The Bills over Tulane by 5

[Pistol]

8 minutes ago, RUBillsFan said:

If SLU could have kept the mid/late 1990s hype train running, then I have no doubt we'd be similar to Dayton in terms of fanbase rabidness.  Romar (to some extent) and Soderberg really took the wind out of our sails.  Need to sustain success across generations with no gaps of being awful to build that kind of support.  We started to build it up again and then Crews killed it.

For the first time, I feel like our athletic department is doing a good job of motivating students to show up. There's a lot more civic engagement, as well. The ads have been solid in recent years, they do well to get people out to a few women's games a season - that's much improved.

But yes, we need to sustain success. That was an unreal run of attendance in the 90s, capitalizing on a well-liked and marketable head coach and a few NCAA Tournament appearances, not to mention a major local star for one season. I wouldn't say Romar took the wind out of our sails because there were a lot of factors - Hughes being one-and-done, the Rams rising suddenly in 1999, early 2000s recession, etc. - but you're right in that we have not been able to sustain success across coaching changes. Looking at SLU attendance through the years makes you wonder if what we saw in the 1990s was an aberration or if we had a chance to make it the new normal. I don't know. There were missed opportunities for sure.

1 minute ago, wgstl said:

also having no other sporting team or events near helps. 

The Dayton Dragons lead Single-A baseball in attendance every season and are usually top-10 in all of the minors. They sell out frequently.

But you're right, there's not a lot of competition for live sports around there. Wright State doesn't draw well. HS football does but the seasons mostly don't overlap.

I think more important than the "entertainment dollars" argument, though, is that when you're the top show in town, you get media attention. I used the Rams' rise as a downside factor for SLU attendance above because it felt like once Hughes was gone and the Rams got good, no one at any local news outlet was covering SLU anymore. Now the Blues are the talk of the town, and competing with the Cardinals for attention is a year-round effort. Dayton basketball gets covered in Dayton, always. My point here is not that people have limited budgets for tickets and are only choosing one thing (it actually seems like the people who spend money on tickets for one sport will spend on more than one), it's that casual fan interest is a fickle beast and needs to be led.

[billikenfan05]

6 minutes ago, Pistol said:

For the first time, I feel like our athletic department is doing a good job of motivating students to show up. There's a lot more civic engagement, as well. The ads have been solid in recent years, they do well to get people out to a few women's games a season - that's much improved.

But yes, we need to sustain success. That was an unreal run of attendance in the 90s, capitalizing on a well-liked and marketable head coach and a few NCAA Tournament appearances, not to mention a major local star for one season. I wouldn't say Romar took the wind out of our sails because there were a lot of factors - Hughes being one-and-done, the Rams rising suddenly in 1999, early 2000s recession, etc. - but you're right in that we have not been able to sustain success across coaching changes. Looking at SLU attendance through the years makes you wonder if what we saw in the 1990s was an aberration or if we had a chance to make it the new normal. I don't know. There were missed opportunities for sure.

The Dayton Dragons lead Single-A baseball in attendance every season and are usually top-10 in all of the minors. They sell out frequently.

But you're right, there's not a lot of competition for live sports around there. Wright State doesn't draw well. HS football does but the seasons mostly don't overlap.

I think more important than the "entertainment dollars" argument, though, is that when you're the top show in town, you get media attention. I used the Rams' rise as a downside factor for SLU attendance above because it felt like once Hughes was gone and the Rams got good, no one at any local news outlet was covering SLU anymore. Now the Blues are the talk of the town, and competing with the Cardinals for attention is a year-round effort. Dayton basketball gets covered in Dayton, always. My point here is not that people have limited budgets for tickets and are only choosing one thing (it actually seems like the people who spend money on tickets for one sport will spend on more than one), it's that casual fan interest is a fickle beast and needs to be led.

I’ve been doing a lot of research into 93-97 and I’m starting to understand why I have such a deep connection to the program. My gosh those teams were fun, even looking back on paper.

[Old guy]

38 minutes ago, Pistol said:

I honestly think Dayton's alumni base is a lot like SLU's, but I'm guessing they have a much smaller percentage of graduates in and around Dayton than SLU has in and around STL. The city is much smaller, as are its opportunities.

The difference is that their basketball culture has historically been different. The arena has always been just across the river from campus, the team has been consistently competitive, and they have unwavering local support. For whatever reason, they've had generations of students and other fans coming out where SLU has been up and down. And they travel much better.

