.
And even though it was a reasonably competitive game (more due to Morgan's nerves than any special effort by the Iris),
The outcome was never really in doubt and for the nation the drama was limited.
It's hardly surprising that ratings were lacking.

I have been reminded regularly by Doggy and Ice of the horrific transgressions of Pat and the UTenn staff and administration and the reasons Geno has insisted on apologies before considering a renewal of the series.

But I am reminded of an essay by Deems Taylor, a much beloved writer and critic on music in the first half of the last century. In his piece entitled "The Monster." he described a ne'er-do-well, who cheated on his best friend, stole his wife, backstabbed everyone in sight, ran out on debts, was anti-Semitic…a real nice guy as our friend Ozzie used to say…

But Taylor goes on to say that none of this matter, doesn't matter at all, because the "Monster" was Richard Wagner and that his corpus of work excuses his bad behavior…is of no consequence compared to what we have been left.

My agreement is not exactly parallel, but related.

Interest in the game is on some levels, not increasing.
The finals of the National Championship should be suspenseful and have powerful story lines.
UConn will be a completely unmatchable powerhouse next year and maybe on into the future.
Playing UTenn regularly is a necessity, perhaps not for Geno, but for continued growth of the game we love.

What is necessary is for the rest of the country.... is to get better. Geno can't coach everyone's teams. The rest of the country can't depend on a UConn vs TENN game to make the world care about WBB. I think that is far more shortsighted. If WBB stopped looking to blame other programs and started working on their own it would grow. Individual growth requires self reflection. The same can be said about a team. The sport spends far too much time worrying about why UConn is so good. Let's take a look @ why we suck. Who is out there having that conversation?

 

[Nuyoika]

It'll make a great story line next..."Stewie, Mojeff, and Tuck going for an unprecedented 4th National Championship in a row....Diamond DeShields in her first season back since transferring to the once powerhouse Tenn LadyVols, whose in the championship game for the first time since 2008. Stewie and Co trying to cement UCONN's place in the history books and Diamond and Co trying to restore former glory to a once great program"
I can see the ESPN media machine having a field day with our storylines next season. But the question remains....can Tenn play good enough basketball to set this storyline in place???? We shall see next season.

I definately think they have enough talent to make a FF. However, once the FF hits you need great coaching and the ability to operate in the half court as well as transition to win in the NC game. Warlick has mentioned a few times she doesn't much focus on offense. It shows. Talent can only get you so far. When it gets tough you need coaching and execution. Can Warlick make that happen? If so, I they could be in the mix.

 

[RegisteredUconn]

Credit where credit is due. If a decline in ratings has followed a decline in competitiveness at the top, the credit goes to ND, Baylor, Stanford, Tenn, Duke, UNC, et. al., not UConn.

 

[OldAlum]

Playing Tenn in season right now would be anticlimactic at best. Lots of hype and hoopla, then UConn crushes them. Then everyone complains again about the lack of parity.
UConn doesn't need it. And I see no reason to give more attention to a program that maligned UConn and will not own up to it.

I think it is actually better that they don't meet until and unless they meet in the Final Four. Lots of anticipation and a better chance of a competitive game. I find the matchups much more interesting if the teams haven't met before. Wouldn't the UConn/ND matchup have been more fun this year without a previous meeting?

 

[JoePgh]

Number of Top 25 teams played during OOC (total number of OOC games):

2001-2002: 5 (16)
2002-2003: 3 (13)
2003-2004: 2 (11)
2004-2005: 4 (11)
2005-2006: 3 (14)
2006-2007: 4 (13)
2007-2008: 4 (13)
2008-2009: 2 (14)
2009-2010: 6 (14)
2010-2011: 7 (14)
2011-2012: 5 (14)
2012-2013: 7 (14)
2013-2014: 6 (13)
2014-2015: 4 (12)

Maybe this year aside, I'm actually noticing an upwards trend, from about 2009-2010 on...

Keeping the strength of the out-of-conference schedule the same, or even a little better than in the past is insufficient to maintain UCONN'S current level of prominence and visibility. Now that we are exiled in the AAC, our in-conference SOS will always be bad --the team will have only South Florida to keep it awake in January and February.

