(07-03-2014 02:49 PM)ThunderingHerdFan Wrote:  Yes, it takes one dominating program to establish itself and get noticed. You have two or more, they beat each other, and the nation yawns.

This is the first year we haven't played a P5 school. As you well know, Louisville reneged on their scheduled appearance in Huntington this fall. That forced MU to pick up Rhode Island.

Otherwise, Marshall has played Virginia Tech 4x, WVU 7x, Ohio State, Purdue (coming in 2015, too, I believe), Tennessee, Wisconsin, Miami, Louisville, Cincinnati 2x, and Kansas State 2x since joining Conference USA.

A nation yawns at competition? A nation wants one team to dominate a conference? Which nation are we talking about again?

And btw, I'm now confused. Right after it was said that you have scheduling difficulties, you come out with how many teams you've played since joining the conference. What changed? Was it all because your fans wanted you to play only teams that are nearby? Also, how did you fare in those games?

I don't

(07-02-2014 11:51 PM)Volkmar Wrote:  

(07-02-2014 08:45 PM)MUsince96 Wrote:  

(07-02-2014 02:45 PM)Afflicted Wrote:  The best thing that could happen to CUSA is for Marshall to get the Access Bowl. The worst thing that could happen to CUSA is for Marshall to get the Access Bowl and then get clobbered by their opponent because there competition was so light throughout the season. If Marshall gets in, they need to perform.

I see your point. But I'd say the worst thing that could happen to C-USA is for us to beat up on each other like C-USA 2.0 did and nobody stands out. Access Bowl = Money and exposure. Something we need in the first year of the 'G5'.

I disagree with that, and here's my reasoning behind it...

Let's say Marshall takes full advantage of their light schedule and goes undefeated (or perhaps just one loss at the most). Let's also say that they crack the top 35 (or maybe even top 30) because of it. What benefit does C-USA get from one team dominating the conference? The talk would more likely be about how the program might be too good for the conference.

Before the realignment occurred, C-USA was well regarded and certainly wasn't dominated by one team. In 2012, you had UCF, ECU, and Tulsa all vying for top dog in the conference. In 2011, Southern Miss, Houston, and Tulsa (and to a certain extent Marshall) were in contention. In 2010, it was likewise UCF, SMU, and Tulsa, etc. A conference is only as strong as the sum of its parts. The reason the SEC is THE conference is because even the 9th best team in that conference is sufficiently strong enough to obliterate our C-USA champion last year 44-7. Imagine how bad that would've looked for our conference if Rice had indeed dominated our conference.

Even during UTSA's one year in the WAC, which was the 2nd year of our program and first playing in an FBS division, there were 3 teams in that conference who were ranked within the top 25 at some point during the year (Utah State, San Jose State, and La Tech). Those teams beat up on one another but the conference still benefited from the overall quality they represented. The LAST thing a conference wants is to be recognized as a one-horse show. Just my opinion though. I could definitely be wrong and am open to hearing a different perspective.

You are correct. The WAC was extremely good in 2012. But the way the WAC did it --and the way CUSA needs to do it-- is by winning big Out of Conference (OOC) games.

In 2012, LA Tech beat the Big Ten's Illinois, the ACC's Virginia and CUSA's Houston on the road OOC. The Bulldogs also beat UNLV OOC, and lost a 59-57 shootout to Heisman Trophy winner Johnny Manziel and Texas A&M in Shreveport that year. Of course, it didn't hurt that Tech averaged 51 points per game that year, and played an exciting brand of football.

Likewise, the WAC's 2012 conference champ (Utah St) finished 11-2 and beat Utah, Colorado St, UNLV and lost a heartbreaker to the Big Ten's Wisconsin Rose Bowl team 16-14, and BYU 6-3.

Meanwhile, WAC runner-up SJSU also did well that year OOC. The Spartans beat BYU, Navy, San Diego St, UC Davis and Bowling Green in the Military Bowl OOC, and lost to a very good Stanford Rose Bowl team 21-17.

So, that's how a non-AQ conference gets 3 teams in the Top 25. The WAC's 2012 credentials were earned in OOC play.

Saw this from an oddsmaker on twitter:

@lindetrain: OMG I have Marshall favored by 18+ in every game. Is 12 under -130 a fair win total?

@lindetrain: I have them laying 18 at Akron. ODU and Rice games the only other two under three TDs

(07-03-2014 02:55 PM)Volkmar Wrote:  

(07-03-2014 02:49 PM)ThunderingHerdFan Wrote:  Yes, it takes one dominating program to establish itself and get noticed. You have two or more, they beat each other, and the nation yawns.

This is the first year we haven't played a P5 school. As you well know, Louisville reneged on their scheduled appearance in Huntington this fall. That forced MU to pick up Rhode Island.

