(03-05-2017 11:05 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  It is just so amazing to me how much carnage this ESPN deal left behind and how much damage it continues to do

It's awful. So many people (myself included) used to attend every home game but majority of the games are now unfeasible for people who don't live near DeKalb. What a criminal deterrance to the student and alumni experience for everyone in the MAC. Both sad and infuriating.

This is NOT the AD's fault though. STF can't do a damn thing about it.

(03-06-2017 02:53 AM)IWokeUpLikeThis Wrote:  

(03-05-2017 11:05 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  It is just so amazing to me how much carnage this ESPN deal left behind and how much damage it continues to do

It's awful. So many people (myself included) used to attend every home game but majority of the games are now unfeasible for people who don't live near DeKalb. What a criminal deterrance to the student and alumni experience for everyone in the MAC. Both sad and infuriating.

This is NOT the AD's fault though. STF can't do a damn thing about it.

Wait for you know who to spin your statement around and state it is ALL STF's fault.

The MAC had an opportunity to have NIU vs EMU on Saturday Sept 23rd instead of October 26th on short rest late in the season for BOTH teams.

The MAC cares about TV dollars more than players safety.

The sad thing is that realistically this game has a 50/50 shot at being on ESPN3.com which is worthless for the exposure angle of these games.

(03-07-2017 10:04 AM)HuskieJohn Wrote:  The MAC had an opportunity to have NIU vs EMU on Saturday Sept 23rd instead of October 26th on short rest late in the season for BOTH teams.

The MAC cares about TV dollars more than players safety.

The sad thing is that realistically this game has a 50/50 shot at being on ESPN3.com which is worthless for the exposure angle of these games.

You put this game on a Saturday and the schedule isn't much different than prior years.

This is on the "good Doctor" who is our fearless leader of the MAC.

(03-05-2017 11:30 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(03-05-2017 11:19 AM)Rabid Squirrel Wrote:  

(03-05-2017 11:05 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  It is just so amazing to me how much carnage this ESPN deal left behind and how much damage it continues to do

I think you overlook the changing landscape of college football when you evaluate Frazier. It takes 2 things to survive in the FBS. Fan support AND tv revenue. You can't live on just one. NIU/MAC had only 1 tv revenue option that I'm aware of and they had to take it. Of the two necessities, fan support is the only one that is fluid. A tv deal is yes or no. You can choose the tv money and hope for fan support. You can't choose the fans and hope for tv money.

I know but NIU and many other MAC schools are close to having literally no fans coming to games that are wholly inaccessible. The number of long time fans not considering ticket renewal scares the buhjeesus out of me

As a parent of a current player I would like to add one more thing. Players make great coaches and great players make great teams. If our stands remain empty I promise you no coach not even Carey lol will be able to recruit players or keep players. If you do not think recruits and current players are not absolutely turned off by our terrible fan support you are wrong. Most of the kids we can get are the kids who have an overwhelming draw to play D1A and have very very few other options outside of another no draw MAC school and for whatever reason they do not want to go 1AA. But I promise you we are and will lose out to the NDSU and SDSU and yes even Northern Iowa who provide a hungry and energetic fan base at the 1AA level. If you want better players and thus better teams we must find a way for the players to feel some kind of fan support. They bust their tails to do what they love and come charging out of the locker room to the cheers of 2500 people on a cold thursday night how do you expect them to play the way they can. I promise you many current and future players are asking themselves that question as I type this.
We WILL I promise lose recruits and current player to the top 1AA schools at a much higher rate as this fan base disappoints us all !!

(03-07-2017 11:17 AM)randy6969 Wrote:  

(03-05-2017 11:30 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(03-05-2017 11:19 AM)Rabid Squirrel Wrote:  

(03-05-2017 11:05 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  It is just so amazing to me how much carnage this ESPN deal left behind and how much damage it continues to do

I think you overlook the changing landscape of college football when you evaluate Frazier. It takes 2 things to survive in the FBS. Fan support AND tv revenue. You can't live on just one. NIU/MAC had only 1 tv revenue option that I'm aware of and they had to take it. Of the two necessities, fan support is the only one that is fluid. A tv deal is yes or no. You can choose the tv money and hope for fan support. You can't choose the fans and hope for tv money.

