Next step for MAC: Draw fans consistently

Tuesday, September 23, 2003

ROB OLLER

Familiarity breeds contempt, not crowds, which is why Terry Hoeppner isn

Not a bad article. But sometimes I think these writers are very short sighted when they cite attendance.

When Miami played at Northwestern, the Wildcats drew only 24,000...yet if the Mildcats had a winning season, I guarantee you that a bowl would take them just because of their Big 11 affiliation.


Also, when EMU traveled to Navy, the Middies only drew 27,000 for the game, yet again, if they qualified for a bowl game they would go, period.

I liked the comment though from Miami's coach that we need to stop looking down our noses at our own league. Great comment.

These wins will result in some good happening and attendance to me, as far as bowl consideration goes, is a bit a of red herring. It seems to only apply to MAC schools. Look at C-USA's attendance numbers...not too impressive there either.

Most of these Midwest writers crack me up. Now it's the fault of the fans the MAC hasn't received due respect and could do better with attendance? It's high time writer's themselves, or at least their sports editors, share in the blame.

Over the past 25 years, individual MAC teams have taken turns having modest success at the national level. But the rustbelt newspapers only give them a couple days worth of obligatory ink, then spend the other 363 days providing free publicity for the Big 10. Hell, they didn't even know WHO Dan Majerle was until he made the U.S. Olympic team.

Of course, these indignant writers will say they are only writing what their readership wants. But isn't it ironic since the advent of USA Today and others in print and on the internet, the MAC gets more ink nationally than locally.

So here's my challenge to you, the Detroit Free Press, Detroit News, Cincinnati Post, Chicago Tribune, et.al... get out of your 1900's way of thinking. We're sick and tired of being called OTHER in your sports sections!!! At least assign one of your junior writers the MAC BEAT.

O.K., I feel better now.

Good point.

At least we are getting ink right now. The Plain Dealer's Bill Livingston had a column on MAC football today on the front of the sports section.

In Ohio, at least, many newspapers will have some decisions to make. With Miami, Bowling Green and Toledo playing so well, a lot of small dailies may also have to re-evaluate the space they are giving to the MAC. Small dailies are kind of handcuffed right now because the AP only serves up a round up preview and a few graphs per typical MAC game (which ends up cobbled together in most papers as a postgame round up).

Papers not running that pregame round up may soon start. But whether they will get more copy out of each game -- and even demand it from AP -- will drive the space the MAC gets in these smaller papers.

This is a big issue for Bowling Green, which would love more attention in the the small county seats around the university.

The intermediate step would be for these smaller papers to write an occasional feature. That depends on the resources and interest at each paper. Some of the small papers that might have some interest in Bowling Green football have very thin staffs, so this isn't easy.

More wire coverage is likely to come for any team that punches into the Top 25, as Toledo would do with a win Saturday. When Bowling Green was ranked last year, those four-graph dispatches turned into real stories. Big papers from around the country -- especially in the South -- will run a substanitial story on every Top 25 game.