(09-02-2017 02:23 PM)bikechuck Wrote:  

(09-02-2017 02:06 PM)huskie1stdown Wrote:  Who cares.
12,000 will show.

Hope we draw better than that for an instate opponent. Last night's crowd was terrible for bringing in a big name opponent. I am sure Frazier is frustrated after listening to what so many said they wanted, making it happen and then drawing a small crowd even with all of the special promotions.

I guess playing so late on a Friday night did not help but I still felt there should have been 20,000 for a game like BC.

I know this is probably about three years late, but I am now struggling with the whole schedule-apolooza thing. When it came out, I was pretty excited with the following names: Maryland, Boston College, San Diego St, Wyoming, Utah, BYU....I thought, wow---this is going to be cool to see these "big" teams come here and pack Huskie Stadium.

Now, I see something I didn't see that all these schools have in common. I don't believe any of them have, even remotely, a strong alumni base in the Chicago, or maybe even Midwest area. To fill the stadium you are still depending on Huskie fans or Chicago area fans (that have to be knowledgeable football fans) to fill the stadium.

Of course---the real draws---Iowa, Iowa St, Illinois, Purdue, Ohio State, the Big Team Michigans, Missouri, Kentucky, etc----WON'T come here, so it's a Catch 22.

Those names we drew were nice---but none of them are remotely close and I don't see any school bringing in any sort of base that will fill up about 20% of the stadium.

(09-03-2017 08:29 AM)Milwaukee Pilot Wrote:  

(09-02-2017 02:23 PM)bikechuck Wrote:  

(09-02-2017 02:06 PM)huskie1stdown Wrote:  Who cares.
12,000 will show.

Hope we draw better than that for an instate opponent. Last night's crowd was terrible for bringing in a big name opponent. I am sure Frazier is frustrated after listening to what so many said they wanted, making it happen and then drawing a small crowd even with all of the special promotions.

I guess playing so late on a Friday night did not help but I still felt there should have been 20,000 for a game like BC.

I know this is probably about three years late, but I am now struggling with the whole schedule-apolooza thing. When it came out, I was pretty excited with the following names: Maryland, Boston College, San Diego St, Wyoming, Utah, BYU....I thought, wow---this is going to be cool to see these "big" teams come here and pack Huskie Stadium.

Now, I see something I didn't see that all these schools have in common. I don't believe any of them have, even remotely, a strong alumni base in the Chicago, or maybe even Midwest area. To fill the stadium you are still depending on Huskie fans or Chicago area fans (that have to be knowledgeable football fans) to fill the stadium.

Of course---the real draws---Iowa, Iowa St, Illinois, Purdue, Ohio State, the Big Team Michigans, Missouri, Kentucky, etc----WON'T come here, so it's a Catch 22.

Those names we drew were nice---but none of them are remotely close and I don't see any school bringing in any sort of base that will fill up about 20% of the stadium.

Again, when STF got here one of the top things he heard from the fanbase was to bring P5 teams to Huskie Stadium. He has done that, so the stadium should be full of NIU fans regardless of the travel of the opponent. The fact is the NIU fanbase isn't good, and even if we played in the Big 12 no one would go to games.

(09-03-2017 08:40 AM)DogPoundNorth Wrote:  

(09-03-2017 08:29 AM)Milwaukee Pilot Wrote:  

(09-02-2017 02:23 PM)bikechuck Wrote:  

(09-02-2017 02:06 PM)huskie1stdown Wrote:  Who cares.
12,000 will show.

Hope we draw better than that for an instate opponent. Last night's crowd was terrible for bringing in a big name opponent. I am sure Frazier is frustrated after listening to what so many said they wanted, making it happen and then drawing a small crowd even with all of the special promotions.

I guess playing so late on a Friday night did not help but I still felt there should have been 20,000 for a game like BC.

I know this is probably about three years late, but I am now struggling with the whole schedule-apolooza thing. When it came out, I was pretty excited with the following names: Maryland, Boston College, San Diego St, Wyoming, Utah, BYU....I thought, wow---this is going to be cool to see these "big" teams come here and pack Huskie Stadium.

Now, I see something I didn't see that all these schools have in common. I don't believe any of them have, even remotely, a strong alumni base in the Chicago, or maybe even Midwest area. To fill the stadium you are still depending on Huskie fans or Chicago area fans (that have to be knowledgeable football fans) to fill the stadium.

Of course---the real draws---Iowa, Iowa St, Illinois, Purdue, Ohio State, the Big Team Michigans, Missouri, Kentucky, etc----WON'T come here, so it's a Catch 22.

