LVille Gametime set

[rich1122]

Please show us proof Warde had a choice. One benefit of late start is more high school recruits who play on Friday nights get to see more of the game.

Bottom line is 5 straight hours of UConn on TV is more valuable than 3 plus 2.

I kind of agree with this line of thinking. I would have liked it much less if it was a Thursday or Wednesday. 5 hours on a Friday against quality opponents, well it does wonders I think.

 

[whaler11]

I am missing how exposure is UConn's problem.

 

[mattp]

You will lose a few but not much. My friends from the city are still hitting the football game because clearly that's the better attraction that night.

Like you said your friends in the city will be going to the football game. I'm sure a lot of them would have made their way to the Barclay Center if the games were on different days. I think the Rent will still be full, and I think we'll still show well in Brooklyn, but they will somewhat cannibalize each others crowds. Considering how important our attendance in Brooklyn is when viewed from the conference alignment/NYC market penetration perspective, it really sucks that we're not giving ourselves our best chance to impress. The Barclay Center holds about 18k and we need the game to be a sell out if we're going to claim that NYC gives a damn about UConn basketball.

 

[J187Money]

It probably wouldn't be a sellout in November if you moved it to Saturday and held it in the Garden. Yes you will lose handfuls of people either way and I'd prefer they weren't the same night but it is hardly an abomination.

 

[whaler11]

The bad outcome are the people who skip the football game to watch basketball instead. It's an easy out if the football season isn't going well.

 

[J187Money]

The bad outcome are the people who skip the football game to watch basketball instead. It's an easy out if the football season isn't going well.

I suppose it is possible that I could be one of those people - if the team is in shambles. But I work in the city so that's an easier choice. But I still don't see it happening.

 

[freescooter]

Wow, UConn gets an 7 hours of prime time ESPN and a night home game against a probable top 10 team, and there is still bitching. Wow. If UConn has 5-6 wins going to the Louisville game, the Rent will be packed. I think this is awesome.

This is a pretty inane argument. It might make sense if UConn were playing at Louisville and another away opponent. But we're at home and at a venue that is close enough for half our fan base to get to. But as someone above put it, we accepted second class status. Not in order to play Duke, not Kentucky, not Indiana, but a 2nd rate ACC team. In a game that starts at 6:30. So you're going to get a group of fans who stay home to watch the basketball game, and a group who travel to Barclays to watch it, both of which will hurt the gate for the football game, then an 8:30 kick off will discourage even more of the casual fans we need to cultivate...and really, if UConn basketball needs this kind of exposure, we're in much worse shape than I thought even in my most pessimistic moments.

"Please show us proof Warde had a choice. "
To quote Ronald Reagan, "Just say NO." Say, "we'll play it on Saturday night because we have a big home football game on Friday." Keep in mind this is a game with Maryland we're talking about, not Duke or North Carolina. We should be the ones dictating terms, not a mid level ACC program. This is the kind of scheduling that mid-majors do all the time. Team from a major conference comes along and says we don't care what you want, we need a game on this date, in this location. Shut up and show up. It isn't the kind of scheduling that supposed powers, winning winners who win winningly as Susan Herbst might say, do. Maybe next year, Warde will be able to top this and schedule a home football game and a home basketball game at the same time. that would be really cool. We could show the basketball game on the scoreboard at the Rent and the football game on the scoreboard at Gampel...and set up big screen tvs in the corners of each venue to show the home hockey and soccer games as well...this was utter incompetence on the part of the Athletic Department.

 

[freescooter]

I suppose it is possible that I could be one of those people - if the team is in shambles. But I work in the city so that's an easier choice. But I still don't see it happening.

Or if its a cold night or if its rainy or threatening rain or if its dark...

 

[uconnflyer88]

"Please show us proof Warde had a choice. "
We should be the ones dictating terms, not a mid level ACC program..

I believe it's ESPN that dictates the terms.....therefore, Warde has no choice

 

[freescooter]

I believe it's ESPN that dictates the terms.....therefore, Warde has no choice

Just say no, we aren't playing that night. ESPN doesn't decide who schedules who in non-conference games, for heaven sakes. We were offered this game and Warde said ok. he should have said "Get bent! We're UConn. We won't schedule against ourselves. And we can find someone else to play us on Saturday" Just admit it. Warde acted like the mid-major AD he is. He so wanted to play in new york (never mind we're playing in Brooklyn, not MSG), against a team from a P5 league (never mind that its maryland, not Duke) that he agreed to a bad arrangement. Major programs don't compete agaisnt themselves. Mid majors agree to anything to get to share a court with the likes of Maryland.

 

[uconnflyer88]

Just say no, we aren't playing that night. ESPN doesn't decide who schedules who in non-conference games, for heaven sakes. We were offered this game and Warde said ok. he should have said "Get bent! We're UConn. We won't schedule against ourselves. And we can find someone else to play us on Saturday"

....I think you just made that entire post up

ESPN has contracts with both AAC and ACC, I'm pretty sure they decide who they want on Saturday vs. Friday since it is there network that will be showing the games, why would it make sense that we could dictate when ESPN can show games on their network?

