Greetings and a question...

[newtiger2]

Hello mustang fans, I a memphis fan and came over here to ask you a question regarding the future of your football program. I have been reading about your coach (Bennett) and some people seem optimistic and some are on the fence on what might happen this coming year in football. My question is, if SMU football were to go 9-3 or 8-4 this next year, how much of an increase in fan support do you think you will see in the next couple of years? I ask because 5 years ago when we hired Coach West, we never would imagine how far our football program has come and is continuing to grow. The fact the we had Deangelo Williams for the last 4 years and went to bowl games the last 3 has helped, but we have had a real effort in the community to support the Memphis Tigers football team and that wasn't there in the past. Memphis and Dallas are similar in the fact that like you with big 12 fans, we have a lot of SEC fans in the area so until we started winning, there was minimal support at best from the community. Unilke SMU, though, out Alumni base is probably not as strong or as high dollar but the University is working to change that as well. Hope I can get some good responses and good luck with the upcoming football season and good hire for basketball.

[EastStang]

Welcome. I think if we put up a good season and go to a bowl game next year, attendance will start to drift upward. 20 years of bad news can really rip the guts out of attendance. When the party outside of the stadium is better than the game inside the stadium, drinking has more participation. Hopefully, the lines between the two will begin to blur like the vision of those at the parties.

[jtstang]

First, I have doubts we can break .500 this year, but even assuming we have record such as you've described, I doubt you'll se a big upswing in community support after being mired in mediocrity for the last twenty years. And I think people are mistaken about SMU's alumni base in Dallas. It's neither as big nor as interested in SMU athletics as some think.

[newtiger2]

I hear that, before we started winning, I had friends who would come to University of Memphis games with me who were from the university of tennessee and they would describe the enviorment of our games as being at a club with a football game going on in the back. It was somewhat fun of sitting in the student section and basicall having a full bar at your disposal with the game in the background, but I much prefer the fact that we are now averaging close to 44-47k for our games. What is avg. attendence at SMU games?

[jtstang]

I hear that, before we started winning, I had friends who would come to University of Memphis games with me who were from the university of tennessee and they would describe the enviorment of our games as being at a club with a football game going on in the back. It was somewhat fun of sitting in the student section and basicall having a full bar at your disposal with the game in the background, but I much prefer the fact that we are now averaging close to 44-47k for our games. What is avg. attendence at SMU games?

Since Ford Stadium opened in 2000(or '01, how quickly the mind goes), I'd venture to guess we've averaged somewhere around 14,000 in actual attendance. Don't confuse that with SMU's reported attendance, which evidnetly is based on tickets sold.

[nc pony]

Welcome MT2! thanks for the post.

What you had that we do not (yet!) is a player to market your team around. I think we are all hoping that DeMyron martin will break thru into the national scene this year and we can build on that. A good season and a bowl berth would help too, but it needs to be sustained (like Memphis has done). A big-time running back with heisman potential can do wonders for a program (see LaDanian Tomlinson TCU, Eric Dickerson SMU) that hasn't seen the national spotlight in a while. But after that, it still comes down to winning. Win games, go to bowls, and people will come! (sorry, watched field of dreams last night!)

my 2 cents

[smu diamond m]

First, I have doubts we can break .500 this year, but even assuming we have record such as you've described, I doubt you'll se a big upswing in community support after being mired in mediocrity for the last twenty years. And I think people are mistaken about SMU's alumni base in Dallas. It's neither as big nor as interested in SMU athletics as some think.

Is there any water in your glass? Do you have a glass?

[Stallion]

Hey I love DeMyron-but he is not now or ever will be a Heisman candidate. He doesn't have the speed or manueverability.

[jtstang]

First, I have doubts we can break .500 this year, but even assuming we have record such as you've described, I doubt you'll se a big upswing in community support after being mired in mediocrity for the last twenty years. And I think people are mistaken about SMU's alumni base in Dallas. It's neither as big nor as interested in SMU athletics as some think.

Is there any water in your glass? Do you have a glass?

I don't see anything particularly pessimistic in that post. It's all supported by recent history. "Hey bud, what's your problem?"

[nc pony]

Hey I love DeMyron-but he is not now or ever will be a Heisman candidate. He doesn't have the speed or manueverability.

Maybe I was a little premature w/ the Heisman talk...all i mean is that you need a player w/ star qualities to help market the program, and I think DeMyron could be that guy. If he puts up some serious stats this year, hey, you never know! But winning games and having a recognizable name/face on theteam is what will get buttsin the seats.

my 2 cents

[EastStang]

DeMyron is Keylon Kincaide with a bit more speed.

[mrydel]

DeMyron is Keylon Kincaide with a bit more speed.

Personally I think his potential is greater. Not Heisman but he is good in our league and hopefully vision and cutting will improve with experience. He is interesting to watch in that his style is a little unique. By Junior or Senior year I would hope he is gettng mentioned for the Doak Walker watch list. That would be a big plus for SMU from our recent past.

[SMU Football Blog]

At least Demyron doesn't drop the football on the 1 yard line at least once a game.

[jtstang]

At least Demyron doesn't drop the football on the 1 yard line at least once a game.

My god, how'd Keylon make such a habit of that?

[newtiger2]

Would you guys comepare DeMyron with what we had the past couple of years in Deangelo? Also, what kind of offense does your team run? It was interesting to see that in the first year of the new look CUSA, there were quite a few teams that ran a spread offense.