(12-13-2011 03:00 PM)b0ndsj0ns Wrote:  

(12-13-2011 02:56 PM)piratefan1975 Wrote:  I don't know about you, but I'm growing tired of 5-7 and 6-7 seasons. That gets us nowhere. Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and over and expecting different results.

We sold out our stadium this year for CUSA games. The regional OOC BCS games are fun, but we don't need 3 or 4 of them per year.

Our fan base will appreciate 10 win seasons, finishing the season ranked and being nationally relevant. The people will come to see a winner.

Terry Hollands scheduling philosophy has done what it was intended. It helped grow our fan base exponentially, and for that, I'm grateful. However, if we want to think of ourselves as a big time football program, we need to schedule like a big time football program. Big time football programs don't schedule 3 top-30 BCS OOC games a year.

Big time football programs also play 3 or more of those games in conference every year. Lets take a look at this year, we went 5-7, if you got rid of the VT and USC games and put 2 cupcakes we still finish 7-5 and likely sell thousands less tickets in the process, and lose out on the 1 million we cleared in the USC game. Next year is going to be a test if fans will tolerate a watered down home schedule. Our home OOC games are Navy and App. If ticket sales don't drop off then sure we might have reached the point we can do it without having a negative affect on our bottom line.

I agree that going 4-0 against our usual OOC schedule is a tough nut to crack, but a few observations if I may......

1. Each of those games were here at home or within traveling distances for fans. When you meet a USC at Panther stadium and it's on TV and people see 40,000 ECU fans at a game that is 4 hours from Greenville. That says alot. Annapolis isn't 5 hours up the road. Same with any ACC teams we play. Those are rivalry games and folks show up for rivalry games.

2. We didn't have to schedule 2 patsies in place of South Carolina/VA Tech/UNC/Navy......in of itself to go 7-5.......we needed to not give the game away to UTEP or to Marshall or to VA Tech for that matter. We can't give up 28 points in the 1st QTR to Southern Miss w/out the Eagles offense ever stepping one foot on the field. That game might have turned out a little different. We could have potentially been 8-4. We've had the stigma for years of not being up to strike the fatal blow to another team. To drive the ball down their throats. We get a lead and sit on the ball it seems or we change our whole gameplan. I've said there's a big difference between playing to win and playing not to lose. And that's been a big problem.