That makes it more urgent that the OOC schedule be as strong as possible. Geno is doing his best, but the task is increasingly difficult.

 

[01Neaggrad02]

Who cares? Connecticut fans are tuning in. Tennessee fans are not watching because they are not winning... Notre Dame fans will start to decline because they are tired of being bridesmaids...

All I care about are if UCONN viewers are "tuning out".... and I think UCONN fans are tuning in more...

 

[Tenspro2002]

I agree, except not in our lifetime

Given the demographics of the WCBB fan community, "our lifetime" doesn't necessarily connote a long time!

 

[Henry]

Either other programs will reach the bar Geno has set or the coaches will continue to get fat making money on their overpaid contracts without delivering a championship. Geno has it right. If you hate us so much, try to beat us. Eventually the UCLA,Celtics,Yankees and Canadiens dynasties ended. We have the right to enjoy it as long as it lasts. If others tune out, who cares?

 

[UcMiami]

Well ... This year was an extremely competitive final, last year might have gotten a little more press because both teams were undefeated, but with the injury, it wasn't really very competitive and the year before ... blow out. So ... by the blow outs are bad - this year should have been more highly rated.

On TN - maybe next year TN will actually have a competitive team, but for most of the period since the series was cancelled a Uconn/TN match-up would have looked like Uconn/USF or Uconn/Lousiville - was that really going to get peoples juices flowing, to see a once competitive team get their doors blown off by their arch-rival?

The reality as someone mentioned above - Baylor and ND were the best competition for Uconn over the current string of 5 out of 7 NCs and those two teams distanced themselves from the rest of the pack. Baylor slipped behind ND after Griner left but is still formidable. SC maybe will stay in the picture as well. TN ... wait and see.

 

[DobbsRover2]

In my view, it's terribly shortsighted of Geno not to be scheduling UTenn and rebuilding that rivalry
Especially now that Notre Dame is apparently significantly weakened.

The result of the final was a foregone conclusion in the nations psyche.
And even though it was a reasonably competitive game (more due to Morgan's nerves than any special effort by the Iris),
The outcome was never really in doubt and for the nation the drama was limited.
It's hardly surprising that ratings were lacking.

I have been reminded regularly by Doggy and Ice of the horrific transgressions of Pat and the UTenn staff and administration and the reasons Geno has insisted on apologies before considering a renewal of the series.

But I am reminded of an essay by Deems Taylor, a much beloved writer and critic on music in the first half of the last century. In his piece entitled "The Monster." he described a ne'er-do-well, who cheated on his best friend, stole his wife, backstabbed everyone in sight, ran out on debts, was anti-Semitic…a real nice guy as our friend Ozzie used to say…

But Taylor goes on to say that none of this matter, doesn't matter at all, because the "Monster" was Richard Wagner and that his corpus of work excuses his bad behavior…is of no consequence compared to what we have been left.

My agreement is not exactly parallel, but related.

Interest in the game is on some levels, not increasing.
The finals of the National Championship should be suspenseful and have powerful story lines.
UConn will be a completely unmatchable powerhouse next year and maybe on into the future.
Playing UTenn regularly is a necessity, perhaps not for Geno, but for continued growth of the game we love.

This position has been stated many times but never with any real beef or logic behind it. What is so interesting about a UConn and UTenn game? It's now an ancient relic that increasingly fewer fans even remember. If UTenn had been a top team the last 7 years and was competing with the Huskies, there might have been some value to a match up. But in recent times there have been much more interesting opponents to line up. If UConn was going to play an SEC team recently, than USCar is the obvious candidate, as at least with the GC-ocks there was a some tension about the outcome going into the game. With the Vols, there wouldn't have been.

No Pat, no competition, no point in playing. If UTenn can prove it can hang with the big dogs next year, then maybe some inquiries about scheduling the two teams could be made purely on a competition level if certain obligations are taken care of. But pretending you can somehow step back into the distant past and revive the excitement of a once big series is just silly.

