Going into the season...I said
and he didn't foresee UCLA coming. Did you?
Why are we opening 2020 with a road game vs Utah State?
- Thread starter chipdouglas
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True. But people are also aware the ACC does this as well right? As long as you don't play ND, you get 4 noncons in the ACC. They've just done nothing with it really as a conference.
It is a statistical fact that playing better teams gives you a higher chance of losing. When that happens in Week 2, you're starting the season in a big fat hole. I think it's also fair to say that chances of key injuries - early in the season! - are greater against more talented/physical opponents.
OTOH, the evidence of needlessly difficult games paying dividends in conference is less clear to me. I'd even venture to say it doesn't exist.
And the fact that the ACC/SEC generally schedule the easiest games they can every year helps tip the scales further: those conferences loaded up this year on NMSU, Southern Miss, Western Carolina, William & Mary, Liberty, Old Dominion etc.
6 turnovers, terrible special teams play and coaching... I didnt see that train wreck coming. I dont think that is something you would have seen though.
Sports culture has become an "ends justify the means" entity, hasn't it?
The SEC sets the trend and their fans just willingly follow, blindly accepting anything they do if it leads them to a title.
I wonder if fans will ever reach a point where they realize they're spending a great deal of time and money watching a product that is largely unentertaining.
Imagine being an Alabama season ticket holder, your tickets arrive and it's Duke, New Mexico St, Southern Miss, Ole Miss, Tennessee, Arkansas, LSU & Western Carolina. Other than that LSU game, let's gas up the RV and watch 6 blow outs and maybe Tennessee gives you a game for a half.
It is what it is, I guess.
I don't mind a home and home with Utah St. but I'd rather see WSU open with IDAHO and then go to Utah St.
Me too, but for whatever reason, two schools located 8 miles apart can’t sell 25K tickets to a Labor Day in Pullman. That *should be* the annual season opener for both programs. It says a lot about the level of fan support we have that we can’t sell that game out.
Scheduling for us is an interesting balance. We want to play OOC teams that we can beat, so we get 3 quick wins and have a good chance at a bowl. But, if our 3 wins are too soft it could come back to bite us at the end of the season. So we don’t want it to be a steady diet of Northern Colorado, New Mexico State, and UNLV. There needs to be at least one team in the mix that isn’t a complete walkover. On top of that, if we have 3 cupcakes to start the season, that can hide deficiencies in our play that need to be corrected before we get to the conference schedule. We also need to have the foresight to figure out which teams are the right ones, usually a couple years before we play.
it’s true that Labor Day home games are almost always poorly attended. There have been very few exceptions to that. Maybe solution to that is that we either play on the road, or we adopt a scheduling model that moves a cupcake game to late October/early November, similar to what the SEC does. It creates another late win that’s effectively a late bye week, and creates the potential for Labor Day to be an off week for us, unless we choose to have a home game.
Regarding engaging fans in Tri-Cities...I’ve said many times before that WSU in general, and athletics in particular, have tended to completely ignore TC - even though they have a campus here. It would be supremely easy to have spring ball or early fall camp in TC. The spring game would be better attended here than in Pullman, but we don’t have a stadium that seats as many as Albi. Really seems like a no-brainer to me. They could even charge admission here, and if they tied it to some kind of local benefit it would probably improve attendance
it’s true that Labor Day home games are almost always poorly attended. There have been very few exceptions to that. Maybe solution to that is that we either play on the road, or we adopt a scheduling model that moves a cupcake game to late October/early November, similar to what the SEC does. It creates another late win that’s effectively a late bye week, and creates the potential for Labor Day to be an off week for us, unless we choose to have a home game.
Regarding engaging fans in Tri-Cities...I’ve said many times before that WSU in general, and athletics in particular, have tended to completely ignore TC - even though they have a campus here. It would be supremely easy to have spring ball or early fall camp in TC. The spring game would be better attended here than in Pullman, but we don’t have a stadium that seats as many as Albi. Really seems like a no-brainer to me. They could even charge admission here, and if they tied it to some kind of local benefit it would probably improve attendance
95, I found your post interesting. Regarding having the Spring game in the Tri-Cities, what is the largest stadium available there and would there be any possibility of increasing size with some temporary bleachers? Pullman is too isolated to avail itself to a large crowd for the Spring game. Albi is a depressing dump and seems to do little in the way of attracting the Spokane citizenry. The Tri-Cities might do well even if only as a change. Might stir some increased interest among alumni in the area. Worth a try?