Culture takes a long time to change.

The arena was not across the river always. I remember going to their basketball games at their gym, a cramped little place, in the early 1960's. They were good at the time and in 1968 went to the NCAA tournament and got to the finals against UCLA, playing against the then called Lew Alcindor. Dayton lost, of course, but going that far helped them raise the money and land for their new arena across the river.

In the early 1960's Dayton was an industrial hub with heavy emphasis in metal machining. This, of course went the way of the Dodo but once upon a time they had the headquarters and main manufacturing site for NCR (cash registers, which were fully mechanical, not electronic, at that time). Dayton was a hard working blue collar, manufacturing city then. Dayton U was primarily an engineering school with an overall ratio of males to females of over 10 males per female. Small school, Marianist and usually fed by Chaminade High Schools from all over plus the locals. I believe the Marianists had another university somewhere in Texas as well.

And as far as sports went the town loved Dayton sports although it would have been quite easy to  drive down to Cincinnati or East to Columbus to attend Xavier or Ohio State sports, or go to professional baseball games at Cincinnati.

And yes, I went to Dayton for college, 1963 to 1967, did a couple of years of mechanical engineering and then transferred to pre med. I graduated from there 52 years ago, and my love and fandom, which transferred to me from my wife, is for SLU.

[Pistol]

2 minutes ago, billiken_roy said:

the active duty military deserves every penny they get and more.   i do not consider them part of the deep state.   

Roy, there is no deep state. Just government employees doing their jobs. Sometimes leadership is worse than other times.

My wife is an attorney for a branch of the Treasury Department. She finished first in her law school class in 2010, which was possibly the worst year ever to hit the job market looking for legal jobs. She was one of the few who actually had 6-figure options at law firms and instead chose a federal clerkship, eventually followed by her current job. I don't know anyone with a stronger work ethic and had she gone the private route, she'd be making double as a partner at a firm somewhere. But she's working in the public sector as her grandfather (FBI) and others in her family have done. But to you she's just another cog in a grand conspiracy theory, right?

Sometimes the correct answer is the simplest one. I would expect more from a SLU grad.

[Pistol]

3 minutes ago, Old guy said:

The arena was not across the river always. I remember going to their basketball games at their gym, a cramped little place, in the early 1960's. They were good at the time and in 1968 went to the NCAA tournament and got to the finals against UCLA, playing against the then called Lew Alcindor. Dayton lost, of course, but going that far helped them raise the money and land for their new arena across the river.

In the early 1960's Dayton was an industrial hub with heavy emphasis in metal machining. This, of course went the way of the Dodo but once upon a time they had the headquarters and main manufacturing site for NCR (cash registers, which were fully mechanical, not electronic, at that time). Dayton was a hard working blue collar, manufacturing city then. Dayton U was primarily an engineering school with an overall ratio of males to females of over 10 males per female. Small school, Marianist and usually fed by Chaminade High Schools from all over plus the locals. I believe the Marianists had another university in Texas somewhere as well.

And as far as sports went the town loved Dayton sports although it would have been quite easy to  drive down to Cincinnati or East to Columbus to attend Xavier or Ohio State sports, or go to professional baseball games at Cincinnati.

And yes, I went to Dayton for college, 1963 to 1967, did a couple of years of mechanical engineering and then transferred to pre med. I graduated from there 52 years ago, and my love and fandom is for SLU, which transferred to me from my wife.

Correct. I meant to say "on campus or just across the river". Their previous arena still stands on campus and the volleyball team plays there now. (It is named after former AD Tom Frericks, who I believe has no relation to the former SLU player of the same name.)

[Brighton]

The Flyers are the only game in town. The Bills have to compete against the Blues (even moreso now they have the Cup) , had to compete against the NFL and even the old Hawks when they were a perennial fixture in the NBA Finals for decades. 

[Box and Won]

They really are fortunate in that they've had sustained success since the 1950s.  Aside from a seven-year stretch in the '90s, they've never gone very long without an NCAA or NIT appearance.  Basically the one bad coaching hire they made was the coach they had before Purnell.

We dog Gregory all the time, but even he led them to two NCAAs and three NITs in eight seasons during a stretch in which Brad was ineffective and Majerus was rebuilding.  And in two of the three seasons in which his teams didn't play in the postseason, they still won 19 and 18 games.