 

[UConnNick]

UConn needs the Tennessee game more than Women's College Basketball does. At some point, recruits are going to be put off by the fact that UConn spends most of its schedule playing the Memphises and Southern Methodists of the world, while in the ACC they could play bigtime opponents. And ESPN will lose interest in televising UConn games if they consist mostly of 40-point blowouts. The list of Top 20 teams willing to play UConn gets smaller every year, and there is the lurking threat of a conspiracy by P5 conference teams to avoid playing UConn at all, to keep them off national television.

I could even imagine that at some point the P5 conferences would decide to hold their own Women's National Championship tournament during the same three weeks as the NCAA tournament. If that idea takes off, it would make the NCAA championship meaningless, and obviously UConn wouldn't be able to play in the other tournament.

The statute of limitations has expired on whatever happened in 2007 and before. UConn and Tennessee should agree to play without preconditions, because it is in the present interest (financial and otherwise) of both schools to do so.

You think a school that routinely fills a 110,000-seat football stadium, whether the product on the field sucks or not, cares about the potential for a possible financial windfall from a UCONN vs. Tenn. women's BB game? I'm sure they could care less, from a purely financial standpoint.

 

[UConnNick]

For UConn 3 of the 5 least watched and 4 of the 6 most watched, so it's a mixed bag. Actually I don't think it's that viewers don't want to see UConn win, they just don't want to see ND lose again, with its 4th runner-up in 5 years. Huskies need to see a fresh face in the NC game, or maybe they can agree to play the games with an arm held behind the back.

Among casual fans it's likely they don't care to see UCONN win another NC, but at least part of the ratings drop is influenced by the fans of the two schools in the title game. In this case, your average ND fan is a football fan only, unless you're an alum. Even among them, I suspect most of them pay attention to football and not much else. Even the men's BB fans at ND, which made a deep tournament run this season, were dwarfed by the turnout from other schools at the Final Four, which took place in their own home state. It's a football school, and all other sports come in as a very distant second and below. You probably could have walked into most sports bars in South Bend and not be forced to elbow anybody out of your way to see the UCONN vs. ND final.

 

[nd2tty]

Keeping the strength of the out-of-conference schedule the same, or even a little better than in the past is insufficient to maintain UCONN'S current level of prominence and visibility. Now that we are exiled in the AAC, our in-conference SOS will always be bad --the team will have only South Florida to keep it awake in January and February.

That makes it more urgent that the OOC schedule be as strong as possible. Geno is doing his best, but the task is increasingly difficult.

Disagree.

Visibility: UConn's visibility is a function of its 10 NCs. Only when they begin to lose, and continue to lose, will their position in the AAC hurt their visibility.

Prominence: UConn is 2 for 2 in NCs since joining the AAC. Unless something drastic changes in Geno's practice philosophy and his game score/effort/goals philosophy, that prominence is not going to decline simply because of the AAC. It doesn't matter how many cupcake teams you are playing in January and February if practice is harder than 95% of all teams you could play.

 

[j66kicker]

Either other programs will reach the bar Geno has set or the coaches will continue to get fat making money on their overpaid contracts without delivering a championship. Geno has it right. If you hate us so much, try to beat us. Eventually the UCLA,Celtics,Yankees and Canadiens dynasties ended. We have the right to enjoy it as long as it lasts. If others tune out, who cares?

Whoa whoa whoa! The Yankees dynasty has not ended - merely a lull in the action....

 

[UConnNick]

Dynasties don't end, unless there's an extended time period of maybe 20+ years with the team being totally non-competitive. They all have their ups and downs in between winning titles. The Canadiens and UCLA are both now 20 years or more removed from winning a title, so they're arguably past the point where they qualify as dynasties anymore. The Yankees, Lakers and Celtics are all still relevant as dynasties because they've all experienced fairly recent successes.

 

[Henry]

Whoa whoa whoa! The Yankees dynasty has not ended - merely a lull in the action....

I'm a Yankee fan. The dynasty was 1949-1964 and 96,98-2000. You can't have a dynasty based on one championship in 14 years. China had a Ming dynasty. What have they won lately?

 

[Padutch5]

I'm a Yankee fan. The dynasty was 1949-1964 and 96,98-2000. You can't have a dynasty based on one championship in 14 years. China had a Ming dynasty. What have they won lately?

