Eric_Soncrant

Hey Everyone: I just wanted to add a couple of facts to this conversation in defense of our department and SG. Over the past two years, the following things have been done to encourage student involvement/attendance at games: Student Bulls Club Sixth Bull - started last year to bring some consitency to our student sections. Will do something similar for football but working with marketing on this one. Student Tailgates at RJS - the marketing department has brought in WBUL to provide pregame entertainment in the tailgate lots prior to home football games. Continuing to build on this for the upcoming year. Selling Beer at SunDome - although not specifically to market towards students, SG pushed this policy through and with their help we continue to sell beer at home basketball games and promote drinking responsibly. Student Lounge at SunDome - area at Entry 2 (student entrance) with pregame entertainment and concessions that opens before the rest of the SunDome to encourage students to come out. Will continue to build on this. Student Government played a big role in that. On the criticism of not using current student to help market to students, we have and will continue to utilize them as interns. Just because some of these things weren't happening when you were here, doesn't mean they aren't happening now. Some of you I know are going to rip on some of this, but I don't think it's right to wine about what we aren't doing without stating what we are doing. These are baby steps towards rebuilding the tradition of students going to games and providing us with a real home court/field advantage. We even did provide complimentary beer prior to one game last year but don't expect that to be of the norm (way too much liability). But we will continue to build on these ideas and others. Suggestions are always welcome on what else we could do (and we get it, free food/beer but even when we have the free food, the student come for the food and leave before the game (see Hooters)). Our new marketing person starts in a week and he is ready to hit the ground running. This concludes my editorial defense. Eric

Actually that would be when bulls fly! ;D Get it, we'd have to fly to San Francisco....nevermind! Eric

As long as the criticism is constructive and not just bashing someone personally, keep it coming. These are suggestions from the same people we want to have involved. So the suggestion that golf isn't for everyone and that they loved the golf will be valuable as we continue to build. Cubanbull is right, what works in one area isn't going to work everywhere in the state. These events may take on completely different forms in various parts of the state and country. Keep the helpful suggestions coming! Go Bulls! Eric

All the information on away games is listed in our official site www.gousfbulls.com. Click on the Bulls Club/Athletic Association links and you'll find a downloadable version of our travel brochure which tells you who to call. Go Bulls! Eric

This is great stuff guys, keep it going. Let me shed a little light on the purpose of Around the Horns and what we hope to do in the future. Around the Horns is a "friendraising" event. We hope that it is profitable at the same time but our focus is to make it as affordable as possible for someone to come out and see our coaches. Believe it or not, $125 for golf and dinner is about as affordable as they come these days. The $30 dinner the same way. We cover our costs on the attendance fees. There are other costs involved in putting these events on that we hope are covered by sponsorships. This was the second year of the Around the Horns tour. The first year we did luncheons and receptions. We combined some with the Alumni Associations Community Luncheons. We continue to work with the Alumni Associaiton on many levels but decided that the Around the Horns and Community Luncheons needed to be mutually exclusive from each other. That's why you will see one athletic representative speaking at the community luncheons and more on the university and academics. Our hope for the future is to grow these events. We will look at this years events and decide where to do golf tournament/dinners and where to do just dinners. You'd be surprised at where the "successful" events happened and where we struggled. A huge part of the success of these events is the volunteers that help us organize them and recruit participants. We can't run a half dozen of these events with just our staff and still pay attention to raising scholarship funds. These volunteers make the event. We will be discussing a schedule for next year throughout July with the hopes of sending information out throughout football season and basketball season promoting these events. We will go back to the same locations as this year for sure (with some changes in what type of events we do right cubanbull), perhaps some changes in the golf in certain areas, and perhaps some new areas (other areas in Florida, Atlanta and Dallas have been discussed but no promises as of yet guys). We have to take in budget considerations, staff considerations, the availability of the coaches, weather (we got really lucky this year except for Miami), other events (athletic auction, alumni association community luncheons, major university events, etc). At most of these events if you attended the dinner, you would have had the opportunity to sit and talk with Coach McCullum and a few others. He doesn't play golf so he rides around the course and talks with everyone and then heads in and helps greet people coming just for the dinner. Anyway, this has got to be the longest post I've ever done so I'll end on this. We believe in these events and are committed to continuing to make them successful. If you have ideas you can share them directly with me or offer to be on the organizing committee for the event in your area. We don't overwhelm you with responsibilities and the meetings are fun. I have a chat scheduled with Brad for sometime in July and will be more than happy to discuss this and other things with you then. Until then, be nice to Tom Veit tomorrow night guys and I'll keep checking in. Go Bulls! Eric