[Old guy]

20 minutes ago, Pistol said:

Correct. I meant to say "on campus or just across the river". Their previous arena still stands on campus and the volleyball team plays there now. (It is named after former AD Tom Frericks, who I believe has no relation to the former SLU player of the same name.)

Pistol I did not know the old gym was still in use, I thought by now they would have dismantled it. The campus, by the way grew up enormously after they got the old NCR sites across the main street from campus. I have not visited the place since 1967, too busy and no money at the time, no interest later on. I know they became many times the size they used to be. Some of my old engineering friends went to work at Wright Pat AFB, which was doing a lot of space R+D at the time. I knew kids who volunteered for human research they were doing at the base. One of them responded to an add asking for people who had never had motion sickness, it paid very well. He took the bait. So, they brought him to the base very early in the morning, fed him a huge breakfast, and then strapped him to one of those gigantic centrifuges and spun him until he puked, carefully measuring how long and what speed it took to get him there without passing out, never again... Wright Pat also had, or has, a superb Air Force Museum with many unique airplanes in it. Honestly, I enjoyed Dayton (as it was then), I have no idea what it is like now.

[drkelsey55]

1 hour ago, RUBillsFan said:

Let me preface this by saying that I love SLU.

I wonder how many people are actually going to attend a game between SLU (St. Louis, MO) and Tulane (new Orleans, LA) in Phoenix, AZ?  SLU and Tulane are both roughly 1,500 miles away from Phoenix.  SLU averages less than 7,000 fans per game at home and Tulane averages less than 2,000.  I understand that both schools probably have alumni in the area that might attend the game.  This is a showcase with some other games later and they're probably selling tickets as a package deal.  However, I'd guess it will be very sparsely attended in person.  Talking Stick Resort Arena has a capacity of over 18,000.  The place is going to be a morgue.

Further, if there is no TV for this game, I wonder if the total number of people who witness this game is going to be less than 1,000.

If a NCAA Division I basketball game occurs and no one sees it, does it actually count?

I will be there, bring my brother that lives in Sun City.

[Pistol]

12 minutes ago, Old guy said:

Pistol I did not know the old gym was still in use, I thought by now they would have dismantled it. The campus, by the way grew up enormously after they got the old NCR sites across the main street from campus. I have not visited the place since 1967, too busy and no money at the time, no interest later on. I know they became many times the size they used to be. Some of my old engineering friends went to work at Wright Pat AFB, which was doing a lot of space R+D at the time. I knew kids who volunteered for human research they were doing at the base. One of them responded to an add asking for people who had never had motion sickness, it paid very well. He took the bait. So, they brought him to the base very early in the morning, fed him a huge breakfast, and then strapped him to one of those gigantic centrifuges and spun him until he puked, carefully measuring how long and what speed it took to get him there without passing out, never again... Wright Pat also had, or has, a superb Air Force Museum with many unique airplanes in it. Honestly, I enjoyed Dayton (as it was then), I have no idea what it is like now.

I like it. Downtown is about an hour from me and it's sleepy - not much going on business or living-wise but better than 10 years ago. The city overall has about what you'd expect for a city of its size (maybe 800,000 metro, so less than a third of STL's metro size). I get up there every few months to see friends or the annual SLU game. We plan on taking my son to the AF museum soon; he'll love it.

That's hilarious about your guinea pig friends. If you want to go down an Internet rabbit hole, you should also look up Wright-Patt's UFO history. Fun stuff.

[Littlebill]

1 hour ago, billiken_roy said:

the active duty military deserves every penny they get and more.   i do not consider them part of the deep state.   

What in the world?

I didn't think the thread could get more ridiculous than Glory Ravs posting a how-to on how to shoot freebies, yet here we are...

[HoosierPal]

Hopeful to get this thread back on track.......

[Crewsorlose]

15 hours ago, Old guy said:

The Bills have played a tougher schedule than Tulane has, beaten a higher ranked opponent than Tulane has and being beaten by an even higher ranking opponent than Tulane has. Both teams are 7-1 in ooc. We can win this game.

The Vegas spread will not be available until the night before this game, however team rankings currently has Tulane as a predicted winner with a 1 star confidence (up in the air).

 

We're 113 in KenPom. Tulane is 216. It's a neutral court game. I don't feel confident, but smart money has to be on the Bills in this game. 