I know but NIU and many other MAC schools are close to having literally no fans coming to games that are wholly inaccessible. The number of long time fans not considering ticket renewal scares the buhjeesus out of me

As a parent of a current player I would like to add one more thing. Players make great coaches and great players make great teams. If our stands remain empty I promise you no coach not even Carey lol will be able to recruit players or keep players. If you do not think recruits and current players are not absolutely turned off by our terrible fan support you are wrong. Most of the kids we can get are the kids who have an overwhelming draw to play D1A and have very very few other options outside of another no draw MAC school and for whatever reason they do not want to go 1AA. But I promise you we are and will lose out to the NDSU and SDSU and yes even Northern Iowa who provide a hungry and energetic fan base at the 1AA level. If you want better players and thus better teams we must find a way for the players to feel some kind of fan support. They bust their tails to do what they love and come charging out of the locker room to the cheers of 2500 people on a cold thursday night how do you expect them to play the way they can. I promise you many current and future players are asking themselves that question as I type this.
We WILL I promise lose recruits and current player to the top 1AA schools at a much higher rate as this fan base disappoints us all !!

Good points but this needs to be directed to MAC front offices and our AD who are responsible for this

(03-07-2017 11:20 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 11:17 AM)randy6969 Wrote:  

(03-05-2017 11:30 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(03-05-2017 11:19 AM)Rabid Squirrel Wrote:  

(03-05-2017 11:05 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  It is just so amazing to me how much carnage this ESPN deal left behind and how much damage it continues to do

I think you overlook the changing landscape of college football when you evaluate Frazier. It takes 2 things to survive in the FBS. Fan support AND tv revenue. You can't live on just one. NIU/MAC had only 1 tv revenue option that I'm aware of and they had to take it. Of the two necessities, fan support is the only one that is fluid. A tv deal is yes or no. You can choose the tv money and hope for fan support. You can't choose the fans and hope for tv money.

I know but NIU and many other MAC schools are close to having literally no fans coming to games that are wholly inaccessible. The number of long time fans not considering ticket renewal scares the buhjeesus out of me

As a parent of a current player I would like to add one more thing. Players make great coaches and great players make great teams. If our stands remain empty I promise you no coach not even Carey lol will be able to recruit players or keep players. If you do not think recruits and current players are not absolutely turned off by our terrible fan support you are wrong. Most of the kids we can get are the kids who have an overwhelming draw to play D1A and have very very few other options outside of another no draw MAC school and for whatever reason they do not want to go 1AA. But I promise you we are and will lose out to the NDSU and SDSU and yes even Northern Iowa who provide a hungry and energetic fan base at the 1AA level. If you want better players and thus better teams we must find a way for the players to feel some kind of fan support. They bust their tails to do what they love and come charging out of the locker room to the cheers of 2500 people on a cold thursday night how do you expect them to play the way they can. I promise you many current and future players are asking themselves that question as I type this.
We WILL I promise lose recruits and current player to the top 1AA schools at a much higher rate as this fan base disappoints us all !!

Good points but this needs to be directed to MAC front offices and our AD who are responsible for this

If I had a contact that would listen I would send it to them LOL This program is in bigger trouble than you can imagine. no fans at some point soon will mean no team. Kids just will not come to play for less fans than many of them played for in High School. And the success of D1aa kids making it to the NFL will only fuel the issue.

every time a midwestern D1aa kid goes to the combine it will continue to erode our recruiting potential. BTW keep your eyes on Jake Wieneke from SDSU he will be the next big combine skill guy who gets drafted after the 2018 combine. Those kids will eventually be the death of Mac schools with no fan base like ours I promise you !

