Bowl Analysis -- South Florida

[WoolyBully]

..but everything to do with "travelling well to bowls." If USF wants to be in the same category as FSU and UF, we gotta put up like their fans do...

And why do you think we didn't get more to MCCB than we did? Holiday aside, why do

you think we didn't get more traveling up that way?

[RMF5630]

Getting 5K of our 16K season ticket base to show up in Charlotte is pretty good

Pretty good compared to who?  FIU? Cinn? UCF?  The problem is that what appears good to us, is not good to the Bowls.  People say "You can't expect us to bring 30k like Wisconsin or Iowa."  The Bowls DO want that and ARE comparing us to those schools.  When invitations are given if they have a choice they will take a school that travels well and produces a sell out.  Right now, we will lost to Army and Navy, everytime.  We will lost to the Big 10 #8 team at 6-6, even if we are Big East #4 at 8-3 if the Bowl can get away with it.  A 6-6 Michigan State or Minn because they will travel.  Read the Big East bowl relationships, there are not many mandatories.   That is my point about how the Meineke was a disaster.

[windbane]

pretty good  compared to any other school's first bowl game, i'll bet.

[Joe]

I believe the number was a little more than 4500. It was ok for our 1st bowl game,

Comparably:

UConn had brought 6k to the Motor City Bowl (which was considered unbelievable for that bowl game, obviously not the same in our case)

I think Arkansas State brought around 4,000 for their 1st bowl game every last year.

[chicky9914]

good grief.  cincy's attendance this year appears to be horrible (unless it was just sunday night that NOBODY showed up to) and they didnt send a single fan to a bowl game last year, so there's a decent chance we'd get picked over them (at 6-6).

THANK YOU!!! A gorgeous stadium like that, a team that's not doing too shabby and they can only muster 15,000? That's nothing but a JOKE!! They'd be crazy to invite Cincy over USF

[RMF5630]

pretty good  compared to any other school's first bowl game, i'll bet.

That is the attitude I am talking about!  No one cares that USF is a new program any more than they care Ru is 116 years old.  They care about numbers and dollars.  USF has got to get over the attitude that "we are new," so Bowls should be happy with only 5k travelling.  It does not work that way.  All that does is hold the program down and we are in danger of backsliding.  THis program has not "arrived"  it can just as easily backslide to UCFdom as move up to UFdom.  USF becoming a power is not a forgone conclussion.   There is a lot of potential problems coming up.  Try this:

WVU runs the table and does not go to the NC game.  Rodriguez says screw this and jumps to UNC because he knows he can't win the big one in the Big East.  Petrino does the same thing to NC State or UM.  Now the BE has lost its 2 premier coaches.  Throw Schaivano to Penn State (a school he said he would go to earlier with a 90 year old coach) and what do you have?  A conference that is no better than a BCS version of the MAC, a stepping stone.  It can very easily happen.

USF needs to have higher expectations than 40k is great for a 10-year old program and the fans need to start acting like big time college fans like UF, FSU, OSU, etc if we want to not be a throw in team for some **** bowl.

[Brad]

RMF5630, ceems to remind me of someone...we'll need to keep a close eye on his exhortations as a Bulls fan.   ;D

If you are going to inject fact into an argument all facts should be considered.  The 10-year thing is not an excuse it's a perspective.  You can't honestly think we should travel 30K when we don't have that many season ticketholders?  The bowls know this.

We're young as a program and will someday shake those effects of being young.  Until then, we need to get to any bowl possible (even at 6-6) and continue to build a fan base.

Putting down USF in a public forum does little to affect the groundswell of support USF truly does need.

[RandyGator]

One thing about BOWLS (and I ranted about it last year!!!!)

YOU MUST BUY YOUR TICKETS THROUGH THE ATHLETIC DEPT. OR USF DOESN'T GET CREDIT FOR THE BUY/SALE.  IF YOU BUY FROM TICKETMASTER IT DOESN'T GET CREDITED TOWARD USF "TRAVELING"!!!!! :o :o :o

[RMF5630]

RMF5630, ceems to remind me of someone...we'll need to keep a close eye on his exhortations as a Bulls fan.   ;D

My perspective as a Bulls fans is different from most, I am interested in the business of college football more than the game on the field or in the stands.  That means I am very interested in USF succeeding, but tend to be a bit more realistic than most "fans."

As for the rest, sorry but you are wrong.  The Bowls do not care that we are only 10 years and 50% of our 10k fans travel.  They will take a worse team than USF in a heartbeat, if the travel well.  This is a business, there is no understanding and giving the new program a break attitude.  

Our 5k traveling is just that 5k, they don't say: "Oh, but they are new so it is really like 20k for another team."  That is a dream-world.  See Meineke Bowl adding Navy.  Why?  They travel and sell hotel rooms, period.  They are looking for an excuse to invite them, no bowl is looking for an excuse to invite USF at this time.  

We need to change that and the ONLY way is to travel well, in front of even winning, that means we need to marke to get people interested and show up at games!  Our 30k home game attendance is horrible for a BCS team, if we want to get to the upper echelon.  USF has to start becoming the first choice, not the 2nd or 3rd, like UF is to their fans.  Those people skip kids events to go to the UF games!  

The sooner we stop putting qualifiers on out accomplishments the sooner we can look at reality and correct it.  That is not being negative, it is just being realistic.

[Guest]

RMF5630, ceems to remind me of someone...we'll need to keep a close eye on his exhortations as a Bulls fan.   ;D

Our 5k traveling is just that 5k, they don't say: "Oh, but they are new so it is really like 20k for another team."  That is a dream-world.  See Meineke Bowl adding Navy.  Why?  They travel and sell hotel rooms, period.  They are looking for an excuse to invite them, no bowl is looking for an excuse to invite USF at this time.  

1. USF was probably not going back to the Meineke again this year anyway.  Bowl committees don't like to invite the same teams two years in a row, even if we brought 50,000 people.

2. Miami doesn't travel well -- heck, they practically never sell out the OB -- but bowl committees still invite the Hurricanes.  Any ideas why?