[RUBillsFan]

2 hours ago, billikenfan05 said:

I’ve been doing a lot of research into 93-97 and I’m starting to understand why I have such a deep connection to the program. My gosh those teams were fun, even looking back on paper.

I'm the same way.  I went to games during that time frame with my dad and I'm a fan for life despite having gone to a different university.

Given how high attendance was in those years, there has to be a ton of 30 something year olds who went to games as kids in the mid/late 90s and just need to be pulled back in somehow.

[RiseAndGrind]

10 minutes ago, RUBillsFan said:

I'm the same way.  I went to games during that time frame with my dad and I'm a fan for life despite having gone to a different university.

Given how high attendance was in those years, there has to be a ton of 30 something year olds who went to games as kids in the mid/late 90s and just need to be pulled back in somehow.

I remembering listening to the UMass-SLU tournament game with Larry Hughes on the radio. F u k ing loved it 

[slubilliken09]

18 hours ago, Clocktoweraccords2004 said:

I mean fool me once (Ford) shame on you (Fords players). Fool me (3 poor ft seasons) ,  shame on me (Ford). 

Fool me once, strike one. But fool me twice, strike three.

[Old guy]

2 hours ago, Pistol said:

I like it. Downtown is about an hour from me and it's sleepy - not much going on business or living-wise but better than 10 years ago. The city overall has about what you'd expect for a city of its size (maybe 800,000 metro, so less than a third of STL's metro size). I get up there every few months to see friends or the annual SLU game. We plan on taking my son to the AF museum soon; he'll love it.

That's hilarious about your guinea pig friends. If you want to go down an Internet rabbit hole, you should also look up Wright-Patt's UFO history. Fun stuff.

It is nice to know Dayton has had something of a revival. When NCR went electronic and closed the mechanical operations, the city was dealt a close to death blow, or so I heard from old friends. Thank you for the information.

[Old guy]

I did not expect Thatch to play coming Sunday, too bad about Hankton. With two very useful players out of the fray for a while, I wonder is Ford is considering bringing Hargrove in, at least for some time.

[billikenblue]

35 minutes ago, RUBillsFan said:

I'm the same way.  I went to games during that time frame with my dad and I'm a fan for life despite having gone to a different university.

Given how high attendance was in those years, there has to be a ton of 30 something year olds who went to games as kids in the mid/late 90s and just need to be pulled back in somehow.

Don't underestimate the power of conference USA...the casual fan of basketball would walk up to the box office with all the great teams and programs in our league. Numerous ooc games were also better Kansas...UCLA.  U Mass with Calapari....Mizzou etc

[NH]

59 minutes ago, billikenblue said:

Don't underestimate the power of conference USA...the casual fan of basketball would walk up to the box office with all the great teams and programs in our league. Numerous ooc games were also better Kansas...UCLA.  U Mass with Calapari....Mizzou etc

Even in the early 2000s we had much tougher out of conference opponents it feels like. The conference realignment has really not been helpful.

[billikenfan05]

We had 20k for a game with Austin Peay, opponents were not the factor.

 

[RiseAndGrind]

For some reason I feel like if SLU wins this game they are “for real.” 

[T-man]

I don’t post much but the video of Scooter Barry is outstanding. Both French  and Goodwin have a 2 stage free throw and need this tape and device. How about a Go Fund Me to purchase it for SLU?

[bills10]

If anyone is in Dayton for a game or whatever, hit me up. It’s a good place to be and id be happy to show you around, recommend restaurants or bars or anything else you are interested in. 
and @billikenroy, my wife and in-laws both are civil servants. Echoing the sentiment of previous posters, they work super hard and get paid half of what they would in the public sector. My wife is in charge of a program to help females in the Air Force actually be able to function in their roles. Did you know that in 2019, while more women are enlisted, they wear the same body armor in combat as their male counterparts? A 110 lb women swimming in an armored vest designed for a 250+ lb man? This is one of the myriad of issues that she is trying to resolve for these airmen. Btw she has a SLU science degree and an MBA, and is doing her best to perform her civic duty.  I thank her for this, and you should as well. 
I know it is the talking point of the day to bring these people down in order to accomplish a wider political agenda. Please use your SLU education that taught us to be critical of dangerous views that damage other people in order to gain a personal advantage. And please leave these insults of my family off the Billikens board. 

[Brighton]

Why anyone listens to BRoy is beyond me. His crap didn’t fly on The Lounge and shouldn’t here.