I'm surprised no body has mentioned how bad the Bid East was when UCONN first began winning big. I distinctly remember the Tennessee derisive comments about our weak conference the BIgEast responded and I predict the AAC will as well over time, if we stay in that league.

 

[UConnNick]

I'm a Yankee fan. The dynasty was 1949-1964 and 96,98-2000. You can't have a dynasty based on one championship in 14 years. China had a Ming dynasty. What have they won lately?

They're kicking ass economically, exporting low to mediocre quality goods all over the world (i.e. Wal Mart), and we owe them about a zillion dollars in foreign debt. I'd say they're doing pretty good for themselves right about now.

 

[j66kicker]

I'm a Yankee fan. The dynasty was 1949-1964 and 96,98-2000. You can't have a dynasty based on one championship in 14 years. China had a Ming dynasty. What have they won lately?

Well today is the first day of the next dynasty. Yankees up on Red sox 7-0 in the first inning right now.

 

[HuskyNan]

Well today is the first day of the next dynasty. Yankees up on Red sox 7-0 in the first inning right now.

I love Yankees' fans short term memory loss. Yes, they won yesterday but any memory of what happened on Friday and Saturday?

 

[Huskies Rule]

The relentless tsunami of disparaging, negative attacks on the UConn Women's Basketball Program used to bother the hell out of me. Remarks like "UConn fatigue," Evil Empire," "they're killing the game," "they recruit all the best players," and on and on ad nauseum. I took it personally because we UConn fans know how hard our girls work and deserve everything they have accomplished. But I came to realize it was never personal, it was never a hatred of UConn per se, but rather a trifling animus and jealousy that would have been directed at ANY team which achieved the kind of yearly dominance and ascendancy UConn did.

The anti-UConn venom would have been directed squarely and full-force at Notre Dame, had they won 5 of the last 7 National Championships instead of UConn. Or at a South Carolina, Duke, Tennessee or any other team which would have demonstrate such a sustained period of basketball supremacy. [But none of them did, so UConn bears the brunt of the negativity, not because of who we ,but because off what we have accomplished]

I DO think that UConn's extraordinary success has generated lots of enmity, but nothing which should be taken to heart. It's not "us," it's our success they can't stand.
As Michael said, "It ain't personal, Sonny. It's just business." And their enmity is, in fact, the highest possible praise.

 

[j66kicker]

I love Yankees' fans short term memory loss. Yes, they won yesterday but any memory of what happened on Friday and Saturday?

Nope. It has been said many times that a short memory is a characteristic of champions

 

[Bgillon]

The relentless tsunami of disparaging, negative attacks on the UConn Women's Basketball Program used to bother the hell out of me. Remarks like "UConn fatigue," Evil Empire," "they're killing the game," "they recruit all the best players," and on and on ad nauseum. I took it personally because we UConn fans know how hard our girls work and deserve everything they have accomplished. But I came to realize it was never personal, it was never a hatred of UConn per se, but rather a trifling animus and jealousy that would have been directed at ANY team which achieved the kind of yearly dominance and ascendancy UConn did.

The anti-UConn venom would have been directed squarely and full-force at Notre Dame, had they won 5 of the last 7 National Championships instead of UConn. Or at a South Carolina, Duke, Tennessee or any other team which would have demonstrate such a sustained period of basketball supremacy. [But none of them did, so UConn bears the brunt of the negativity, not because of who we ,but because off what we have accomplished]

I DO think that UConn's extraordinary success has generated lots of enmity, but nothing which should be taken to heart. It's not "us," it's our success they can't stand.
As Michael said, "It ain't personal, Sonny. It's just business." And their enmity is, in fact, the highest possible praise.
View attachment 9205

Another part of the "venom" directed at UCONN's is because of our coach. By that I mean our coach is a man in the sport of WOMEN'S BB. Secondly, he has a sharp wit, is very smart, can be very frank, and doesn't fear any public forum. Of course he also is an outstanding student of the game of basketball. The result is unprecedented success, envious competitors, and very happy UCONN fans.

 

[Zorro]

What Dobbs said.