(07-27-2018 10:36 AM)OptimisticOwl Wrote: (07-27-2018 10:13 AM)cr11owl Wrote: . None of the students at Rice even apply to those schools why would they care about watching them?
I care about watching Rice, not Rice's opponent.
And Rice apparently -- and quite stupidly -- long operated on the faulty assumption that all the rest of us were similarly curious oddities, blithely unconcerned with the quality and familiarity of our affiliates and the loss of things like tradition and rivalries.
You realize, do you not, that your oh-so-admirable and inelastic loyalty to Rice was born out of attending during the SWC days? You think that may have played a role? Can you even conceive of being 18 to 22 today, coming to Rice, and seeing the steady diet of "who?" that we've been reduced to? I don't blame today's students one iota for not coming out to see the schools we play. There was much reflected glory to be had in the strivings against Texas, A&M, Arkansas, etc., even in defeat. Not so much against this lot.
You can consider the past 25 years an experiment to see if it matters, greatly, to the vast majority of a given college's students and alumni who their team plays. Spoiler alert: it does.
Bully for you if it doesn't. Although, frankly, come off it already. It does for you too. If you want to claim that your investment level -- whether measured financially, emotionally, or whatever -- in Rice vs. CUSA is the same as Rice vs. SWC, I call BS.
Yeah, UTD is well known for automatic merit money, by the way, making it very attractive to high-stats middle class kids who don't qualify for enough FA to afford more well-known schools (if they even get in) and/or their home state's flagship.