Is it me or is there just no enthusiasm around this season? | Page 2 | The Boneyard

Is it me or is there just no enthusiasm around this season?

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whaler11

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It's not just you. It's been odd how little juice the team had in the offseason even forgetting the rough start.

I can tell you that I HATE 3:30 starts for games that aren't interesting. Forces you to miss the entire day of college football. I'd much rather have a noon start tomorrow.
 

whaler11

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If I had to put a finger on the reason why:

The Big East just is not a good football league. Most UConn fans have become accustomed to playing in a top league with an excellent team due to the success in basketball. In contrast the football league is brutal to watch in comparison to the big games played on a national stage.

I love the Big East and I'll end up watching 90% of the league's games because I'm invested as a fan, but it's a tough league to be a casual fan of.
 

whaler11

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I have seen every team in the Big East play a game and I am convinced we have the best defense in the league. That's something to be excited about.

Specifically:
Kendall Reyes
Sio Moore
Blidi
Byron Jones
Jennings
Jesse Joseph
Trevardo
Smallwood

And most importantly Don Brown

We are a couple of plays away from being 4 - 0 and we are undefeated in the league.

Have a couple beers and be loud tomorrow. It's a football game not a trip to the dentist.

This league is 100% up for grabs and that defense gives UConn a chance every week. The offense probably won't give them enough to win 5 or 6 games and have a chance, but it's not out of the realm of possibility if Johnny finds his groove.
 
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It's not just you. It's been odd how little juice the team had in the offseason even forgetting the rough start.

I can tell you that I HATE 3:30 starts for games that aren't interesting. Forces you to miss the entire day of college football. I'd much rather have a noon start tomorrow.

I agree. After initially not liking 12:00, I have since realized that it is ideal. Almost no great football games are played at noon, and living in South Windsor, I'm home by about 4:00 for the next set of games and the night games. Some great football on tomorrow and unfortunately will miss most of it (although good games at night, no doubt).

Benefit is I will get another few hours of sleep in the morning.
 
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I'm also in Section 241, and what I see is this:

1) When we aren't playing a big name school at home, plenty of the seats around me are either empty or occupied by somebody who doesn't own the tickets (meaning people give tickets away for the weaker games). There is a strong group of people that use their season tickets for every game no matter who the opponent is, but that probably only accounts for half the fan base. It has always been this way and I don't think it is worse this year.

2) LOTS of people come to the Rent for the party, and the football game is icing on the cake. That alone will keep attendance north of 30K unless the program falls off the map.

3) There was NO enthusiasm about last season in my section. The diehards complained about every inside handoff, every bad pass, and whined about every game even though we won ALL of them at home. Up until our last home game, when it became "possible" for us to go to a BCS game...there were always predictions of gloom and doom, even from the people that showed up every game.

Bottom line...the fan base at large has a long way to go...and given the demographics of the fan base and the way the people in this state are in general, I just don't see it changing that rapidly.
 
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A good proportion of the fan base is just ignorant. In my section (used to be 241 but is another one now and will be numberless) the commentary about the game is often moronic and indicates a total lack of understanding about college football and UConn or its opponent in particular. For a brief while it was funny but has now become irritating. I also marvel at the incredible amount of $8 beer some people will consume. Getting beer and drinking it is the focus of the day, not the game. Hey, I consume a decent portion of ETOH before I walk in but spending $40 on $8 worth of beer and making it my day is just insane. I could go on and on but I've said what I observed. An eight year old in NC knows more about college football than many of the adults in my section.
 
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Last year, speaking for myself, I absolutely knew in my heart that while we sucked at that time in the season we were capable of beating everyone on our schedule. This year, I don't have anywhere near that feeling.

But to respond to Carl, it's not investment. I could not be more invested in this season -- any season. But it's a question of whether you start watching a game with anticipation or dread.

This.
 
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i think you're having a revisionist history in regards to last season. we were a darkhorse pick to win the BE going into the season and had a big opening at the Big House, but by this point in the season we'd just lost to Temple and Waylon had predicted a 2 win season.
 
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i think you're having a revisionist history in regards to last season. we were a darkhorse pick to win the BE going into the season and had a big opening at the Big House, but by this point in the season we'd just lost to Temple and Waylon had predicted a 2 win season.