(03-07-2017 11:22 AM)randy6969 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 11:20 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 11:17 AM)randy6969 Wrote:  

(03-05-2017 11:30 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  [quote='Rabid Squirrel' pid='14146702' dateline='1488730747']

I think you overlook the changing landscape of college football when you evaluate Frazier. It takes 2 things to survive in the FBS. Fan support AND tv revenue. You can't live on just one. NIU/MAC had only 1 tv revenue option that I'm aware of and they had to take it. Of the two necessities, fan support is the only one that is fluid. A tv deal is yes or no. You can choose the tv money and hope for fan support. You can't choose the fans and hope for tv money.

I know but NIU and many other MAC schools are close to having literally no fans coming to games that are wholly inaccessible. The number of long time fans not considering ticket renewal scares the buhjeesus out of me

As a parent of a current player I would like to add one more thing. Players make great coaches and great players make great teams. If our stands remain empty I promise you no coach not even Carey lol will be able to recruit players or keep players. If you do not think recruits and current players are not absolutely turned off by our terrible fan support you are wrong. Most of the kids we can get are the kids who have an overwhelming draw to play D1A and have very very few other options outside of another no draw MAC school and for whatever reason they do not want to go 1AA. But I promise you we are and will lose out to the NDSU and SDSU and yes even Northern Iowa who provide a hungry and energetic fan base at the 1AA level. If you want better players and thus better teams we must find a way for the players to feel some kind of fan support. They bust their tails to do what they love and come charging out of the locker room to the cheers of 2500 people on a cold thursday night how do you expect them to play the way they can. I promise you many current and future players are asking themselves that question as I type this.
We WILL I promise lose recruits and current player to the top 1AA schools at a much higher rate as this fan base disappoints us all !!

Good points but this needs to be directed to MAC front offices and our AD who are responsible for this

If I had a contact that would listen I would send it to them LOL This program is in bigger trouble than you can imagine. no fans at some point soon will mean no team. Kids just will not come to play for less fans than many of them played for in High School. And the success of D1aa kids making it to the NFL will only fuel the issue.

every time a midwestern D1aa kid goes to the combine it will continue to erode our recruiting potential. BTW keep your eyes on Jake Wieneke from SDSU he will be the next big combine skill guy who gets drafted after the 2018 combine. Those kids will eventually be the death of Mac schools with no fan base like ours I promise you !
[/quote

MACtion attendance is an issue, but I doubt it's having the impact on recruiting to that extent. It would really have to death spiral to 5k a game or so. Ball st avg 7,900 in attendance in 2016. They also have the 4th best rated recruit class for 2017. While kids love to play to a packed house, they also like playing at Ohio state, Nebraska and Iowa more so than maybe Iowa state once in awhile if your UNI. They also like to be on national tv. Even if it's once or twice. Not local cable channel. When I went through NIUs recruits for the last few years, I don't recall a single one opting FCS over them. They lost a few to other Mac schools and P5s, but there's still more prestige in FBS over FCS, even if attendance is pretty close.(only the top 15 FCS programs average around more than 13k in attendance) why go to uni who avgs 12k/game when maybe you could go to Toledo, Ohio or BG and have 20k/game plus the FBS perks?

(03-07-2017 12:01 PM)Rabid Squirrel Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 11:22 AM)randy6969 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 11:20 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 11:17 AM)randy6969 Wrote:  

(03-05-2017 11:30 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  [quote='Rabid Squirrel' pid='14146702' dateline='1488730747']

I think you overlook the changing landscape of college football when you evaluate Frazier. It takes 2 things to survive in the FBS. Fan support AND tv revenue. You can't live on just one. NIU/MAC had only 1 tv revenue option that I'm aware of and they had to take it. Of the two necessities, fan support is the only one that is fluid. A tv deal is yes or no. You can choose the tv money and hope for fan support. You can't choose the fans and hope for tv money.