Those names we drew were nice---but none of them are remotely close and I don't see any school bringing in any sort of base that will fill up about 20% of the stadium.

Again, when STF got here one of the top things he heard from the fanbase was to bring P5 teams to Huskie Stadium. He has done that, so the stadium should be full of NIU fans regardless of the travel of the opponent. The fact is the NIU fanbase isn't good, and even if we played in the Big 12 no one would go to games.

If NIU had a team that was worth seeing, and you add P5 to that, that's when you have your magic happen

(09-02-2017 02:40 PM)Dog Fan Wrote:  

(09-02-2017 02:23 PM)bikechuck Wrote:  

(09-02-2017 02:06 PM)huskie1stdown Wrote:  Who cares.
12,000 will show.

Hope we draw better than that for an instate opponent. Last night's crowd was terrible for bringing in a big name opponent. I am sure Frazier is frustrated after listening to what so many said they wanted, making it happen and then drawing a small crowd even with all of the special promotions.

I guess playing so late on a Friday night did not help but I still felt there should have been 20,000 for a game like BC.

If it had been on a Saturday afternoon, there'd be over 20,000 there.

Agree 100%

(09-03-2017 09:10 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  

(09-03-2017 08:40 AM)DogPoundNorth Wrote:  

(09-03-2017 08:29 AM)Milwaukee Pilot Wrote:  

(09-02-2017 02:23 PM)bikechuck Wrote:  

(09-02-2017 02:06 PM)huskie1stdown Wrote:  Who cares.
12,000 will show.

Hope we draw better than that for an instate opponent. Last night's crowd was terrible for bringing in a big name opponent. I am sure Frazier is frustrated after listening to what so many said they wanted, making it happen and then drawing a small crowd even with all of the special promotions.

I guess playing so late on a Friday night did not help but I still felt there should have been 20,000 for a game like BC.

I know this is probably about three years late, but I am now struggling with the whole schedule-apolooza thing. When it came out, I was pretty excited with the following names: Maryland, Boston College, San Diego St, Wyoming, Utah, BYU....I thought, wow---this is going to be cool to see these "big" teams come here and pack Huskie Stadium.

Now, I see something I didn't see that all these schools have in common. I don't believe any of them have, even remotely, a strong alumni base in the Chicago, or maybe even Midwest area. To fill the stadium you are still depending on Huskie fans or Chicago area fans (that have to be knowledgeable football fans) to fill the stadium.

Of course---the real draws---Iowa, Iowa St, Illinois, Purdue, Ohio State, the Big Team Michigans, Missouri, Kentucky, etc----WON'T come here, so it's a Catch 22.

Those names we drew were nice---but none of them are remotely close and I don't see any school bringing in any sort of base that will fill up about 20% of the stadium.

Again, when STF got here one of the top things he heard from the fanbase was to bring P5 teams to Huskie Stadium. He has done that, so the stadium should be full of NIU fans regardless of the travel of the opponent. The fact is the NIU fanbase isn't good, and even if we played in the Big 12 no one would go to games.

If NIU had a team that was worth seeing, and you add P5 to that, that's when you have your magic happen

If Lynch was playing Friday night it would have been standing room only.

(09-03-2017 08:29 AM)Milwaukee Pilot Wrote:  

(09-02-2017 02:23 PM)bikechuck Wrote:  

(09-02-2017 02:06 PM)huskie1stdown Wrote:  Who cares.
12,000 will show.

Hope we draw better than that for an instate opponent. Last night's crowd was terrible for bringing in a big name opponent. I am sure Frazier is frustrated after listening to what so many said they wanted, making it happen and then drawing a small crowd even with all of the special promotions.

I guess playing so late on a Friday night did not help but I still felt there should have been 20,000 for a game like BC.

I know this is probably about three years late, but I am now struggling with the whole schedule-apolooza thing. When it came out, I was pretty excited with the following names: Maryland, Boston College, San Diego St, Wyoming, Utah, BYU....I thought, wow---this is going to be cool to see these "big" teams come here and pack Huskie Stadium.

Now, I see something I didn't see that all these schools have in common. I don't believe any of them have, even remotely, a strong alumni base in the Chicago, or maybe even Midwest area. To fill the stadium you are still depending on Huskie fans or Chicago area fans (that have to be knowledgeable football fans) to fill the stadium.

Of course---the real draws---Iowa, Iowa St, Illinois, Purdue, Ohio State, the Big Team Michigans, Missouri, Kentucky, etc----WON'T come here, so it's a Catch 22.

