Tulane is...good???

[SouthronCross]

Tulane can become something solid. It is in fact quite sad that they let a once very quality football program sink as far as it did. Not long ago (the year Skip brought us to the 1-AA playoffs) Tulane had an undefeated season and finished something like #8 in the final poll.

Their biggest obstacle (and this is permanent) is that once they left the SEC, they gave the entire state (as a fan base) to LSU. It took quite a few years (until the early 1980's) but their fan base steadily deteriorated while LSU's grew. At best they may be able to hope for a Boise St situation where they have a stadium that consistently has ~ 32k-34k dedicated fans.

Great post.

Tulane completely screwed themselves when they left the SEC in 1965. And, they've never recovered from it.

They could conceiveably become another version of Boise State. Especially with their location, relative to good recruiting grounds. But, they'd have to sacrafice their academic standards in a major way to even be competitive now. I cannot see them going to that extreme. Vanderbilt has done that, to a degree, but, I do not see it working for them, long term.

 

[whaler11]

Just wanted to touch base on the original question... Nope.

 

[Fishy]

In fairness to Pudge, he only said Tulane is "sort of good".

Which they're not.

 

[UConnDan97]

In fairness to Pudge, he only said Tulane is "sort of good".

Which they're not.

It was me. I want to make sure that Pudge's good name will not be smeared by ties to a thread that suggested Tulane might be "sort of good". I now realize they're "sort of not"...

 

[UConnDan97]

This reminds me; there was a Tulane fan in my row during the Michigan game (yes....a Tulane fan....so approximately 20% of their fanbase was in my row). He was a friendly, talkative, and unapologetic Tulane fan (Tulane sweater and all). It was fun chatting with him. He's quite happy that Montana's kid is their starting quarterback now. I didn't have the heart to tell him that his team got destroyed by Cuse last night, mostly because he was rooting for his fellow AAC school. God bless that man....he's gonna need it...

 

[whaler11]

This reminds me; there was a Tulane fan in my row during the Michigan game (yes....a Tulane fan....so approximately 20% of their fanbase was in my row). He was a friendly, talkative, and unapologetic Tulane fan (Tulane sweater and all). It was fun chatting with him. He's quite happy that Montana's kid is their starting quarterback now. I didn't have the heart to tell him that his team got destroyed by Cuse last night, mostly because he was rooting for his fellow AAC school. God bless that man....he's gonna need it...

You sure it's not Mitch McDeere?

Tulane is lucky they missed the Louisville/Rutgers AAC year. Their schedule is ridiculously hilarious. They might actually win 5 games... Because someone has to win.

The only school they play that doesn't have a direction or city in the name is Rice.

 

[Pudge]

I simply don't see the upside in pissing all over theses schools in this conference.

Does it make You feel good? Of course not ... it's depressing. Aresco did say the other night that the American Athletic Conference could be better than the old Big East. Haha. I think we overrated some of the names ... Pitt & Syracuse ... through most of our existence in the BE. I think the ACC valued them on some poor metrics on TV and market. But, I don't believe that Tulane or East Carolina are going to make this conference better than the 2003/2004 Big East Football we entered.

There is, however, the potential that Memphis or others could be good; one good coach can make a Program. We did see Cincinnati, UConn, Rutgers get much better over the decade (and USF too). I think UCF can be really good. But ... over the whole list ... we are not going to be comparable.

 

[billybud]

The problem with the ACC expansion was that there were only so many teams available that sort of fit the ACC footprint....

Syracuse was most likely brought in; 1. Because Shalala had wanted Cuse in the ACC from Miami's first discussions with the ACC in 2001, and 2. Because Notre Dame had some history with Cuse and a large New York fan base.

Pitt is a long time staple on the Notre Dame schedule and had the support of the basketball guys in the ACC.

I believe that the ACC was committed to bringing in two teams that would make Notre Dame comfortable with playing football in the conference.

 

[whaler11]

I simply don't see the upside in pissing all over theses schools in this conference.

Does it make You feel good? Of course not ... it's depressing. Aresco did say the other night that the American Athletic Conference could be better than the old Big East. Haha. I think we overrated some of the names ... Pitt & Syracuse ... through most of our existence in the BE. I think the ACC valued them on some poor metrics on TV and market. But, I don't believe that Tulane or East Carolina are going to make this conference better than the 2003/2004 Big East Football we entered.

There is, however, the potential that Memphis or others could be good; one good coach can make a Program. We did see Cincinnati, UConn, Rutgers get much better over the decade (and USF too). I think UCF can be really good. But ... over the whole list ... we are not going to be comparable.

Please - mine and anyone else's opinion of Tulane doesn't matter.

It was a ridiculously stupid addition to the league.

Memphis and Tulane will never sustain success in football. Fuente's clock is probably already running.

There is a pretty big difference between the Big East and the AAC. One of them had an autobid to the BCS. This is nothing like Cincinnati and Louisville joining the Big East. This is a bunch of CUSA schools joining CUSA with a better logo.

 

[UConnDan97]

I simply don't see the upside in pissing all over theses schools in this conference.

Does it make You feel good? Of course not ... it's depressing. Aresco did say the other night that the American Athletic Conference could be better than the old Big East. Haha. I think we overrated some of the names ... Pitt & Syracuse ... through most of our existence in the BE. I think the ACC valued them on some poor metrics on TV and market. But, I don't believe that Tulane or East Carolina are going to make this conference better than the 2003/2004 Big East Football we entered.

There is, however, the potential that Memphis or others could be good; one good coach can make a Program. We did see Cincinnati, UConn, Rutgers get much better over the decade (and USF too). I think UCF can be really good. But ... over the whole list ... we are not going to be comparable.

If I came off as making fun of them, that was not my intent. Do they have potential? Yes, from the standpoint that they have a large endowment and if they were to want to invest in football, they could. I was commenting more on what they are now, which I thought maybe was better than I had originally assessed them as. At this point, I think they are only slightly better than what I had originally assessed them as, which is not very good...