I know but NIU and many other MAC schools are close to having literally no fans coming to games that are wholly inaccessible. The number of long time fans not considering ticket renewal scares the buhjeesus out of me

As a parent of a current player I would like to add one more thing. Players make great coaches and great players make great teams. If our stands remain empty I promise you no coach not even Carey lol will be able to recruit players or keep players. If you do not think recruits and current players are not absolutely turned off by our terrible fan support you are wrong. Most of the kids we can get are the kids who have an overwhelming draw to play D1A and have very very few other options outside of another no draw MAC school and for whatever reason they do not want to go 1AA. But I promise you we are and will lose out to the NDSU and SDSU and yes even Northern Iowa who provide a hungry and energetic fan base at the 1AA level. If you want better players and thus better teams we must find a way for the players to feel some kind of fan support. They bust their tails to do what they love and come charging out of the locker room to the cheers of 2500 people on a cold thursday night how do you expect them to play the way they can. I promise you many current and future players are asking themselves that question as I type this.
We WILL I promise lose recruits and current player to the top 1AA schools at a much higher rate as this fan base disappoints us all !!

Good points but this needs to be directed to MAC front offices and our AD who are responsible for this

If I had a contact that would listen I would send it to them LOL This program is in bigger trouble than you can imagine. no fans at some point soon will mean no team. Kids just will not come to play for less fans than many of them played for in High School. And the success of D1aa kids making it to the NFL will only fuel the issue.

every time a midwestern D1aa kid goes to the combine it will continue to erode our recruiting potential. BTW keep your eyes on Jake Wieneke from SDSU he will be the next big combine skill guy who gets drafted after the 2018 combine. Those kids will eventually be the death of Mac schools with no fan base like ours I promise you !
[/quote

MACtion attendance is an issue, but I doubt it's having the impact on recruiting to that extent. It would really have to death spiral to 5k a game or so. Ball st avg 7,900 in attendance in 2016. They also have the 4th best rated recruit class for 2017. While kids love to play to a packed house, they also like playing at Ohio state, Nebraska and Iowa more so than maybe Iowa state once in awhile if your UNI. They also like to be on national tv. Even if it's once or twice. Not local cable channel. When I went through NIUs recruits for the last few years, I don't recall a single one opting FCS over them. They lost a few to other Mac schools and P5s, but there's still more prestige in FBS over FCS, even if attendance is pretty close.(only the top 15 FCS programs average around more than 13k in attendance) why go to uni who avgs 12k/game when maybe you could go to Toledo, Ohio or BG and have 20k/game plus the FBS perks?

NIU is becoming FCS, writing seems to be on the wall. Not to beat a dead horse but we are in for one huge attendance tank this year. Not just a tank, something that will cause shock waves.

(03-07-2017 12:34 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 12:01 PM)Rabid Squirrel Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 11:22 AM)randy6969 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 11:20 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 11:17 AM)randy6969 Wrote:  I know but NIU and many other MAC schools are close to having literally no fans coming to games that are wholly inaccessible. The number of long time fans not considering ticket renewal scares the buhjeesus out of me

As a parent of a current player I would like to add one more thing. Players make great coaches and great players make great teams. If our stands remain empty I promise you no coach not even Carey lol will be able to recruit players or keep players. If you do not think recruits and current players are not absolutely turned off by our terrible fan support you are wrong. Most of the kids we can get are the kids who have an overwhelming draw to play D1A and have very very few other options outside of another no draw MAC school and for whatever reason they do not want to go 1AA. But I promise you we are and will lose out to the NDSU and SDSU and yes even Northern Iowa who provide a hungry and energetic fan base at the 1AA level. If you want better players and thus better teams we must find a way for the players to feel some kind of fan support. They bust their tails to do what they love and come charging out of the locker room to the cheers of 2500 people on a cold thursday night how do you expect them to play the way they can. I promise you many current and future players are asking themselves that question as I type this.
We WILL I promise lose recruits and current player to the top 1AA schools at a much higher rate as this fan base disappoints us all !!

