The attendance complaints are a pet peeve. Not excuses, but things to consider:
Marshall is one of the smallest FBS schools in the country with only about 10,000 undergraduates. If we were 20-30k like most schools, or 40-50k like a lot of schools, how would attendance look? Not only more students, but producing 2-5x the number of alumni every year. It?s why I always say the only way to grow athletics is to grow enrollment.
Next, how many schools have a Big Ten, SEC, 2 ACC and 2 Big 12 schools within 3 hours of their campus? Plus we are located in a tri state area,?so people from KY and OH tend to have some state loyalty attached to their fandom.
I won?t get into demographics, which is the standard go to, because even if Huntington was younger and richer the first two would still be hard to overcome.
I agree about attendance. When the Joan is full, it is an intimidating atmosphere for the opposing team. Last years VT game was a show of force at the Joan, but I don't recall one since then.
Now, after seeing how stadium staff treats fans at the Horseshoe, it is clear that OSU appreciates the fans. The stadium workers were polite, helpful and made for a nice afternoon, except for the final score. Compare that to the Joan's stadium staff behavior during the last rain delay and I can see why people would not want to spend their money to be screamed at to leave cover and go out in a downpour.
As for the quality of our team this year, both our O and D line played pretty well yesterday. There will be positive grades in both of those rooms when they sit down and watch the film. Once Gibson returns, the D line will even be better. Earle had his best game in a Marshall Uniform and his mistakes were effort mistakes, I can live with that. He's only been here a couple months. Our WR room made some plays, which shows they are capable, especially against some of the best in college football. Our LB room did not have a good day as a group and that really hurt our defensive performance. Of all of the position rooms, the LB's definitely were exposed and sometimes just dominated. Special Teams did alright. The biggest mistake the punt team made was a coaching mistake. If a coach can't get a D-1 kid to do what he is told to do, the coach must change the behavior or find someone who will. The punt that was fumbled and called back, Alec Clark threw a dart. I hope he continues to improve. A good punter can change a game.
At the end of the day, the first offensive drive shows that we are capable of moving the ball. We must adjust to the other teams adjustments in order to continue the success we showed in drive 1. OSU had a sideline full of outstanding athletes, but they compete in the Big 10, not the SBC. From what I saw we will be competitive in the SBC and if the stars line up could play for a conference title.
I'm glad we got to play in Columbus, collect our 1.6 million and perform on the national stage. We got beat, but not embarrassed. I'm way more optimistic after yesterday's game than I was after VT.
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