I sort of agree with this. I thought we had a pretty good shot at being good last year, but when Louisville shellacked us, I was like... okay, you know what, maybe we ARE terrible. A lot can change over the course of a season.
 
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We have 6 seats in 104. Have had seats since Memorial.
The section is dead as can be. Except for a couple rows in the middle.
Pretty much if you stand on a non 3rd down play you are told to sit.

God forbid you want to get up and get behind your team. It's FOOTBALL NOT the BUSHNELL !!!

A lot of old farts sitting there on their hands(win or lose).

The atmosphere is the total opposite of what it could/should be.

I feel for this year there is a doom and gloom feeling mostly because for the first time in a long while we don't have a game changer on offense. Seems like the O will struggle to get 17 points a game. Unless the D is lights out(like against Buffalo) it's going to be tough to win in the BE. Hope I'm wrong.

Also, already losing 2 very winnable games has not excited anybody.
 
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No. Not even close.
My crew for today has shrunk from its normal 18-20 down to 8. Going to be a lot of silver showing on TV and probably very few noise induced false starts for WMU I fear.
 

nelsonmuntz

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For me, the conference mess has sucked the life out of this season. It is hard to focus on the season when UConn could be playing in the MAC 5 years from now. Any kind of resolution on that, even a commitment by the Big East schools to stick together, would re-energize me and I suspect a lot of the fan base. Just get rid of the uncertainty.

Secondarily, this is the most jazzed i have been about the basketball team before a season since before Okafor's final year. This could be a historic year for the UConn hoops. That is a lot of competition for a football team whose upside is a Meinecke Bowl invitation against a 7-5 ACC team.

As for the team itself, it is definitely getting better every game. Vanderbilt and Iowa State are a lot better than I expected, and UConn lost close games to both. I am not that worried about the game today. I don't expect a blowout, but I think UConn will win comfortably.
 

ctchamps

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I'm also in Section 241, and what I see is this:

1) When we aren't playing a big name school at home, plenty of the seats around me are either empty or occupied by somebody who doesn't own the tickets (meaning people give tickets away for the weaker games). There is a strong group of people that use their season tickets for every game no matter who the opponent is, but that probably only accounts for half the fan base. It has always been this way and I don't think it is worse this year.

2) LOTS of people come to the Rent for the party, and the football game is icing on the cake. That alone will keep attendance north of 30K unless the program falls off the map.

3) There was NO enthusiasm about last season in my section. The diehards complained about every inside handoff, every bad pass, and whined about every game even though we won ALL of them at home. Up until our last home game, when it became "possible" for us to go to a BCS game...there were always predictions of gloom and doom, even from the people that showed up every game.

Bottom line...the fan base at large has a long way to go...and given the demographics of the fan base and the way the people in this state are in general, I just don't see it changing that rapidly.

There are always passionate, knowledgeable fans at UConn games. There are usually greater numbers of passionate and knowledgeable fans at UConn games when the games are against better opponents and the game has importance. But UConn does suffer, in relative numbers, passionate fans compared to many other programs.

Two years ago Georgia played an important game against Alabama. The Gerogia fans dressed in red. It was an impressive showing on television. Everywhere it was red. Every fan was standing. By halftime the game was over for Georgia. No one left. They were still standing.

UConn has more than its share of fans that think it is dumb to put on a color to support the school. There are many fans that refuse to stand up even during exciting moments and many of these fans are not geriatric. Far too many people leave well before the game ends. Certainly less so if the game is exciting and the outcome is uncertain. But I'm always amazed anyone leaves in these games.

This is not just a problem for football. I've been to men's and women's bb games during seasons of NC runs and the above holds true.

Fans on the Boneyard forums are not the prototypical UConn fans. They are the prototypical fans of the major programs in the South and Midwest. Too many fans attending UConn games believe it is wrong to express passion and emotions. They are either successful, stoic types or puritan types.

The Northeast does not lack passionate fans. Anyone attending or observing a Giants game, Eagles game, Patriots game, Yankees or Red Sox game knows this. But this passion is not nearly as evident at the UConn games. The problem imo, was the push by Lew Perkins and Jeff Hathaway to get corporate people into the arenas. Many of these fans have allegiances to other schools and/or many of these fans find sports a diversion or trophy and not an important part of life.

