CFN SMU Prediction 5-7

[EastStang]

Stallion wants SMU to win, he just is very open about the fact that for the last 25 years we've been well fiddling while the football program burned to the ground. Its on the uptick. I remember many an empty game at the Cotton Bowl and Texas Stadium when I was at SMU. I remember an Oregon State game where you had more roaches in the stands than fans. And come to think of it, the 1983 Cotton Bowl game was pretty empty as well. So, Stallion is right, we don't have a huge fan base. Dallas fans like the Cowgirls and not us. They kneel at the feet of Troy Aikesandpains and ignore the Mustangs. Or as the Directv ad shows, they name their dogs Troy Barkman, not Kyle Barkdron. Ft. Worth fans have TCU and cows in the streets, that's about it. Many like the Cowgirls, too, but didn't go to games as much as Dallas folks.

[Alaric]

Stallion speaks the truth when he says attendance at SMU was bad in the 1980s. Unfortunately, his mostly accurate commentary is couched in major a$$holism. Even though we drew poorly in the 1980s, that doesn't mean we're doomed to have poor attendance forever.

Factors lowering our attendance probably included us being a rich school buying players, our poor efforts to become part of the larger community, no recent tradition of success (like now) at the time, small alumni base), etc. We can change some of these factors.

The question remains whether we can increase our draw. Many private schools draw much better than us but most are BCS teams that draw a lot of their attendees from visiting schools. If we were to string multiple successful years together, make major efforts to become Dallas' school instead of the Park City's school and marketed the program well, I think we could fill the stadium consistently.

Below is a list of private schools and their average attendance from 2006. Some obviously aren't incredibly relevant to us.

USC - 91k
Notre Dame - 81k
BYU - 61k
Miami - 42k
Boston College - 39k
Baylor - 37k
Vandy - 35k
Wake - 33k
TCU - 32
Northwestern - 28k
SMU - 15k (106th, North TX was 105th)

[Treadway21]

The freebies stopped for the most part when Potts left and Bob Hitch was hired-heres some home attendance figures:

1980 (Russ Potts last year-Game Clinching our First Bowl Game in 11 years)
Arkansas 28, 225

1981-SWC Champs
UTA 20,130
NTSU 20,400
Rice 28,750
Texas Tech 24,410

1982-SWC Champs
NTSU 30,118
Houston 31,817

1983 10-2
Louisville 23,750
UTA 23,578
Rice 28, 750
Texas Tech 30,000

1984 SWC Co Champs
NTSU 27,124
Houston 28,361
Arkansas 28,712

1985
UTEP 24,611
Rice 20,014
Texas Tech 29,447

1986
Boston College 26,432
Houston 25,967
No. 11 Arkansas 32,382 (easily half the crowd were Razorbacks)

Please pull TCU's attendance during those years to compare. I don't know, but I imagine their attendance was not good when they were a bad team, which they were for a lot of the 80's. Now it may have been better than ours now, but I don't think they were as beaten down then as we were up until the last two years and I think their teams in the 80's were better as ours post DP. Of course, I am too lazy to look it up myself.

By the way when did you graduate Stallion?

[carolina stang]

The freebies stopped for the most part when Potts left and Bob Hitch was hired-heres some home attendance figures:

1980 (Russ Potts last year-Game Clinching our First Bowl Game in 11 years)
Arkansas 28, 225

1981-SWC Champs
UTA 20,130
NTSU 20,400
Rice 28,750
Texas Tech 24,410

1982-SWC Champs
NTSU 30,118
Houston 31,817

1983 10-2
Louisville 23,750
UTA 23,578
Rice 28, 750
Texas Tech 30,000

1984 SWC Co Champs
NTSU 27,124
Houston 28,361
Arkansas 28,712

1985
UTEP 24,611
Rice 20,014
Texas Tech 29,447

1986
Boston College 26,432
Houston 25,967
No. 11 Arkansas 32,382 (easily half the crowd were Razorbacks)

Please pull TCU's attendance during those years to compare. I don't know, but I imagine their attendance was not good when they were a bad team, which they were for a lot of the 80's. Now it may have been better than ours now, but I don't think they were as beaten down then as we were up until the last two years and I think their teams in the 80's were better as ours post DP. Of course, I am too lazy to look it up myself.