Otherwise, Marshall has played Virginia Tech 4x, WVU 7x, Ohio State, Purdue (coming in 2015, too, I believe), Tennessee, Wisconsin, Miami, Louisville, Cincinnati 2x, and Kansas State 2x since joining Conference USA.

A nation yawns at competition? A nation wants one team to dominate a conference? Which nation are we talking about again?

And btw, I'm now confused. Right after it was said that you have scheduling difficulties, you come out with how many teams you've played since joining the conference. What changed? Was it all because your fans wanted you to play only teams that are nearby? Also, how did you fare in those games?

If you would read the parts of my post you took out, I answered all of your questions.

Look, I see you're looking for any way to be offended or to disagree with anything said about anyone but UTSA. Whatever, that's fine. I'm not claiming my take on things to be absolute truth. Our opinions differ. That's really it.

Good luck to your Roadrunners. Great coaching staff, solid football team that has a chance to have a very good year. Don't take it for granted. Marshall went 20 years without a losing season, made a bad hire and 10 years later, is just getting back to winning consistently. Hopefully.

I do like the folks who doubt our defense, though. MTSU and Rice were the only two that did anything significant against it. If you saw just those two games, I understand. But if you saw the other games, you might have a different take. There's going to be a bad game or two every year defensively. Hopefully, we make the bad games be allowing under 25 points instead of 35-40+.

That said... It's nice to be talking football again. Here's to a great 2014.

(07-03-2014 10:27 PM)ThunderingHerdFan Wrote:  If you would read the parts of my post you took out, I answered all of your questions.

You're right. I went back and just noticed that I missed that.

(07-03-2014 10:27 PM)ThunderingHerdFan Wrote:  Look, I see you're looking for any way to be offended or to disagree with anything said about anyone but UTSA. Whatever, that's fine. I'm not claiming my take on things to be absolute truth. Our opinions differ. That's really it.

That's where you're wrong. I'm actually not looking for any way to disagree. There are two main things I've disagreed with some on, one being that one or two teams dominating a conference is better for the conference than having several strong programs, and the other being the schedule difficulty. WEARE already made some good points on the schedule issue, which I acknowledged in my reply (and I didn't disagree either). Upon my reply to him, I considered that issue over.

I think I accidentally skimmed over part your message because the last three of your paragraphs started out this way...

"We have a problem of Kentucky flat out refusing to play"...
"We are scheduling 1-for-1's now"...
"Besides...we're scheduling to win the conference"...

Mind you, aside from the things around the house that I was doing, I was tired of reading by that time, and tired of responding, and basically skimmed the first sentence of those three paragraphs to see if they might contain something that wasn't already talked about in the many previous messages. They all started with statements about scheduling, so I honestly didn't even bother to read the rest, thinking it would just be more of the same stuff I've already gone 'round and 'round on with a couple others, and which WEARE had already given me a satisfactory answer to. So, my apologies for that, but rest assured, I'm not here to argue for the sake of arguing. Life's too short for nonsense.

(07-03-2014 10:27 PM)ThunderingHerdFan Wrote:  Good luck to your Roadrunners. Great coaching staff, solid football team that has a chance to have a very good year. Don't take it for granted. Marshall went 20 years without a losing season, made a bad hire and 10 years later, is just getting back to winning consistently. Hopefully.

I do like the folks who doubt our defense, though. MTSU and Rice were the only two that did anything significant against it. If you saw just those two games, I understand. But if you saw the other games, you might have a different take. There's going to be a bad game or two every year defensively. Hopefully, we make the bad games be allowing under 25 points instead of 35-40+.

That said... It's nice to be talking football again. Here's to a great 2014.

Appreciate it, and good luck to you guys also, even though I still hope Rice beats you...lol. And yeah, trust me, I know very well about how a team can have a bad game, or quarter for that matter. In closing, as I told WEARE, I hope it'll be a great year for C-USA!

(07-03-2014 10:27 PM)ThunderingHerdFan Wrote:  

(07-03-2014 02:55 PM)Volkmar Wrote:  

(07-03-2014 02:49 PM)ThunderingHerdFan Wrote:  Yes, it takes one dominating program to establish itself and get noticed. You have two or more, they beat each other, and the nation yawns.

This is the first year we haven't played a P5 school. As you well know, Louisville reneged on their scheduled appearance in Huntington this fall. That forced MU to pick up Rhode Island.

Otherwise, Marshall has played Virginia Tech 4x, WVU 7x, Ohio State, Purdue (coming in 2015, too, I believe), Tennessee, Wisconsin, Miami, Louisville, Cincinnati 2x, and Kansas State 2x since joining Conference USA.

A nation yawns at competition? A nation wants one team to dominate a conference? Which nation are we talking about again?