Those names we drew were nice---but none of them are remotely close and I don't see any school bringing in any sort of base that will fill up about 20% of the stadium.

It's pathetic. They played a power 5 school on a Friday night at 8:30pm. A friend of mine flew in from NYC to catch the game with me. If you work Friday there should be absolutely no excuse to not be able to make a game that starts that late. People had months to figure out a plan for babysitting, work scheduling, etc. The fan base is a joke and NIU games are not that important to them.

Also I think the university needs to get the students more involved. Particularly the frats/sororities who basically put together a large tailgate but never make the game. Maybe get them involved with halftime competitions against each other. Sell beer on that side of the stadium? Anything to get them to come in the stadium. Maybe your less likely to heavily binge drink if you could have a beer inside.

Carey lost to an average FCS school last year and I'm fully confident he can lead us to another loss against a team with far less talent again this year unless our guys can find a way to overcome the coaching some how...

(09-03-2017 10:52 AM)JoeNovak Wrote:  It's pathetic. They played a power 5 school on a Friday night at 8:30pm. A friend of mine flew in from NYC to catch the game with me. If you work Friday there should be absolutely no excuse to not be able to make a game that starts that late. People had months to figure out a plan for babysitting, work scheduling, etc. The fan base is a joke and NIU games are not that important to them.

If the game started at 7pm there probably would have been another 2,000 people there. I had several family members/friends that would have brought themselves and 2-3 kids between the ages of 4-10. They didn't want to drive out to Dekalb just to leave at halftime which wasn't until like 10:15pm if I recall correctly. Playing on Fridays isn't ideal either when high school football is going on...any parents/family members that had HS kids playing (or cheering, performing, dancing, etc) that night were at those games, not in Dekalb. I have no doubt that if the game was on a Saturday there would have been another 3,000+.

The storyline for me in this game is how does NIU come out of the gate It's not your typical good EIU team. Not a pushover but not the skill we have seen. How players rebound will be very interesting, I could see this game being a scary one. I could see something like halftime 10-10, and NIU doing enough in 2nd half to win 30-20

I'm hoping everyone one here that is complaining attended the game. Frazier did what was asked and got a good team to come here. No one showed up. Our fans are pretty lousy unfortunately and it hurts to say that since I'm a die hard. BC did make the stipulation that they wanted Friday and tv so we got screwed on the time. Many students wouldn't have stayed for Saturday. As for everyone saying if Lynch was playing we would have been full, go back and check the attendance during our MAC dominance run. I believe we still only averaged 15-17 k. Granted there were many maction games but we still didn't draw well.

I don't know about all of you, but I've been watching football games pretty much all week and attendance hasn't been an issue. I'm getting really tired of hearing, "....but it was a Friday night!" or "The game started too late!" These are garbage excuses for a fan base that is burnt out.

(09-03-2017 09:17 PM)Dtownboys Wrote:  I'm hoping everyone one here that is complaining attended the game. Frazier did what was asked and got a good team to come here. No one showed up. Our fans are pretty lousy unfortunately and it hurts to say that since I'm a die hard. BC did make the stipulation that they wanted Friday and tv so we got screwed on the time. Many students wouldn't have stayed for Saturday. As for everyone saying if Lynch was playing we would have been full, go back and check the attendance during our MAC dominance run. I believe we still only averaged 15-17 k. Granted there were many maction games but we still didn't draw well.

In 2013 when Lynch was getting Heisman hype we had 2 sellouts. The only ones we've had for more than a decade. Saturday games, of course.

I agree that NIU alumni in general simply suck. Bunch of lame asses convinced by the media that only football factories count. But the vast majority of people on this board were at the game or are far removed from Dekalb.

Can't believe I would ever say this, but I am starting to wonder if this program needs to really really bottom out to save it. We know one thing, excluding incredible circumstances (i.e. Carey gets arrested or shows up to a game drunk) Frazier is not firing Carey. I never thought I would say this but I am starting to understand VegasHuskie's point in that it almost might be better for this thing to tank than go 4-8 and say "Oh but we played so good late in the year against the Buffalo's, EMU's, etc". Maybe a loss to EIU will really force Frazier's hand to make a change. This thing is headed to very very very bad places right now.

(09-04-2017 12:42 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  Can't believe I would ever say this, but I am starting to wonder if this program needs to really really bottom out to save it. We know one thing, excluding incredible circumstances (i.e. Carey gets arrested or shows up to a game drunk) Frazier is not firing Carey. I never thought I would say this but I am starting to understand VegasHuskie's point in that it almost might be better for this thing to tank than go 4-8 and say "Oh but we played so good late in the year against the Buffalo's, EMU's, etc". Maybe a loss to EIU will really force Frazier's hand to make a change. This thing is headed to very very very bad places right now.

