Every game from here out is on national tv. Works for me. 56 degrees here at game time.

Attendance will be bad and overstated. My 4 seats will be counted in the number, but no one will be in them, because I couldn't give them away. Don't care about the weather, but with 3 kids 10 & under trick or treat of course wins.

The crowd will be embarrassing on ESPN, but it won't matter because very few will be watching as I expect the World Series to get great ratings following the amazing game 5. The World Series is my favorite sporting event of the year, I'll be bouncing back and forth on the DVR.

Well, I'll be watching. And so will my wife, my kids and my dogs. My cat won't give a shit.

Wow! With all due respect to one of OU's most loyal fans, this is telling. Until someone can tell me exactly how much money we NET from this debacle, I'm not convinced it's worth it.

How many times have we heard about the playoff and the mega schools tonight? They know little information about 2-3 guys on each side of the ball and talk and talk and talk about those same guys over and over again. Terrible commentary. I usually mute the tv so I don’t have to listen to these jackasses because most of the time they are either stating the obvious (“that was a great post route ran there by *looks at roster sheet for 3 secs....Andre, I meanAndrew Meyer* or “Miami hasn’t done well on 3rd downs tonight* elementary stuff. Anyways, I read the comment about how obnoxiously blatant they are by spending 60% of the time talking about the playoff, 20% about Franks Nebraska roots, and 20% about the actual game being played and I agree, it’s awful. Turning on the radio for the WS while watching the Cats play on a muted TV. Can’t beat that

I have suffered through some dreadful Saturday crowds - I think that given the weather and the time/day of the game, it was a really nice crowd..

I had nearly 30 people tailgate and go to the game with me and we all had a very nice evening and were excited for the big win.

If everyone that complains so much about lack of student attendance would just reach out to some connection that they have on campus and invite some kids to have a good time prior to the game and during it, maybe we would start to actually see a culture that we all seem to desire.

There is no way I would care about Ohio Athletics like I do unless one individual reached out to me during my time in undergrad and would ask if I wanted to go to games with him, tailgate with his family and friends and network with people he knows.

The biggest laughable and frustrating thing about this forum is the consistent complaints about the students when nobody does the easiest thing in the world to try and increase student involvement: ask them personally to come.

Alan, I wouldn't read too much into this. If the game had been Saturday, I also could not have attended due to my daughter playing in soccer tournament. Personally, I love the mid-week games because I get to watch my Bobcats and I'm free on the weekends to watch my kids play. As for what financially we're getting out of this, according to reports the MAC gets $8M annually from ESPN alone (doesn't include secondary contracts from CBS, etc.) so that works out to $670K per school. That's probably as much or more than most schools make in total football ticket revenue annually.

The fact of the matter is it's not even a hard decision for the AD. November Saturday attendance in the MAC (see Akron vs Buffalo) is not great. Also, keep in mind that much of this was created with the advent of the 12th game and 14-week schedule. Prior to the 12th game, most MAC schools played 5 home games per year. So they've only moved one game off that model. The 14-week schedule also means the potential for Thanksgiving week games in towns like Athens or Oxford. The 2008 Akron at Ohio game played on Saturday November 22nd, 2008 was the worst attended Ohio game I've seen in my 30 years following the Bobcats.

One last consideration I would ask that you make is the players. When I attend Ohio Football Media Days, I always ask the players off the record what they think of the mid-week games. They love them. They get to be in the national spotlight for a night. It's something that not even many Power 5 players get to experience. They get singular focus from NFL scouts. When it hits rights, you get national radio hosts like Jim Rome talking about you or your highlights on SportsCenter. 

It has its drawbacks obviously. You're just not going to get good crowds (although again you may not get them on Saturdays either). And when you're not having a good season and relegated to ESPNU or ESPN3, that's no fun. But it's part of the deal. The MAC playing in secrecy on November Saturdays for 50 years got the conference nowhere. I think these games get the MAC some amount of attention. Worst case, you cash a $670K check.

I took my wife out for dinner last night for her birthday.

It being Game Day ,I had on an Ohio polo.

When the waiter came came over he said "Ohio,you guys are on T.V.tonight".
Then he said he was looking forward to watching some "Maction".

I asked him how he knew about us.
He said he's a big college football fan and loves being able to watch midweek games.
Apparently,from what he said,so are a bunch of his friends.

Exactly! As I posted on another thread, I remember the last Halloween Saturday game. It had nice weather, and about half as many people as last night.