A bit of a p.s. I live in Mercer Island and I'll be damned it I am going to drive 300 miles again to be depressed by Albi and I see enough of Hwy26 during the season. But check out the Yakima Valley wineries coming and going with some football in the middle? You bet. And even if the stadium is a tad on the small side, maybe a smaller but packed house would have a better environment.
Labor Day games in Martin have always been a problem. The detachment of Pullman from any of the state's population centers leaves us with at least one strike against the school as far as attracting crowds. Throw in Labor Day Weekend when many are taking advantage of the last opportunity for fishing, camping etc. and that's your second strike. An OOC game against a cupcake opponent and you're out at the plate. Only the diehards with no sense or nothing better to do- like me- show up. We should always schedule a road game for that weekend. Schedule it with a school with enough nearby population that the Labor Day effect will be minimized. Either that or, as I think you are suggesting, leave it as a bye week and schedule a Big Sky or Mountain West opponent in November or October. All of this would require the participation and approval of the Pac12 commissioner. Shultz and Chun would have to do some pretty hard leaning to put it across but the advantage to the school would be worth it. We are, after all, one of the Pac12 members and what is good for us would be good for the conference. Limo Larry or no Limo Larry.
A bit of a p.s. I live in Mercer Island and I'll be damned it I am going to drive 300 miles again to be depressed by Albi and I see enough of Hwy26 during the season. But check out the Yakima Valley wineries coming and going with some football in the middle? You bet. And even if the stadium is a tad on the small side, maybe a smaller but packed house would have a better environment.
Labor Day games in Martin have always been a problem. The detachment of Pullman from any of the state's population centers leaves us with at least one strike against the school as far as attracting crowds. Throw in Labor Day Weekend when many are taking advantage of the last opportunity for fishing, camping etc. and that's your second strike. An OOC game against a cupcake opponent and you're out at the plate. Only the diehards with no sense or nothing better to do- like me- show up. We should always schedule a road game for that weekend. Schedule it with a school with enough nearby population that the Labor Day effect will be minimized. Either that or, as I think you are suggesting, leave it as a bye week and schedule a Big Sky or Mountain West opponent in November or October. All of this would require the participation and approval of the Pac12 commissioner. Shultz and Chun would have to do some pretty hard leaning to put it across but the advantage to the school would be worth it. We are, after all, one of the Pac12 members and what is good for us would be good for the conference. Limo Larry or no Limo Larry.
Kennewicks stadium holds nearly 7,000...plenty big for a spring game. Now you guys are on to something.
That's all I've been saying. Playing Houston away didn't send anyone into panic mode last year. They finished 72nd. Yet playing the team that was 81st the previous year scares them.
I would argue that the entire conference would benefit from a late OOC game, for the same reasons we would, and for the same reasons the SEC does it every year. Really shouldn’t be a hard sell.
I’d also agree that having the spring game in a smaller stadium in TC would be a better environment than in Martin stadium with the same number in attendance. Actually, I think it would pull more attendance in TC, but that’s a different argument. Even in Spokane with 20K-ish seats available, the bulk of the crowd was in the beer garden or parking lot. A spring game in Lampson would be a popular way to spend a Saturday, and if proceeds went to support WSU-TC scholarships or something, it’d be a packed house.
Are you listening, WSU Athletic marketing? We’re dropping gems here.
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I get it, but I think the Houston game offered a pretty decent challenge, especially when factoring in the 2000-mile trip. We won by 3 points and there were plenty of times it felt like we were going to lose it. I was there and it definitely wasn't comfortable.
So if we wanted a better test, we would have had to have an even more difficult road trip--not sure what that would be--or a better opponent willing to come to Pullman (which pretty much isn't happening, and hasn't happened, other than Boise State's recent home-and-home).
Houston may have finished 72nd, but a lot of that was due to tanking the season. They were viewed as a reasonably solid team when we played them, and if they hadn't "redshirted" King after the loss to us and another loss in which they crapped the bed late, I would have expected them to finish more like 45th. Pretty awful on defense but the potential to have a solid offense with King. Trying to defend that guy was solid prep.
Your point is sound re Utah State not being all that great, though.
