NIU was pretty bad for a while.

(08-08-2014 08:17 PM)Savacool Wrote:  There is no university called Louisiana in the state of Louisiana. We have Louisiana State University Agricultural and Mechanical College,the flagship public university in Louisiana, Louisiana Tech, the top two public academic tier 1 universities in Louisiana.

Then the twin schools, the University of Louisiana at Lafayette (UL-L) and the University of Louisiana at Monroe (ULM),both tier 2.

To be historically correct the only University of Louisiana was created by the Louisiana state legislature in the later part of the nineteenth century in New Orleans. A wealthy individual Paul Tulane gave serious dollars and property to this university and our legislature converted it from a public to private institution and added the word Tulane in front of the name,now Tulane University of Louisiana, the 52 ranked academic institution in the nation. All the above are facts!

Sigh.........once again you show up and the truth eludes you....please stop this. You have ruined more threads with this madness than anyone else on any fan forum. You are obsessed with this. We are allowed to use "Louisiana Ragin Cajuns" or "Louisiana" as an Athletic Acronym. It is legal. ULM is a Regional University and University of Louisiana at Lafayette is designated a National Research University by USN&WR. Your attempt to tie the two Universities at the hip is petty and childish. The University of Louisiana at Lafayette and Louisiana Tech are both rated 4 year 2 or Doctoral II by the Southern Regional Education Board. Mow your own grass pal. Tulane is on the upswing. Worry about things that concern you like how well your University is doing. Pure freaking madness. Lastly I would like to apologize to others on this Forum for my own post. I don't want to come onto this Forum and do this but I cannot allow this guy to post his childish attacks on my University and let them stand. For the life of me I cannot understand this type of animosity.

I definitely thought that ULL using Louisiana went against the spirit of the name change agreement. Whatever you call yourself for athletics is what most people will call your school and think it's splitting hairs whether there is any official name change. The fact that Wisconsin is actually the University of Wisconsin at Madison for instance is fairly irreverent, to most people it's simply Wisconsin.

That said, it must not have been specified closely enough or the legislature must not care as I don't think they'd have been using it without being allowed to technically (although it must be a little grey given most outside sources all refer to Louisiana-Lafayette). So kudos if they found a loophole.

(08-08-2014 10:45 PM)NIU007 Wrote:  

(08-07-2014 10:42 PM)Kittonhead Wrote:  

(08-06-2014 05:17 PM)MJG Wrote:  I am kinda thinking NIU losing streak in the twenties to consecutive bowl seasons. The first MAC program to reach a BCS game. Their low has to be one of the lowest and high near the top.

The problem with NIU is they were a strong MAC program in the 80's and they left to play an Independent schedule.

Going independent drove their program into the ground for a decade. Returning to the MAC revived their program quickly. I would say this is more of a case of a program that lost its way for a while more than a historic loser turned into a success overnight. They have been the best MAC program by far over the last decade.

Some of the other schools mentioned like Boise State had a ton of success at the FCS level. It may have been a couple of lean years transitioning to FBS but they quickly blossomed. BYU would be the example if this was 1984 but the turnaround has been so lasting that they are regarded today as a program of great tradition.

I feel in the case with ULL and AState that they've been held back more by the SBC's struggle for identity more than lack of commitment to their programs. The wins may have only come the last 3 years but the ground work was started in the 4-5 years before that. They weren't notoriously dreadful before that time and always thought of as a step above ULM and UALR in the SBC.

NIU really only had the one good year in the 80s in the MAC - 1983 when they won the league. They had one or 2 good years as an independent in the late 80s-early 90s. And they were 3-30 in the mid-90s. Going from that to where they've been the past decade, particularly the last 4 years, is a pretty big turnaround.

That and from what I can remember when Joe Novak came in to NIU he revamped the recruiting model from one that emphasized individual performance to one that is team oriented with strong student athletes

The philosophy switch I think was key at NIU plus rejoining the MAC with its ESPN TV deal to spur local recruiting interest. NIU roster is full of guys that are Illinois or Iowa student athletes caliber but for whatever reason didn't get recruited by those staffs. In some cases they picked NIU over those schools.