 

[uconnflyer88]

Think about it, what is ESPN's number one goal...more viewers right?

You have a mediocre (in their eyes) Football team with a national powerhouse basketball team.....what is the best way to get the most viewers

Show the national powerhouse basketball team first, and hope that people will want to watch both games knowing that they can't physically go to both

Allows for more viewers than if games were shown on separate days with other compeition

 

[freescooter]

....I think you just made that entire post up

ESPN has contracts with both AAC and ACC, I'm pretty sure they decide who they want on Saturday vs. Friday since it is there network that will be showing the games, why would it make sense that we could dictate when ESPN can show games on their network?

ESPN doesn't decide who our non-conference schedule will be. They simply do not. They approached UConn about this game. UConn should have said exactly what I said. "NO. We have an important home football game that night and need that to be the focus of things on that date." It might have meant we don't play Maryland, but come on, its Maryland. And maybe we don't play a November game at Barclays, but again, so what. We're playing at MSG 2 weeks later. You, I think, share Warde's outlook that we're a mid-major now so we should just shut up and do as the big boys tell us. At least we know where we stand, I guess.

 

[J187Money]

Or if its a cold night or if its rainy or threatening rain or if its dark...

I'm only talking about the theoretical possibility, of course. Because I haven't missed a home game since the Rent opened. Even games where I couldn't stay the whole time, I at least showed up late or left early.

*I* am not the guy that talks all kind of ^&^$ and won't show up to a game.

 

[dsturdy5]

ESPN certainly does push the envelope for OOC basketball games. They were the ones who got UConn vs Florida. They want more of these games and they want them in the "dead" periods when there are few marquee games such as the opening week and between the preseason tourneys and conference games. They pushed the B1G/ACC challenge, SEC/Big East challenge, etc. They set up the AD's and then get to air the games.

 

[Waquoit]

Warde's outlook [is] that we're a mid-major now so we should just shut up and do as the big boys tell us.

It's hard to argue otherwise. He agreed to this last year and again this year.

 

[freescooter]

dsturdy5,
I don't disagree with you that ESPN wants this type of game. I wouldn't be surprised if they were the ones who proposed it to UConn. But they don't have the ability to make us schedule someone out of conference unless its one of the Challenge series. So UConn could have and should have just said no, not interested in playing in a crappy timeslot on a night when we have a big home football game, which also ends up in a less desireable time slot, by the way. this is the 2nd year in a row that our AD has agreed to this, too. the difference of course was that last year it had less impact, since the game in Germany wasn't accessible to a chunk of the fan base. And just an interesting note, last year's Pitt game had the 2nd lowest attendance of our home games, just barely beating out the Cincy game. there is obviously no way to prove it, but I'd suspect that at least a few fans stayed home to watch the basketball game rather than trek to East Hartford.

For what its worth, I also agree with flyer88 that ESPN cares about viewers. We do too but not at the expense of fans in the seats, especially at Rentchler Field. As was pointed out above, we need to create at least the illusion that people care about UConn football, and ideally create the illusion that UConn basketball is the toast of New York. By agreeing to this game, both those propositions became more difficult.

 

[BlueMAB]

We are going to have (for consecutive years) 5+ hours of UConn programming on a national network with the potential to catch millions of eyeballs.

This is a bad thing?

It sucks for the minority of UConn fans who have to choose between attending a football game at home, or basketball game in Brooklyn. All 5,000-6,000 of us. For the hundreds of thousands who watch on TV, this is awesome.

We win both games and we'll be all over sportscenter and probably one of the lead stories on Gameday the next morning. Especially if we have a decent record at the time.

 

[J187Money]

FS - I don't think people are disagreeing with you that it isn't optimal. But what if it was play this game, or not get a P5 game of similar stature? You seem to be assuming we could have just picked what we wanted. Or maybe that isn't the case, and we'd have ended up with another Vermont game or the equivalent, not in NYC, which lots of people would skip anyway because it is Vermont. The team is much better off having Maryland on the schedule, than something less than Maryland.

Also - to your other point about the time of the football game. It is a Friday. If the game is at 7, that means anyone from outside the Hartford area has to leave work early, make special plans, take a half-day, etc to get up there by kickoff. For working people that live outside a 30 minute ride to the Rent, 8:30 on a Friday is probably a better time (I know it is for me). On a Thursday I might agree given how late the game will run, but for a Friday night game I think 8:30 is fine.

 

[whaler11]

Hundreds of thousands of UConn fans watch on TV?

 

[J187Money]

Hundreds of thousands of UConn fans watch on TV?

Billions?

 

[BlueMAB]

Hundreds of thousands of UConn fans watch on TV?

