What is "consistently" to you? I believe Gallia mentioned 2-3 games a year over stadium capacity. Over stadium capacity and turning away fans are not parallel, but they are close enough that I think DISCUSSION at the very least is merited.
2-3 games a year seems reasonable to me. Even the biggest and best have games where the crowds are less than other games. The MACtion games are not going to sellout unless Athens sees a major population boom. Just because those games aren't selling out, I don't think we should be avoiding this discussion.

Can we please include the ridiculous idea of having a "home" game in Cleveland or Cincinnati. That would be a huge disaster.

Parents weekend and band day are almost always full houses as well. I think SE Louisiana is Parents weekend and there will be a very large crowd on hand. I will challenge on the OSU games impacting attendance as much as it use to. I just don't think it does as much as it use to.

Can't you guys see that Billy the Cat is being sarcastic?

From the Marshall Game Notes.

http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/ohio/sports/m-footbl/...

Near the top
With back-to-back season of double-digit victories – 10-4 and 13-1 – Marshall enters 2015 owning one of the best FBS records in that two-plus-season span. Only fi ve FBS teams have a better record since the start of the 2013 season than Marshall’s 24-5.
Florida State (28-1), Ohio State (27-3), Michigan State (25-3), Oregon (25-4) and Alabama (24-4) are the top five. Marshall’s 24-5 shares the next spot with Missouri and Northern Illinois, which the Herd downed last December in the inaugural Boca Raton Bowl.
50+
Marshall’s 52-23 win over NIU last season was the 14th time that the Thundering Herd has reached the 50+-point plateau under coach Doc Holliday.

Marshall has won nine of its last 10 bowl appearances, including four in a row, three of those under Coach Doc Holliday.

Holliday’s six Herd teams have a combined 41-25 record. When Marshall has an edge in turnover margin, it is 23-4. When the turnover number is equal, Marshall is 10-4. But when the opponent is more sure-handed, the Herd is 8-17.

The graduates
Marshall will play the 2015 season with 13 players already owning their MU undergraduate degrees – a record for a Herd football team.

Big additions
Marshall’s program – its entire athletic program, in fact – had two big additions this summer, when the final two facilities funded by the Vision Campaign for Athletics opened as part of the Chris Cline Athletic Complex.
In early June, the Buck Harless Student-Athletic Academic Center opened, giving Herd athletes a welcome place to do their studies outside the classroom and the campus libraries. The Harless Center’s 14,150 square feet include 98 computer work stations, private tutoring room, a 34-seat classroom and 75-seat
auditorium, among other amenities.
In mid-July, the Marshall University Sports Medicine Institute opened its doors for Herd athletes as well as the general public. It’s a cooperative effort among MU Athletics, Cabell Huntington Hospital’s SMART Center (Sports Medicine and Rehabilitation Therapies), Marshall Orthopaedics and a hospital-run franchise of Stack Velocity Sports Performance.

Coaches Pay
Holliday’s six-year deal is for a total package of $755,500 -- up from $600,000 -- with additional dollars available through incentives tied to conference championships, bowls and season ticket sales. Holliday’s new contract includes a base salary from the university of $175,000. He also is guaranteed $330,500 annually for appearances on his weekly radio and TV shows and $200,000 (beginning this July) for annual appearances at Big Green Scholarship Foundation fundraising functions

This game preview calls Ohio underrated although they have Marshall winning a close one.
http://collegefootballnews.com/2015/marshall-vs-ohio-pred...

Video: Doc Holliday press conference, 9-8-2015, vs. Ohio

 

Interesting note about the 2004 game- Marshall beat Ohio 16-13 without scoring an offensive touchdown, a pick-6 was their only TD. OU missed a 32yrd FG with 25 seconds left that would have tied the game. The game was played a week after OU beat Kentucky in Lexington 28-16.

EDIT:

To continue that thought, here's a list of the dates when Marshall won in Athens and the margin of victory-

2004: +3
2002: +3
1998: +7
1986: +14
1972: +27
1964: +10

IIRC, we figured out late in that game that we could run wide on Marshall, for about 4-5 yards a pop, pretty consistently. I always thought that if there had been another minute or two on the clock we would have scored 6 on that last possession.

As it was, we had to play for the tying FG, and WHOOPSIE! Knorr'ed again...

Pretty sure it was a middle screen. Goddard just swiped it out of the air and took it in for the score.

I like our odds better than last season. Home field, more experienced team. T'erd's offense scored 27 last week (their D had 14), and if we can hold their offense to 27 we should have a good shot. Our guys need to make good decisions so they don't beat themselves.

We have 10 penalties or whatever that big number, I doubt we win. We take care of the ball and play error free, I think it will be a real good game. Can't wait to get back to Athens and see it!

That's a great quote, perimeter, thanks. That quote exactly states what Solich-style football has always been all about, and what I respect about it. Ohio hasn't always had the most talent on the field, but they have always played hard, and they always play until the whistle. We saw that from 2005 until mid-2012, and we saw that again last year. The 2014 team didn't have the experience, nor depth, to win but half their games, but they always played hard, and they won all the close ones except NIU. In games decided by under 15, the 2014 team was 6-1.

Some negative types will ask "why didn't they have the talent", but I think we've already covered that one, and I'm not going there again. Instead, my question is, "how do you get a team to play hard when they are already down 41-0, and how do you keep them playing as a team, instead of pointing fingers at each other?" As the Marshall player said, that isn't something all teams do.

In any case, Monroe starts his "down period" from the arbitrary starting point of the Miami game in 2012. Therefore I will create an arbitrary ending point for that period, and an arbitrary beginning for the new "up period", beginning with the 2014 Buffalo game. Ohio is now 3-1 since that game, and the only loss was a 7 point loss to the MAC Champions.

Monroe's arbitrary starting point isn't actually completely arbitrary. That's the point where TT made an error at the end of the game and failed to win it a the end, and the fans turned on him. Similarly my ending point isn't completely arbitrary. I feel like the attitude and effort went back to normal at the beginning of 2014, but the team was young. As the season wore on, the team got better, but it wasn't until the Buffalo game where the team finally really got things going, and got their confidence going.

I have confidence that the 2015 team will similarly continue to improve as the season goes on, and they will build up for even better 2016-2017 seasons. At some point in the next few years I think Solich will most likely retire, and I think he'll go out on a high note.