Our final Around the Horns event is today in Bradenton. We are committed to continuing these events with only moderate success this year. If you'd like see something specific, by all means we are open to suggestions and would love to have you on the volunteer committee organizing the event in your area. Call me at (813) 974-3481. The Florida, FSU, and Miami events are successful and we hope to make ours just as successful. All those events are driven by the volunteers in the area putting it together. As kdawgy and collbull said, our events are designed to get you close to our coaching staff, not to stand in line with 1,000 other people for 30 seconds and an autograph with a coach. If you didn't make it to an Around the Horns event this year, make sure you do next year. We hope to have next years dates scheduled prior to football season starting. Go Bulls! Eric

Thanks Rebe. We are trying. That's why it is so important if you are available that you attend one of these events. We made them as affordable as possible so that anyone could participate. We'll keep trying. Hope to see everyone at an upcoming event. Eric

Call all USF Alumni and Bulls fans in the Miami area. Our Around the Horns event is on Friday, June 17th. We are trying to fill out some groups for our golf outing at the Country Club of Miami. If you play, I guarantee you will be playing with one of our coaches that will be making the trip down. Cost is $125 per person. Get two friends to play and the three of you can play with a USF Coach or Administrator (Doug Woolard or Lee Roy Selmon). If you have any questions, please feel free to call me at (813) 974-3481 or email me at soncrant@admin.usf.edu. Thanks as always for your attention. Go Bulls! Eric

We haven't started organizing for the most part because we aren't sure about the television schedule right now. But our goal with watch parties has been to do them in areas until fans like yourselves just start organizing them on their own. If you want to set up shop any where, similar to what Gene and the Pinellas County Alumni Associaiton are doing, we'll help publicize. With the increase demands of travel, more and more of our staff need to attend away games which leaves us less staff back in Tampa to run watch parties. So this is a great time to start getting these put together. Here are some of the places that I had talked to people about: Courtside Grille off of Ulmerton (may be too close to Capogna's to make sense though) Clubhouse Grill on Fowler Beef's on Fowler New place scheduled to open this Summer called the Bulls Ring on Fowler (where Hops used to be) Gecko's in Sarasota and Bradenton have been our traditional places but open for suggestions. Beef's in Wesley Chapel Let me know your thoughts. I'm sure we'll have a Phoenix location as well. Eric

The pregame is not part of the package. The alumni association hasn't been able to finalize prices as of yet for those events so we have put together packages without that. Once the prices are set we will let everyone know. You can also check the alumni website events calendar and register for them online. Eric

I hear their coach is pretty cool! ;D Eric

This bus I would hope would be family friendly. The student buses not so much. If we think we can get 100 people to bus down there with us will get a couple of buses and then the student buses. It will all be based on supply and demand. Keep the questions and feedback coming. Eric

Just more proof that USF Football is one of the best entertainment and sports buys there are. We hope to continue to provide affordable athletics for everyone. This concludes Eric's Public Service Message! ;D

In regards to staying at the hotel and just busing to the stadium and back but driving down yourself, that is one of the reasons why I was looking for feedback. Just to try and get a feel for what people want. It may be were we put together a Miami package that is just hotel, ticket, and game transportation. I'll continue to check for more feedback from people and as soon as we finalize what we feel comfortable people are interested in, I'll report back to you. Thanks everyone for your CONSTRUCTIVE feedback. Go Bulls! Eric

We are working on some student packages with our Student Bulls Club and Student Government.  They will be on a separate bus but the plan is to have a bus caravan down there.  The bus will transport from the hotel to the game and back afterwards.  We will have some sort of pre-game tailgate but that will have to be purchased separately through the Alumni Association. Probably won't be able to bring a keg on the bus. Sorry about that. And I'm pretty sure you couldn't bring propane or lighter fluid. But if you had a little grill in a box you could probably put that underneath. We won't put limits on luggage and such but it's a one night trip so hopefully you aren't bringing three suitcases.  Keep the feedback coming.  Thanks everyone.  And SC, maybe we can meet half way ÂÂ

Here is your chance to help us serve all of you.  One of our major goals with our travel program is to create an opportunity for everyone to travel.  Obviously, the Miami game allows us to try and do something very affordable to most people. We have put together a package that includes bus transportation from USF, leaving Saturday morning (time of departure will be determined once game time is set).  You would arive a couple hours prior to the game free to tailgate wherever you'd like.  The package includes your game ticket and one night hotel and a good hotel in the Coral Gables area and near Cocunut Grove.  The current cost of this trip is $200 per person for a single room and $150 per person if you are willing to share a room with someone else. Keep in mind these prices include the $46 game ticket. Please provide any feedback.  If there seems to be plenty of interest we will hold the rooms.  If it appears that most people plan on traveling on their own and just need the game ticket we won't hold as many rooms.  Any feedback is welcome.  Thanks and Go Bulls! Eric modified by Bulliever to repair typo

That is our goal, to keep it growing, but we can't do it without all of you. Maybe some day we can do one in Brazil.

