Conference realignment "Rumors" "tweets" "etc"

[El_Toro_86]

5 minutes ago, Rocky Style said:

I don't agree on that, but I think the nature of where we play our games makes it feel like fake college football.  This is bolstered by when we play big teams.  We needed to get the alumni back on campus.  It's about building the brand and pride in the school.  Then you get the donors and buy in when they feel like they are part of something.  It's hard to explain, but it's a vibe we couldn't capture after we weren't playing the big teams anymore.

Could not agree more.

[Rocky Style]

3 minutes ago, 79 Bull said:

And now we don't even have a President to go to bat for us.

LOL even fake cancel culture came for us at the worst time.

[NewEnglandBull]

3 minutes ago, 79 Bull said:

John Allen oozed the anti-football culture.  I remember hearing the story on campus in the late 70's that Anheuser-Busch offered to pay fully to build Busch Stadium on campus and Allen told them not necessary as USF will NEVER play football. 

And now we don't even have a President to go to bat for us.

Yes, Allen probably gets the most blame. He really hated football and started this culture at USF. 

[Rocky Style]

1 minute ago, NewEnglandBull said:

But you saw what it took to sell out Ray Jay…a number 2 ranking. Yes, we still had some good attendance but even UCF with its success still does not sell out their little place. I just think the culture of Florida college football was too great to overcome coupled with the pro sports. 

UCF is doing great and they have an opportunity to build off it though.  That should have been our mentality.  We still "member when we played WVU" over and over.

[Friscobull]

This thread is depressing and I am retiring from it, would recommend many do the same, it is not healthy.  At the end of the day we lost out in every conceivable way and I am ok with it.  I didn’t even bother watching most of the third and all of the fourth quarter last night and was too embarrassed to ask anyone to put the game on because we are atrocious so I watched Ohio State/Minn.  The silver lining is we didn’t lose the expansion race when we were all rabid fans, it is hard to get excited nowadays about this pathetic product so most of us will slowly disappear as a apathy puts a stranglehold over a once proud program.  It was real and it was fun, but it wasn’t real fun.  

[puc86]

It was fun while it lasted, we will always have the memories 

[NewEnglandBull]

3 minutes ago, Rocky Style said:

UCF is doing great and they have an opportunity to build off it though.  That should have been our mentality.  We still "member when we played WVU" over and over.

Yep, we needed to spend (dip into the endowment..if it’s allowed for sports) and did not do it. It really was a perfect storm that doomed USF football but it was a storm that we all controlled and contributed towards. 

Edited September 3, 2021 by NewEnglandBull

[NewEnglandBull]

1 minute ago, Friscobull said:

This thread is depressing and I am retiring from it, would recommend many do the same, it is not healthy.  At the end of the day we lost out in every conceivable way and I am ok with it.  I didn’t even bother watching most of the third and all of the fourth quarter last night and was too embarrassed to ask anyone to put the game on because we are atrocious so I watched Ohio State/Minn.  The silver lining is we didn’t lose the expansion race when we were all rabid fans, it is hard to get excited nowadays about this pathetic product so most of us will slowly disappear as a apathy puts a stranglehold over a once proud program.  It was real and it was fun, but it wasn’t real fun.  

I get that but it does have some therapeutic value. Dissecting the cadaver can be useful. 

[MSBulls]

We need to start looking into AAC replacements now. My opinion? UAB, FAU, Marshall. Thoughts?

Bottom line - expansion is not done at the highest level yet. SEC will have 16 teams, Big 10 and ACC with 14, and PAC 12 and Big 12 at 12. Inevitably there will be more movement to even out the conferences, and teams being stolen from the Big 12 is still highly likely (Kansas, OKSt, ect)

I look at this upcoming period of time as the third strike and final opportunity for the program. We're one of the biggest G5s left, and are finally getting facilities that look to be amazing which would dwarf many teams on our level. The only expectation moving forward is for the program to turn around into a consistent G5 heavyweight with our resources and location. With CFP expansion, we could be one of those top G5 teams competing with the likes of Boise and Memphis for that G5 spot as well. Anything short of fighting with the teams at the top of the G5 is a failure, and without question we should be competing for the conference. This is our last opportunity to align ourselves with a chance to get back to a high level.

It sucks and pisses me off like many others who know where we were, but we just screwed ourselves 12 years ago not building on our successes, and collapsing when missing out on expansion years ago. If we're now committing to athletics and facilities, it may take a couple years but let's see what the hell we can do with it

EDIT- I want App State instead of Marshall

Edited September 3, 2021 by MSBulls

[Triple B]

9 minutes ago, puc86 said:

That could be true but it certainly felt like every where you went you saw USF fans growing. Any store you went to had USF stuff, anywhere you went there were people representing and fans materialized in the stands. Now you are hard pressed to find anything or see anyone, the fans didn’t squander anything they tried to grow while USF went out of its way to make you not be able to care anymore.

During that "heyday" and all the work that CJL did do in the BE, we went from from donor level of $2.7M in 2005 to $2.9M in 2009. In comparison, CUSA ECU was at $4.8M in 2009. Ticket sales were fine then but donations are your bloodline through thick AND thin times and ours have been anemic in both.