You don't think 100,000 or more of the viewers that night will be UConn fans?

If we can get 30,000+ to show up for a football game, another 5-7,000 to show up for a basketball game the same night; it's reasonable to estimate that for every fan in the seat, 3-5 will be watching on TV sets around the country.

Whether you agree with that estimate or not, we know that there is the potential for millions of TV sets to be tuned into UConn athletics for 5 hours. This is a good thing no matter what Debbie downer has to say about it.

 

[freescooter]

FS - I don't think people are disagreeing with you that it isn't optimal. But what if it was play this game, or not get a P5 game of similar stature? You seem to be assuming we could have just picked what we wanted. Or maybe that isn't the case, and we'd have ended up with another Vermont game or the equivalent, not in NYC, which lots of people would skip anyway because it is Vermont. The team is much better off having Maryland on the schedule, than something less than Maryland.

Also - to your other point about the time of the football game. It is a Friday. If the game is at 7, that means anyone from outside the Hartford area has to leave work early, make special plans, take a half-day, etc to get up there by kickoff. For working people that live outside a 30 minute ride to the Rent, 8:30 on a Friday is probably a better time (I know it is for me). On a Thursday I might agree given how late the game will run, but for a Friday night game I think 8:30 is fine.

J187,
we still have a finicky fan base. I think the later start hurts attendance. It wouldn't at Alabama but it does at UConn. I don't know that playing Maryland or not playing Maryland is that big a deal. It's Maryland as I said. Kind of like playing Washington or Wake Forest. On the good side, people know who they are. On the bad, they aren't that good. NIT semis last year. I htink if they played Vermont in the season opener at Gampel on Saturday night that would be a much better outcome. Not sure why we need a game of this "stature" to the extent Maryland has any stature currently. And we could have likely found another opponent, for a different date of equal stature with a bit of effort anyway. These are schools people have actually heard of that had RPIs within 6 spots plus or minus of Maryland at the end of last season: Better than MD were BYU, Eastern KY, Baylor, Stephen Austin and Denver. Worse than MD were Wyoming, Stanford, Indiana State, Virginia and Montana. Not exactly tough to find an "or equal" to the Terps. My guess is you could have made a game with most of them, played it at Gampel and not hurt your RPI one bit. The problem here was that ESPN and Maryland called and Warde did his usual and genuflected because they are "big time programs" kissed their backsides and said "whatever you say Sir" instead of standing up for his programs.

 

[freescooter]

Just one more note on Maryland. they are one of those teams that gets a much higher RPI than they deserve by virtue of playing in the ACC. As statistical analyses show that the RPI over values Strength of Schedule anyway, so a mediocre team in a good league always gets treated better than it deserves.

 

[huskymedic]

J187, we still have a finicky fan base. I think the later start hurts attendance. It wouldn't at Alabama but it does at UConn.

We've had 8:00p kickoffs on Fridays before without anyone biotching - you can't convince me that an 8:30p kick-off against Lousiville is a bad thing unless you have to be @ work by midnight. Lots open @ 4:3o. Has the making for a great night!

 

[sportsart]

ESPN did not schedule MD for us, but they did tell us when they would like to schedule it on ESPN 2.

We could have turned it down and taken ESPNU or ESPN3 the next day.

Warde made the correct choice no matter what the clueless think

 

[J187Money]

We've had 8:00p kickoffs on Fridays before without anyone biotching - you can't convince me that an 8:30p kick-off against Lousiville is a bad thing unless you have to be @ work by midnight. Lots open @ 4:3o. Has the making for a great night!

I think people might leave earlier if the game is a blowout (either way), but I don't think it affects the actual gate much. Maybe 5% - the other 95% of the variable attendance will be directly correlated to our on-field performance.

 

[whaler11]

You don't think 100,000 or more of the viewers that night will be UConn fans?

If we can get 30,000+ to show up for a football game, another 5-7,000 to show up for a basketball game the same night; it's reasonable to estimate that for every fan in the seat, 3-5 will be watching on TV sets around the country.

Whether you agree with that estimate or not, we know that there is the potential for millions of TV sets to be tuned into UConn athletics for 5 hours. This is a good thing no matter what Debbie downer has to say about it.

Hundreds of thousands is defined as 200,000 plus. That's the definition of the words. You'd have to define 'fan' to actually try to estimate.

I'm fine with the Maryland game. I'd prefer a time I could attend because I haven't been to the Brooklyn arena. I do think that the scheduling could lead to people staying home to watch both instead of attending either. That's just reality.

 

[uconnflyer88]

ESPN did not schedule MD for us, but they did tell us when they would like to schedule it on ESPN 2.

We could have turned it down and taken ESPNU or ESPN3 the next day.

Warde made the correct choice no matter what the clueless think

this

 

[J187Money]

I can't see skipping a football game against a ranked opponent that I have tickets for in order to stay home and watch a basketball game in November. But I guess that's just me.