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we get a higher percentage than almost anyone. We had about 3500 students there last night - half our student body. Very few schools get that kind of turn out. The issue is we are 1) small and 2) 60% out of state. THe out of staters dont get our obsession with football. Its 100 and sweaty and they watched 3 or four field goals and they have beer, air-conditioning and cute girls waiting for them. I was jealous when they left.

if you are a private school and want to take more in staters you get TCU's student body. They are douchy and stupid. At least ours are douchy and smart-ish

SMU made the decision to be a truly national private institution. Like the above poster stated, if we wanted to a Texas private we'd be TCU....which sucks.

gostangs wrote:The issue is we are 1) small and 2) 60% out of state. THe out of staters dont get our obsession with football. Its 100 and sweaty and they watched 3 or four field goals and they have beer, air-conditioning and cute girls waiting for them.

There were never any cute girls waiting for me when I was a student

CalallenStang wrote:More would stay if we had actual cell phone coverage in the stadium. Like it or not, today's students like to be connected to the rest of the world 24/7.

My cell phone worked, my wife's and my business partner's without any problem - Verizon.

Well, all that counts are the points in the endzone. I suspect our OL wasn't up to the task in winning this game...

I think the problem is we have no fans. Student section was fine. They were the loudest SMU bunch. The home side was very quite and I was in a sea of black.

smumustang1980 wrote:

CalallenStang wrote:More would stay if we had actual cell phone coverage in the stadium. Like it or not, today's students like to be connected to the rest of the world 24/7.

My cell phone worked, my wife's and my business partner's without any problem - Verizon.

I had cell signal so I could text but I couldn't use the internet or data at all - AT&T

I had my sisters tickets and she called me on my cell to tell me to come to the gate and give them to her. We have Sprint. I used my phone last year in the stadium too. I didn't know that was an issue.

So, the question becomes "How do we engage the students?"
Here is my solution:
We hold a contest where all the students put their names in a hat. We draw names the week before the game. The names drawn are to replace the coaches. Let the student coaches loose on game day to go nuts. Surely they stand a chance of doing a better job than our present staff. After the last pitiful years under June, they can't do any worse. The end.
Forgot to add--who wouldn't stay to see their fellow students coach?

I'm afraid what you saw with theSMU students is happening all over college football.

It's a generational thing. Kids are multi tasking with their smart phones and easily bored. That's the way it is.
To say our kids are somehow different is wrong.
Plus, lets face - all fans - regardless of age - come to see you win not to see you play.

I did think the game day experience was the best I've seen at SMU.

Our student turnout was excellent last night, especially considering our games are off campus this year, of course a lot of that was thanks to the shuttle bus system our president and AD made possible.


I'm not surprised at the behavior of the SMU students, different year, same story.

gostangs wrote:we get a higher percentage than almost anyone. We had about 3500 students there last night - half our student body. Very few schools get that kind of turn out.

This.

Remember, everyone moans and groans about the student section at Alabama doing the same thing: leaving at halftime. It may well be the nature of the beast!

Cougar King wrote:Our student turnout was excellent lost night, especially considering our games are off campus this year, of course a lot of that was thanks to the shuttle bus system our president and AD made possible.


I'm not surprised at the behavior of the SMU students, different year, same story.

Neither am I. Our students are Ps of S.

Why are people acting like this is news? Some students leave games. I never thought of leaving a game, any game, when I was in school, but there were students who left games then, too. When we beat UTEP a few years ago to get bowl-eligible for the first time in a million years, students left. It's sad, but true.

To say we weren't competitive when the first people left was simply inaccurate: the TD throw to Gaines never should have been called back. Prescott Line was called for holding because a guy thought he had the ball and tried to tackle him, and then twisted him so it looked like P.Line pulled the defender down, which was ridiculous. So the TD comes off the board, we miss the field goal and they go down and score. We were more than competitive at that point. We should have been winning, and a 14 point swing by the officials (JJ's not allowed to talk about refs, but we are) took a lot of wind out of us.