By the way when did you graduate Stallion?

Hey Brother Treadway. As you wish.....
A look at the 80's.
This should be just home games for the Poly Wogs:

1981
Coach: F.A. Dry
09/19__UTA______________W__38-16___18,071
09/26__SMU_____________L___9-20___25,862
10/03__Arkansas (18)______W__28-24___30,313
10/17__Utah State________T___13-13___15,357
10/31__Houston__________L___16-20___13,257
11/21__Texas A&M________L___7-37___29,483

1982 –
Coach: F. A. Dry
09/11__Utah State________W__24-9___17,423
10/09__Rice______________W__24-16___20,278
10/23__Baylor____________W__38-14___23,811
11/06__Texas Tech________L___14-16___22,104
11/13__Texas (20)_________L___21-38___22,468

1983
Coach: Jim Wacker
09/10__Kansas___________T___16-16___27,244
09/17__at Kansas State_____L___3-20___25,400
09/24__SMU_____________L___17-21___34,405
10/01__Arkansas__________L___21-38___28,310
10/15__Mississippi________L___7-20___21,176
10/29__Houston__________L___21-28___16,810
11/19__Texas A&M________L___10-20___28,640

1984 – Finished 8-4 and went to bowl
Coach: Jim Wacker
09/22__Kansas State_______W__42-10___28,412
10/13__Rice______________W__45-24___22,612
10/20__North Texas St._____W__34-3___18,795
10/27__Baylor____________W__38-28___23,885
11/10__(15) Texas Tech_____W__27-16___34,075
11/17__(12) Texas (10)_____L___23-44___47,280

1985 – 3-8 Year that Wacker kicked several off the team due to payoffs in past.
Coach: Jim Wacker
09/14__Tulane____________W__30-13___31,512
09/28__SMU_____________L___21-56___42,414
10/05__Arkansas (10)______L___0-41___40,112
10/19__North Texas St._____W__14-10___19,914
11/02__Houston__________L___21-26___19,854
11/23__Texas A&M________L___6-53___38,782

1986 –
Coach: Jim Wacker
09/20__Kansas State_______W__35-22___26,139
10/11__Rice______________L___31-37___21,092
10/18__North Texas St._____L___20-24___16,021
10/25__Baylor____________L___17-28___24,101
11/08__Texas Tech________L___14-36___25,729
11/15__Texas_____________L___16-45___27,517

1987 –
Coach: Jim Wacker
09/19__BYU______________W__33-12___22,615
10/03__Arkansas__________L___10-20___39,017
10/17__North Texas St._____W__19-10___23,291
10/31__Houston__________W__35-7___25,257
11/21__Texas A&M (8)______L___24-42___40,164

1988 –
Coach: Jim Wacker
09/17__Bowling Green_____W__49-12___18,706
09/24__Boston College_____W__31-17___25,335
10/08__Rice______________W__21-10___25,102
10/22__Baylor____________W__24-14___25,221
11/05__Texas Tech________L___10-23___29,363
11/12__Texas ____________L___21-30___29,083

1989 –
Coach: Jim Wacker
09/16__Texas A&M________L___7-44___42,960
09/23__Southern Miss_____W__19-17___15,839
09/30__SMU_____________W__28-10___26,023
10/07__Arkansas (7)_______L___19-41___25,734
10/21__Air Force__________ W__27-9___23,593
11/04__Houston__________L___10-55___19,112

1990 –
Coach: Jim Wacker
09/01__Washington St._____L___3-21___25,198
09/22__Oklahoma State____W__31-21___25,082
10/13__Rice______________W__38-28___23,704
10/27__(24) Baylor________L___21-27___28,035
11/10__Texas Tech________L___28-40___28,730
11/17__Texas (7)__________L___10-38___39,007

[Charleston Pony]

there's a reason many refer to SMU and TCU as "sister schools"

[Stallion]

What an amazingly irrelevant response to my point.