I'd definitely be up for a UK event. We might be able to put a nice event together. Detroit, well, I grew up in Michigan and not in a big hurry to get to the Detroit area. But maybe an event up in the Traverse City area would be nice, especially around the Cherry Festival (good times my friend, good times). Anyway, we do hope to grow this to new locations in the future including but not limited to Atlanta, Dallas, North Carolina/South Carolina, etc. But we need to make these successful to begin. So help me get all these other folks out for golf and/or dinner and we can slowly expand Bulls Country to include your parts of the world. Go Bulls! Eric

Hey Everyone: In our continuing effort to outreach to all of our donors, friends, alumni and fans, this June we will be conducting our 2nd Annual USF Bulls Club Around the Horns. This is our summer coach's tour were all fans will have the opportunity to talk, get autographs, take pictures and discuss strategy with USF Coach's including Jim Leavitt, Robert McCullum, Gigi Fernandez, Jose Fernandez, Claire Lessinger, and so many more. We have priced this to try and make it affordable for everyone. Costs are $125 per person for golf and dinner, $30 just for dinner, and $250 for a hole sponsorship. You can download a registration form at www.GoUSFBulls.com by clicking on the Around the Horns logo on the front page. Here is the schedule: June 2 Citrus/Hernando Riverside Resort (Homosassa) June 6 Hillsborough/Pasco Tampa Palms Golf and Country Club (New Tampa) June 7 Pinellas County East Lake Woodlands (Oldsmar) June 17 Dade/Broward Country Club of Miami (Miami) June 20 Polk/Orlando The Grasslands (Lakeland) June 27 Manatee/Sarasota Tara Golf and Country Club (Bradenton). If you received the mailing to all Bulls Club donors, please make note in the change of date of the Manatee/Sarasota event. It was originally on June 3 but we had to change it due to a conflict. If you have any questions, please let me know. Even if you are not a golfer you can attend the dinner. They will be run as separate events. It's important that we get good turnouts at these so we can continue to do them so I encourage you not only to attend but to get others out as well. Let's make these events fantastic. Eric

Hey Everyone: Just thought I'd thank you guys for getting this done. You have done so much for us in so many ways. I have ordered my magazine but we are going to try and find a way to promote the magazine at our upcoming Around the Horns events as well. Either by having some there or getting the information out to people at the events. I hope to see all of you at these events by the way. We will be near almost all of you at some point in time during the month of June. I'll create a separate topic for that though. Thanks again. Eric

I'll preface this by mentioning that my wife is a Miami grad and a former cheerleader, thus my experience with parking at the Orange Bowl. We've been down a couple of times and always park up on campus in one of the free visitor parking lots and then take the metro rail down (which costs like $2 or something). They have buses that will then take you to the stadium. It's pretty easy going but the only problem is then after the game everyone is trying to get on the buses to take you back to the rail. During the day we walk some times. Also, for those that will be interested in staying with the USF group, bus transportation from the hotel will be provided if you order through us. Just a little convenience of booking through the Bulls Club. Go Bulls! Eric

Our away game packages usually are set by early summer (june or july). We are working on them right now and information will go out as soon as they are ready. I know for the Miami game, we are talking about having a booth at the Around the Horns location in Miami for people interested in tickets. Perhaps we can do something like that at each of the Around the Horns events for each of the road trips. I'll keep you posted as to when the information is ready and when tickets will be available to be purchased. We should have plenty for everyone. Eric

Brad: You are not on the pull list which means you should be good to go. I'll double check with the ticket office but I'm positive it is all taken care of. Go Bulls! Eric

The deadline to renew your football season tickets has passed. If you haven't renewed them and plan to, please call 1-800-GoBulls and make arrangements. We will be relocating people over the next couple of days into the seats vacated by non-paid renewals. This is the last chance. Hopefully all of you have already taken care of this. Go Bulls! Eric

If any of you don't by chance get your spring game tickets in the mail, just call 1-800-GoBulls and let them know. We can send you them to you in time, but you should all get them. If you aren't a Bulls Club donor but still have season tickets, you will be receiving your spring game tickets in a separate mailing going out this week. As always, if you have any questions, please feel free to ask me here or give me a call. Go Bulls! Eric