Good points but this needs to be directed to MAC front offices and our AD who are responsible for this

If I had a contact that would listen I would send it to them LOL This program is in bigger trouble than you can imagine. no fans at some point soon will mean no team. Kids just will not come to play for less fans than many of them played for in High School. And the success of D1aa kids making it to the NFL will only fuel the issue.

every time a midwestern D1aa kid goes to the combine it will continue to erode our recruiting potential. BTW keep your eyes on Jake Wieneke from SDSU he will be the next big combine skill guy who gets drafted after the 2018 combine. Those kids will eventually be the death of Mac schools with no fan base like ours I promise you !
[/quote

MACtion attendance is an issue, but I doubt it's having the impact on recruiting to that extent. It would really have to death spiral to 5k a game or so. Ball st avg 7,900 in attendance in 2016. They also have the 4th best rated recruit class for 2017. While kids love to play to a packed house, they also like playing at Ohio state, Nebraska and Iowa more so than maybe Iowa state once in awhile if your UNI. They also like to be on national tv. Even if it's once or twice. Not local cable channel. When I went through NIUs recruits for the last few years, I don't recall a single one opting FCS over them. They lost a few to other Mac schools and P5s, but there's still more prestige in FBS over FCS, even if attendance is pretty close.(only the top 15 FCS programs average around more than 13k in attendance) why go to uni who avgs 12k/game when maybe you could go to Toledo, Ohio or BG and have 20k/game plus the FBS perks?

NIU is becoming FCS, writing seems to be on the wall. Not to beat a dead horse but we are in for one huge attendance tank this year. Not just a tank, something that will cause shock waves.

If we are under 20k for the BC game I'll be concerned. Under 15k and I'll agree we are in trouble. The MACtion attendance woes, while disheartening, have a valid explanation. It will take a great team or break out star to prop the MACtion games up over 10 or 12k. That's not likely. What We really need are two or three big, early season Saturday games to off set the end of the year debacle. I'd think getting 30k on a warm Saturday vs a quality opponent is more attainable than 15k on a cold weeknight.

(03-07-2017 12:55 PM)Rabid Squirrel Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 12:34 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 12:01 PM)Rabid Squirrel Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 11:22 AM)randy6969 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 11:20 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  As a parent of a current player I would like to add one more thing. Players make great coaches and great players make great teams. If our stands remain empty I promise you no coach not even Carey lol will be able to recruit players or keep players. If you do not think recruits and current players are not absolutely turned off by our terrible fan support you are wrong. Most of the kids we can get are the kids who have an overwhelming draw to play D1A and have very very few other options outside of another no draw MAC school and for whatever reason they do not want to go 1AA. But I promise you we are and will lose out to the NDSU and SDSU and yes even Northern Iowa who provide a hungry and energetic fan base at the 1AA level. If you want better players and thus better teams we must find a way for the players to feel some kind of fan support. They bust their tails to do what they love and come charging out of the locker room to the cheers of 2500 people on a cold thursday night how do you expect them to play the way they can. I promise you many current and future players are asking themselves that question as I type this.
We WILL I promise lose recruits and current player to the top 1AA schools at a much higher rate as this fan base disappoints us all !!

Good points but this needs to be directed to MAC front offices and our AD who are responsible for this

If I had a contact that would listen I would send it to them LOL This program is in bigger trouble than you can imagine. no fans at some point soon will mean no team. Kids just will not come to play for less fans than many of them played for in High School. And the success of D1aa kids making it to the NFL will only fuel the issue.

every time a midwestern D1aa kid goes to the combine it will continue to erode our recruiting potential. BTW keep your eyes on Jake Wieneke from SDSU he will be the next big combine skill guy who gets drafted after the 2018 combine. Those kids will eventually be the death of Mac schools with no fan base like ours I promise you !
[/quote