I don't that day will ever come for those in SEC country. The fans down there draw way too much of their own self worth from being a fan of a winning team. I don't doubt that lots of them actually believe they are better people than fans of teams that don't win as much. Conversely, that day has already come for lots of fans on the West Coast. It would be interesting to see a list of real life priorities for fans in different regions to see where football falls on the list compared to other "real" financial obligations. It might be shocking to see what some people who forego in order to support their teams
I don't know. I do genuinely get irritated when I see Alabama playing William & Mary in Week 9 every season, but who is the joke on when they're a serious contender for trophy case hardware every year, while ESPN still gets WSU & UW mixed up?
Given the narrow margin of victory these days, the fact that different conferences still play by different rules is insane to me.
Related: the SEC rightly takes heat for their 4 noncons, but nobody complains about the ACC because they don't cash it in for anything like the SEC does. But everybody needs to start with the same odds, or if they're not, that needs to be a random lottery decision, not the result of a scheduling strategy.
According to NMBR there is a stadium in Kennewick that holds 7000 and according to Bleeds there is one in Richland that holds 9000. Thanks, guys. Those sound appropriate for the Spring game. The more I think about this, the more I like it and see various advantages. A much shorter drive for myself and others in the Seattle-Tacoma area. An easy drive for those in the Portland-Vancouver area. Might even encourage those in said population centers to start thinking about attending some games in Martin. The novelty of the Spring game there would draw some in who would otherwise not care for driving all the way to Spokane or Pullman. Something new and fun.
Instead of just the usual beer garden, I suggest we consider adding a wine tasting section. The TCs are at the confluence of the Yakima, Columbia River and Walla Walla area grape growing regions. Sounds like a natural fit to me. Shouldn't be too hard to get some of the wineries interested in participating. WSU's wine outlets in Walla Walla, the TDCs and Prosser (?) should be able to nudge some into joining for an afternoon. And the wineries would not even have to pay for their employees to do the serving. Students in the enology program at WSU-TC could do that while handling wines from several wineries. All the wineries would have to do is ship a number of cases to the game and receive the leftovers back as well as a few proceeds. A bit of extra income for the various wineries as well as free advertising.
95 queried whether the administration office is paying attention. I would hope they are and suspect they do occasionally check out the Coug sites to get a glimpse at what a small portion of the fanbase is thinking. I would hope that Chun and staff at least give the TCs suggestion some consideration. C'mon, guys, Albi sucks and Martin is just inappropriate for a Spring game. Both are just too far and remote from most of us for what is basically a glorified scrimmage.
Instead of just the usual beer garden, I suggest we consider adding a wine tasting section. The TCs are at the confluence of the Yakima, Columbia River and Walla Walla area grape growing regions. Sounds like a natural fit to me. Shouldn't be too hard to get some of the wineries interested in participating. WSU's wine outlets in Walla Walla, the TDCs and Prosser (?) should be able to nudge some into joining for an afternoon. And the wineries would not even have to pay for their employees to do the serving. Students in the enology program at WSU-TC could do that while handling wines from several wineries. All the wineries would have to do is ship a number of cases to the game and receive the leftovers back as well as a few proceeds. A bit of extra income for the various wineries as well as free advertising.
95 queried whether the administration office is paying attention. I would hope they are and suspect they do occasionally check out the Coug sites to get a glimpse at what a small portion of the fanbase is thinking. I would hope that Chun and staff at least give the TCs suggestion some consideration. C'mon, guys, Albi sucks and Martin is just inappropriate for a Spring game. Both are just too far and remote from most of us for what is basically a glorified scrimmage.
Poor special teams coaching decisions? Not surprised.
6 turnovers? No.
Continuing to do the same thing while expecting diff results? Yes.
Still a grass field?
Nearby parking marginal. (Or in use for other activities)
Booze angle at both fields (and at some of the school parking lots used for tailgating) could be tricky.
Media coverage weaker and they are primarily HS fields where college football games have never been played. (HS scoreboards being shown on Pac12 Network would look shabby)
Could spend the same time need to work through those issues and use that to improve hosting it in Pullman with WSU staff already in place.
If you want more media coverage at a good facility have it (or just a single spring practice) at the Seahawks HQ in Renton.
All the Seattle media have interview & remote set ups at that place. Not sure of NCAA legality.
None of those things are insurmountable, and keeping it in Pullman or moving to Seattle don’t address the issues with outreach to the region.
Media concerns are weak. They don’t do much media for spring games anyway, and the Albi scoreboard isn’t impressing anyone. How often do you see a scoreboard shot in TV anymore anyway?