VegasHuskie read the forecast of Rod Carey like a book years ago. He was insulted heavily, especially by one poster. Boy, reading the archives - it's interesting how some posts age.

(09-04-2017 02:13 AM)IWokeUpLikeThis Wrote:  

(09-04-2017 12:42 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  Can't believe I would ever say this, but I am starting to wonder if this program needs to really really bottom out to save it. We know one thing, excluding incredible circumstances (i.e. Carey gets arrested or shows up to a game drunk) Frazier is not firing Carey. I never thought I would say this but I am starting to understand VegasHuskie's point in that it almost might be better for this thing to tank than go 4-8 and say "Oh but we played so good late in the year against the Buffalo's, EMU's, etc". Maybe a loss to EIU will really force Frazier's hand to make a change. This thing is headed to very very very bad places right now.

VegasHuskie read the forecast of Rod Carey like a book years ago. He was insulted heavily, especially by one poster. Boy, reading the archives - it's interesting how some posts age.

I will admit, he was right , I was wrong. I think the thing which rubbed me the wrong way with Vegas Huskie is that it came off to me like being a close friend of PJ, he was just bashing Carey because he was a friend of PJ. Seemed like his problem was more personal in nature.

I am going to take some credit for seeing this early also, 2015 games vs BC and Ohio State were RED RED RED flags. Those two games said it all right there. In my opinion, that's when Carey lost faith in himself and his players, he lost all confidence from that point on.

(09-04-2017 12:04 AM)NIU007 Wrote:  

(09-03-2017 09:17 PM)Dtownboys Wrote:  I'm hoping everyone one here that is complaining attended the game. Frazier did what was asked and got a good team to come here. No one showed up. Our fans are pretty lousy unfortunately and it hurts to say that since I'm a die hard. BC did make the stipulation that they wanted Friday and tv so we got screwed on the time. Many students wouldn't have stayed for Saturday. As for everyone saying if Lynch was playing we would have been full, go back and check the attendance during our MAC dominance run. I believe we still only averaged 15-17 k. Granted there were many maction games but we still didn't draw well.

In 2013 when Lynch was getting Heisman hype we had 2 sellouts. The only ones we've had for more than a decade. Saturday games, of course.

I agree that NIU alumni in general simply suck. Bunch of lame asses convinced by the media that only football factories count. But the vast majority of people on this board were at the game or are far removed from Dekalb.

I was talking to a few people in the HAF tent before the game. There is no question in my mind that the fan base has been lost because of the midweek games. These are people who have been avid fans and now attend only a couple games a year. They were all complaining like crazy.

(09-03-2017 09:35 PM)NIUGrad Wrote:  I don't know about all of you, but I've been watching football games pretty much all week and attendance hasn't been an issue. I'm getting really tired of hearing, "....but it was a Friday night!" or "The game started too late!" These are garbage excuses for a fan base that is burnt out.

Nobody is hyped about NIU because of Carey. This is the least excited I have been about an NIU season. Carey is still our coach and then we found out Graham who does nothing well was going to be our starter. The same Graham that got benched for a QB turned WR. Then Carey says he's going to play a carousel of RBs rather than giving most of the carries to his best RB.

I have a feeling Saturday could be more competitive than we think.

(09-04-2017 09:55 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  I have a feeling Saturday could be more competitive than we think.

More competitive than we want it to be, but not more competitive than we think. I still have flashbacks to the Western Illinois game, except we don't have Maddie around to attempt to pull the game out.

(09-04-2017 10:01 AM)NIU007 Wrote:  

(09-04-2017 09:55 AM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  I have a feeling Saturday could be more competitive than we think.

More competitive than we want it to be, but not more competitive than we think. I still have flashbacks to the Western Illinois game, except we don't have Maddie around to attempt to pull the game out.

I certainly wasn't happy about the outcome of the BC game, but it's not like we got stomped. We were obviously competitive, and should have won, against an ACC team (albeit a bottom tier one). The coaching and play calling did us in. Our guys , especially the D , played well. If Graham can settle down and hit some passes we'll be OK.

I'm not ready to write off the season yet. As 7 pointed out, some of our best seasons have started out slow. I'm not expecting a great season, but at least not a bad one.

We'll beat EIU handily. It may be close at the half, but we'll pull away in the 4th. Remember the EIU game with Garropolo vs. Lynch?