Thing is... the body of your post is directly contradicted by your signature line.

The thing is that if we'd been playing almost any other opponent, we'd have been rolled off the field. Today we did not see a team that can win a conference division or deserve a bowl bid.

I think we're reaching a point where we should no longer say that we should be content with the positives for the simple reason that we've lived through such miserable negatives. At this stage, to do so is essentially being just good enough not to be the best.

Every good team has a crappy game or two.  These things happen.  Part of the problem with building a fan base is our fans expect too much I think.  Yes my signature line sounds like I expect them to be pristine, but I'm with them regardless.  The fact of the matter is that we overestimated these guys.  Southern teams have a habit of being surprising.  My guess is we just overlooked them because of the fact that in the past few games we just steamrolled the competition.  Despite this I still think we have a decent shot at the MAC again.  Keep our heads up people for the next game is in 5 days and we must be psyched and go in and be loud.

My impressions sitting in the stands:

1.  There had to be a bit of post-Fiami letdown going on.  The offense looked great on the opening drive, but then seemed to just go flat.  Having Franshaw throw INTs on three consecutive passes didn't help, but it was more than that.  I think they scored too easily on the opening drive and then lost the spark.  The emotion from beating Fiami the week before just dissipated.

2.  Losing their starting QB was something of a boost for ULL.  Masson went down on the last play of ULL's opening drive with a knee injury and never came back.  McGuire, the backup, was probably someone OU had not seen and/or had not practiced for.  It took a while for the D to figure him out.

3.  The offense went plain vanilla for the 2nd week in a row.  There wasn't one WR reverse/option.  Having a stiff wind from the south may have had something to do with not having a WR throw the ball; a couple of Franshaw's INTs were thrown into the wind and seem to hang up.  But there was also little misdirection and not as much motion in the offensive sets as we've seen during the rest of the streak. 

4.  The secondary's weakness was really exposed.  There were just too many times when ULL had an open receiver.  We were fortunate that their receivers weren't more adept. 

5.  The OU lines on both sides of the ball played well.  By and large, they controlled the line.  The O line did a nice job of protecting Franshaw and opening holes for the RBs.  Only one sack and just 10 yards lost for the running game.  The D line was able to apply considerable pressure on McGuire most of the afternoon.  Part of the problem in the second quarter was lack of offensive time of possession; the D line spent way too much time out there.  The problem in the 4th quarter was the nickel and dime sets weren't as effective against short crossing patterns and screens as they should have been.

6.  Hershey did it again.  Let's hope he doesn't kill himself vaulting over defenders.

7.  Congrats to Franshaw for not only breaking Cleve's record, but also for showing some mettle in overcoming the INTs and engineering the comeback.

8.  15,000 may be a bit high for the official attendance but it wasn't too far off.  It was probably more like 13,000, but not like the EMU inflation.  I sort of expected more people in Halloween garb, but the parties maybe got started sooner than I thought they would.  One we saw on the way out of town had probably a full house...definitely a full porch...and a full front yard...and was starting to flow (in more than one way) onto the sidewalk.

9.  The band was fabulous.  I loved the routines they did.

10.  Win or lose, there is absolutely nothing like sitting in Peden on an autumn afternoon.

Strange game - started like we would be the blow-out 14.5 favorites that the bookies picked us to be, ended with what was a disappointing, comatose crowd needing a change of underwear.  To the student body, come on, that was a particularly lame turn-out and yea I know it's Halloween in Athens. BFD! 

Boo's first half was "frightening" to say the least. Speaks volumes of the kid to come back the way he did in the 2nd half. Congrats to him for breaking the OHIO TD passing record.

At the end I'm standing there thinking, we stunk up the first half yet we put 38 on the board and were looking down the barrel of a potential  loss.

Great show by the 110! Those first 2 charts with all the marching manuevers were simply outstanding.

Hershey's got some keyoonee's!

Do we practice on-side kicks? It didn't appear so today. You've got to give the ULL coach some credit for the start of the 2nd half call. That was gutsy and we looked dear in the headlights especially on that one.

I counted 300 people on the student side....that was the problem.

UConn's stadium is essentially in the state's largest city. The 2000 census puts the Greater Hartford area at about 1,059,878 people. Athens and surrounding counties (+ Fairfield county) has 382351 souls. UConn's stadium isn't all that much bigger than ours. Travel time wise, the Greater Hartford area is a lot smaller than the geographic area I calculated for Athens. And its the state's flagship university. And that wasn't their city's/university's High Holy Weekend (I think the Nutmeg state celebrates WASP days in the early spring).

seriously, we have the worst stadium management in all of college athletics. this crap does not happen anywhere else. 

anywhere else the student section is behind the opposing team's bench BECAUSE THEY MAKE NOISE. We move ours to where there is a disincentive to make noise, and then let people bring babies into the game and harass the people around them.

peden stadium is too awesome for this. 

I brought both my boys to games in Peden in baby carriers when they were each 1-2 yrs. old.  How else were they going to learn to watch football if we didn't start them early?  There is a 0% chance I would have tolerated that as a member of the OZone yesterday. 

Moving the home team to the East Side of the Peden was a PC required move by the MAC office and IMHO cost us the Wyoming game as we spent the entire second half starring into the sun while they were in the shade. No more 2PM Saturday games in September. 

 Bringing a baby to the student section sounds like someone not aware of football etiquette.  Seems like a simple solution there.  Wonder what they would do if they ended up in the dog pound at Cleveland Stadium?  Plenty of empty sections they could move to last Saturday. 

 

Yeah I'll tack on here that the MAC screwed us on this with the rule that you can't have students directly behind the opposing bench.  So our only option was to switch sides of the field or go back to the old way of having the front section of stands on the student side as the main visitor's section.

Unless Ohio is sitting in the top 25 every year like Boise State I'm not sure how that is ever going to happen. Then every game is a must see game to see if Ohio can keep its winning streak alive. Even then if the team started losing again support would slide back to today's level. Thats a big point I think when considering expanding the stadium beyond its current capacity. I think 27,000 for Peden would be about right long term and would allow the program to get to that magical 25,000 average level that helps a mid major stand out. Marshall I think made the mistake of expanding to 38,000 when in a down turn the crowds are regularly only like half of that.

The man who pushed the MAC to pass this rule is now at Fresno State.  Ohio University brought this rule on themselves.  Coaches like the set up though because the coaches in the box can see the sidelines better.