MACtion attendance is an issue, but I doubt it's having the impact on recruiting to that extent. It would really have to death spiral to 5k a game or so. Ball st avg 7,900 in attendance in 2016. They also have the 4th best rated recruit class for 2017. While kids love to play to a packed house, they also like playing at Ohio state, Nebraska and Iowa more so than maybe Iowa state once in awhile if your UNI. They also like to be on national tv. Even if it's once or twice. Not local cable channel. When I went through NIUs recruits for the last few years, I don't recall a single one opting FCS over them. They lost a few to other Mac schools and P5s, but there's still more prestige in FBS over FCS, even if attendance is pretty close.(only the top 15 FCS programs average around more than 13k in attendance) why go to uni who avgs 12k/game when maybe you could go to Toledo, Ohio or BG and have 20k/game plus the FBS perks?

NIU is becoming FCS, writing seems to be on the wall. Not to beat a dead horse but we are in for one huge attendance tank this year. Not just a tank, something that will cause shock waves.

If we are under 20k for the BC game I'll be concerned. Under 15k and I'll agree we are in trouble. The MACtion attendance woes, while disheartening, have a valid explanation. It will take a great team or break out star to prop the MACtion games up over 10 or 12k. That's not likely. What We really need are two or three big, early season Saturday games to off set the end of the year debacle. I'd think getting 30k on a warm Saturday vs a quality opponent is more attainable than 15k on a cold weeknight.

For the last 3 home games, it would not surprise me if NIU is under 3000

(03-07-2017 01:11 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 12:55 PM)Rabid Squirrel Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 12:34 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 12:01 PM)Rabid Squirrel Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 11:22 AM)randy6969 Wrote:  Good points but this needs to be directed to MAC front offices and our AD who are responsible for this

If I had a contact that would listen I would send it to them LOL This program is in bigger trouble than you can imagine. no fans at some point soon will mean no team. Kids just will not come to play for less fans than many of them played for in High School. And the success of D1aa kids making it to the NFL will only fuel the issue.

every time a midwestern D1aa kid goes to the combine it will continue to erode our recruiting potential. BTW keep your eyes on Jake Wieneke from SDSU he will be the next big combine skill guy who gets drafted after the 2018 combine. Those kids will eventually be the death of Mac schools with no fan base like ours I promise you !
[/quote

MACtion attendance is an issue, but I doubt it's having the impact on recruiting to that extent. It would really have to death spiral to 5k a game or so. Ball st avg 7,900 in attendance in 2016. They also have the 4th best rated recruit class for 2017. While kids love to play to a packed house, they also like playing at Ohio state, Nebraska and Iowa more so than maybe Iowa state once in awhile if your UNI. They also like to be on national tv. Even if it's once or twice. Not local cable channel. When I went through NIUs recruits for the last few years, I don't recall a single one opting FCS over them. They lost a few to other Mac schools and P5s, but there's still more prestige in FBS over FCS, even if attendance is pretty close.(only the top 15 FCS programs average around more than 13k in attendance) why go to uni who avgs 12k/game when maybe you could go to Toledo, Ohio or BG and have 20k/game plus the FBS perks?

NIU is becoming FCS, writing seems to be on the wall. Not to beat a dead horse but we are in for one huge attendance tank this year. Not just a tank, something that will cause shock waves.

If we are under 20k for the BC game I'll be concerned. Under 15k and I'll agree we are in trouble. The MACtion attendance woes, while disheartening, have a valid explanation. It will take a great team or break out star to prop the MACtion games up over 10 or 12k. That's not likely. What We really need are two or three big, early season Saturday games to off set the end of the year debacle. I'd think getting 30k on a warm Saturday vs a quality opponent is more attainable than 15k on a cold weeknight.

