Witch Hazel

quote:

---

But, we showed up.

---

If student attendance doesn't start improving, it makes a compelling case for minor league football.

Football skews heavily towards the blue collar crowd and what's the point of a school having a team if everyone is interested but the students??

Plus student demographics are changing. I'm not certain the large international student population (Asians/Indians etc) are so interested in American football, and a lot academic programs have become female dominated, like medicine and law.

"Declining Student Attendance Hits Georgia (FootBall)"

"At Campuses Across the Country, More Reasons Than Ever to Skip the Game"

"Declining student attendance is an illness that has been spreading for years nationwide. But now it has hit the Southeastern Conference, home to college football's best teams and supposedly its most fervent fans, giving athletics officials reason to fret about future ticket sales and fundraising."

"As it turns out, Georgia students left empty 39% of their designated sections of Sanford Stadium over the last four seasons, according to school records of student-ticket scans. Despite their allocation of about 18,000 seats, the number of students at games between 2009 and 2012 never exceeded 15,000."

"Winning isn't even necessarily a solution. The average student crowd to see last year's Georgia team—which finished the season ranked No. 5—was almost 6,000 short of maximum capacity. Even at Alabama, 32% of student seats went unused by students between 2009 and 2012, when the Crimson Tide won three national championships. Alabama coach Nick Saban wrote a flattering letter last week in the student paper to recruit students back."

LINK

:violin:

quote:

---

That being said, Missouri isn't Southern or "Northern". It's a large mix. My lady friend from the Missisippi Delta region of Missouri (the boot heel) has a practically indecipherable southern accent and calls me a "damn Yankee" every day...and we're both born and raised in Missouri.

---

Maybe, but a very small percentage of the Missouri population lives below HWy 70.

Virtually no one from the Boot Heel attends Mizzou. I think the Boot Heel folks (if they go to college at all) apply to Tennessee, or somewhere else in the south. The south can keep them.

I always thought of Missouri as Mid-Western state. In the same league as Michigan, Illinois, Kansas etc.

Missouri isn't football crazy like much of the south. St. Louis, for example, is a baseball town. Hockey is a big sport here, too.

Plus, southerns tend to be very group and image oriented, and Missourians tend to be more egalitarian and self-centered.

I'm from Missouri and really don't like the new conference. Just doesn't feel right to me. Missouri has more in common with Chicago and Detroit than Atlanta and New Orleans.

Just calling it like I see it.

I doubt they'll expand, if anything they'll contract.(see link below)

"UGA attacks problem of student football attendance - again"

LINK