The passionate fans were first moved to upper seats and then out of the arenas all together. President Herbst and the future AD must, imo, reverse this. They could take immediate steps by getting more students into the venues. And not by a lottery which ignores the passionate students, but by allowing the kids to camp out for games. Reserve some seats for high school kids in the state. Hold contests in which kids compete in cheering and dressing competitions for seats. And get those blue collar crazies back into the seats as well.

This doesn't have to be accomplished all at once. Start with a mix, keeping the big sponsors for the immediate bucks. But begin the process. The school needs to think long term and value long term loyalty. The school needs to factor the importance of a large fan base that, although it can't come up with tens of thousands of dollars in donations, will turn on a television set and tune into the game and show ESPN it has a huge viewership to consider. There is no reason at all that UConn should have trouble filling 75,000 to 100,000 seats if they start the process of bringing in the right "type" of fan. I remember growing up and going to the Yale Bowl and there would be 70,000 screaming fans for an Ivy League game.
 
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There are always passionate, knowledgeable fans at UConn games. There are usually greater numbers of passionate and knowledgeable fans at UConn games when the games are against better opponents and the game has importance. But UConn does suffer, in relative numbers, passionate fans compared to many other programs.

Two years ago Georgia played an important game against Alabama. The Gerogia fans dressed in red. It was an impressive showing on television. Everywhere it was red. Every fan was standing. By halftime the game was over for Georgia. No one left. They were still standing.

UConn has more than its share of fans that think it is dumb to put on a color to support the school. There are many fans that refuse to stand up even during exciting moments and many of these fans are not geriatric. Far too many people leave well before the game ends. Certainly less so if the game is exciting and the outcome is uncertain. But I'm always amazed anyone leaves in these games.

This is not just a problem for football. I've been to men's and women's bb games during seasons of NC runs and the above holds true.

Fans on the Boneyard forums are not the prototypical UConn fans. They are the prototypical fans of the major programs in the South and Midwest. Too many fans attending UConn games believe it is wrong to express passion and emotions. They are either successful, stoic types or puritan types.

The Northeast does not lack passionate fans. Anyone attending or observing a Giants game, Eagles game, Patriots game, Yankees or Red Sox game knows this. But this passion is not nearly as evident at the UConn games. The problem imo, was the push by Lew Perkins and Jeff Hathaway to get corporate people into the arenas. Many of these fans have allegiances to other schools and/or many of these fans find sports a diversion or trophy and not an important part of life.

The passionate fans were first moved to upper seats and then out of the arenas all together. President Herbst and the future AD must, imo, reverse this. They could take immediate steps by getting more students into the venues. And not by a lottery which ignores the passionate students, but by allowing the kids to camp out for games. Reserve some seats for high school kids in the state. Hold contests in which kids compete in cheering and dressing competitions for seats. And get those blue collar crazies back into the seats as well.

This doesn't have to be accomplished all at once. Start with a mix, keeping the big sponsors for the immediate bucks. But begin the process. The school needs to think long term and value long term loyalty. The school needs to factor the importance of a large fan base that, although it can't come up with tens of thousands of dollars in donations, will turn on a television set and tune into the game and show ESPN it has a huge viewership to consider. There is no reason at all that UConn should have trouble filling 75,000 to 100,000 seats if they start the process of bringing in the right "type" of fan. I remember growing up and going to the Yale Bowl and there would be 70,000 screaming fans for an Ivy League game.
Amen brother...amen
 
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I am more enthusiastic this season than any season in the past and I have been rooting for UConn since before Edsall. I have high hopes that Coach P will be able to move the program to the next level. I am looking forward to this team making gradual progress, as it learns the new systems and adjust to the loss of some great players. I think recruiting is on an uptick and the future is looking good. Go UConn!
 
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Not feeling it. Last year, the build up to the game at the Big House got things rolling quickly.

This year..first game delayed cause of hurricane, two bad losses and one ugly win.

I'm just not feeling it like other years.

Need this team to inject some excitement into the season tomorrow
Yeah. Johnny Mac better do something. If we start 2-3 and have the whole conference schedule coming up, we'll struggle to make a bowl. Lose to WVU and Pitt would make us 2-5 (well, either 3-5 or 2-6, because we'd have to play USF first). But we're in trouble if we lose today. And we still are. Excitement requires motivation. I got nome.
 
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