For the last 3 home games, it would not surprise me if NIU is under 3000

make your UNI argument for NDSU, SDSU or Youngstown state or other top FCS programs I promise we do not average 5ooo if you take out one or two games a year. Homecoming and one game vs BC or some other bigger school and the rest of the games they play in front of mom and dad and less than 4.500 non family members I promise you it is killing the program. its not just average attendance it is how many games they play with less then 30 of the seats filled. NDSU has 100 % full stands every game

(03-07-2017 01:29 PM)randy6969 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 01:11 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 12:55 PM)Rabid Squirrel Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 12:34 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(03-07-2017 12:01 PM)Rabid Squirrel Wrote:  If I had a contact that would listen I would send it to them LOL This program is in bigger trouble than you can imagine. no fans at some point soon will mean no team. Kids just will not come to play for less fans than many of them played for in High School. And the success of D1aa kids making it to the NFL will only fuel the issue.

every time a midwestern D1aa kid goes to the combine it will continue to erode our recruiting potential. BTW keep your eyes on Jake Wieneke from SDSU he will be the next big combine skill guy who gets drafted after the 2018 combine. Those kids will eventually be the death of Mac schools with no fan base like ours I promise you !
[/quote

MACtion attendance is an issue, but I doubt it's having the impact on recruiting to that extent. It would really have to death spiral to 5k a game or so. Ball st avg 7,900 in attendance in 2016. They also have the 4th best rated recruit class for 2017. While kids love to play to a packed house, they also like playing at Ohio state, Nebraska and Iowa more so than maybe Iowa state once in awhile if your UNI. They also like to be on national tv. Even if it's once or twice. Not local cable channel. When I went through NIUs recruits for the last few years, I don't recall a single one opting FCS over them. They lost a few to other Mac schools and P5s, but there's still more prestige in FBS over FCS, even if attendance is pretty close.(only the top 15 FCS programs average around more than 13k in attendance) why go to uni who avgs 12k/game when maybe you could go to Toledo, Ohio or BG and have 20k/game plus the FBS perks?

NIU is becoming FCS, writing seems to be on the wall. Not to beat a dead horse but we are in for one huge attendance tank this year. Not just a tank, something that will cause shock waves.

If we are under 20k for the BC game I'll be concerned. Under 15k and I'll agree we are in trouble. The MACtion attendance woes, while disheartening, have a valid explanation. It will take a great team or break out star to prop the MACtion games up over 10 or 12k. That's not likely. What We really need are two or three big, early season Saturday games to off set the end of the year debacle. I'd think getting 30k on a warm Saturday vs a quality opponent is more attainable than 15k on a cold weeknight.

For the last 3 home games, it would not surprise me if NIU is under 3000

make your UNI argument for NDSU, SDSU or Youngstown state or other top FCS programs I promise we do not average 5ooo if you take out one or two games a year. Homecoming and one game vs BC or some other bigger school and the rest of the games they play in front of mom and dad and less than 4.500 non family members I promise you it is killing the program. its not just average attendance it is how many games they play with less then 30 of the seats filled. NDSU has 100 % full stands every game

NDSU is literally the only game in a rather large city. NIU is the smallest fish in an area of the country obsessed with pro sports.

Welcome to MACtion attendance issues! EMU constantly getting dumped on about attendance, but the entire MAC has serious attendance issues, totally exacerbated by these ridiculous ESPN mid week games. We ALL feel the pain.

MAC schools are just playing with the terrible hand they've been dealt. Nobody else who plays weeknight games draws either. The only exception is Friday nights which the MAC doesn't get. We're also in an era when half the bowl games have sparse attendance. It's a cable TV world, regrettably.

(03-07-2017 02:58 PM)NIU1981 Wrote:  MAC schools are just playing with the terrible hand they've been dealt. Nobody else who plays weeknight games draws either. The only exception is Friday nights which the MAC doesn't get. We're also in an era when half the bowl games have sparse attendance. It's a cable TV world, regrettably.

To some extent it's a hand they've been dealt. Part of it is what they did to themselves.