And btw, I'm now confused. Right after it was said that you have scheduling difficulties, you come out with how many teams you've played since joining the conference. What changed? Was it all because your fans wanted you to play only teams that are nearby? Also, how did you fare in those games?

If you would read the parts of my post you took out, I answered all of your questions.

Look, I see you're looking for any way to be offended or to disagree with anything said about anyone but UTSA. Whatever, that's fine. I'm not claiming my take on things to be absolute truth. Our opinions differ. That's really it.

Good luck to your Roadrunners. Great coaching staff, solid football team that has a chance to have a very good year. Don't take it for granted. Marshall went 20 years without a losing season, made a bad hire and 10 years later, is just getting back to winning consistently. Hopefully.

I do like the folks who doubt our defense, though. MTSU and Rice were the only two that did anything significant against it. If you saw just those two games, I understand. But if you saw the other games, you might have a different take. There's going to be a bad game or two every year defensively. Hopefully, we make the bad games be allowing under 25 points instead of 35-40+.

That said... It's nice to be talking football again. Here's to a great 2014.

Holy passive aggressive....
Could there possibly be a reason Marshall might have had an opportunity to schedule these games? If we try really hard to apply ourselves, we may figure out that Marshall has been playing a bit longer than UTSA; therefore, logically, they have been able schedule more difficult teams and competed in some challenging bowl games throughout those years.

Actually, it is a little egocentric to use UTSA as the measure of judgment. I think you will find all the programs in CUSA have cumulatively played more difficult schedules than UTSA. If you actually read and comprehend the responses (not your paraphrased selections), the answers have been given.

While you may have hoped to expose arrogance in our fans, it has obviously back fired. There is no point in continuing a discussion with someone who refuses to use logic and comprehension. Whatever the agenda, I hope you have a good season.

(07-02-2014 02:47 PM)FIUFan Wrote:  

(07-02-2014 02:45 PM)Afflicted Wrote:  The best thing that could happen to CUSA is for Marshall to get the Access Bowl. The worst thing that could happen to CUSA is for Marshall to get the Access Bowl and then get clobbered by their opponent because there competition was so light throughout the season. If Marshall gets in, they need to perform.

I'd take that chance.

The best thing that could happen to CUSA is for Rice (or somebody else with a strong enough OOC) to get into the 4 team playoff.

(07-03-2014 11:57 PM)WEARE Wrote:  Holy passive aggressive....
Could there possibly be a reason Marshall might have had an opportunity to schedule these games? If we try really hard to apply ourselves, we may figure out that Marshall has been playing a bit longer than UTSA; therefore, logically, they have been able schedule more difficult teams and competed in some challenging bowl games throughout those years.

Actually, it is a little egocentric to use UTSA as the measure of judgment. I think you will find all the programs in CUSA have cumulatively played more difficult schedules than UTSA. If you actually read and comprehend the responses (not your paraphrased selections), the answers have been given.

Thanks for pointing out that the answers were given after I acknowledged that the answers were given. lol Have Marshall and other schools cumulatively played more difficult schedules than a 3rd-year program? Of course. Anyone with common sense would assume as much, and I never made any claims to the contrary. It still doesn't mean it wasn't a fair question to ask why a program of Marshall's quality is scheduling lighter foes not only this year, but in the years to come, than a 3rd-year program.

(07-03-2014 11:57 PM)WEARE Wrote:  While you may have hoped to expose arrogance in our fans, it has obviously back fired. There is no point in continuing a discussion with someone who refuses to use logic and comprehension. Whatever the agenda, I hope you have a good season.

You're the one lacking logic and comprehension if the only thing you got from my inquiry was that I was trying to "expose arrogance" in your fans, especially after I've complimented your fans several times in my comments. Hell, I even gave you 2 rep points for your concise, well articulated, and courteous answers to my comments. And yet here you are now jumping to conclusions about my motives. Wow.

Marshall, more than any other team on the very community of csnbbs posters, seem to have an unmatched confidence each and every off season...

(07-07-2014 08:47 AM)the1sttransport Wrote:  Marshall, more than any other team on the very community of csnbbs posters, seem to have an unmatched confidence each and every off season...

I don't find this true at all. Every school has their fair share of shall we politely say "over zealous fans". The very purpose of this thread was to call them out. I don't see any thread on here with the title "Does anyone else think that all the new schools in CUSA won't win half their games this year?".

This is just a thread. Which is part of the fun of these community boards. The way I see it people are taking shots at us because we are the class of the conference right now. It "might" be someone else next year and they will be the next target. Anyhow good luck to all the schools in CUSA this year.

(07-07-2014 08:47 AM)the1sttransport Wrote:  Marshall, more than any other team on the very community of csnbbs posters, seem to have an unmatched confidence each and every off season...

You must be new here, so let me be the first to welcome you to the C-USA board.