The landscape of college athletics has just been changed.

[BlackNGold]

I am as big a supporter as you will find. I am not a high dollar donor by any stretch, but I do what I can and try to get people to the games from Denver every home game. But like I said, I have no real interest in D-1AA football. Maybe I would attend a game or two, but honestly I would probably just start doing other things with my time and money. I would most likely just stop following college football altogether and head out to the Bronco games.

The interesting thing about that to me, is that I am the exact guy the new PAC-12 needs to penetrate into the pro-sports saturated Denver market share. I watch a lot of CU games and cheer against them. However, I would have absolutely no interest in watching any of those games if CU and CSU weren't playing at the same level. Whats it to me at that point? What's it to the large population of the 40,000 or so CSU alumni that live in the Denver metro? I, like many transplants, never grew up here. I never followed the Buffs or developed any allegiance towards the University.

There are over 65,000 CSU alums in the Denver Metro area (actually more than CU). If CSU fans want to be significant in Division 1 Sports then they have to start showing up for the games...Other programs have moved up including programs like Boise State because the fans get out and support the program. It will never happen though at CSU.

 

[BlackNGold]

Hold on a sec... I was once in Cancun for a week and it rained every day. Are you telling me it doesn't rain every day in Cancun? If so, I beg to differ.

Only when you are there...I was there for 11 days and it did rain once.

 

[azbuff]

Wow!!! Talk about trying to manipulate the data - So you are saying that football did not exist before 1997 at CU....You are NOT on point. By the way you cited 1996 in your stats which according to my calendar is before 1997. You are trying to take an extremely small sampling and trying to say there is a correlation...there is not(Dan Hawkins was coach for a third of the last 15 years and he certainly is not representative of CU football)...That is like me visiting Denver for 5 days and it rains all 5 days and then I go back and then saying it rains in Denver 100% of the time.

I understand you missed the follow-up post, so here it is:

Also, did some further research and CSU has 17 winning seasons between 1950 and 1997. CU had winning seasons in 16 of 17 of those years. Granted, CU had winning seasons 70% of the time over the course of those fifty years, but I took my "blinders" off. Happy?

Pretty ****ing petty of you to point out a difference between '96 and '97 in a 15 year analysis. Further, there is something known as a "trend," where you take the most recent data and examine which way it is "trending." This is typically more useful than examining data from sixty years ago when CU played DU regularly. But, those numbers are above for Jack Sparrow's valued consideration.

 

[CsquaredCC]

There are over 65,000 CSU alums in the Denver Metro area (actually more than CU). If CSU fans want to be significant in Division 1 Sports then they have to start showing up for the games...Other programs have moved up including programs like Boise State because the fans get out and support the program. It will never happen though at CSU.

65,000? No kidding. Where did you get that figure? That is CSU's only remaining card in this whole expansion equation IMO. 65,000 alum in this market combined with whatever CU has and then you are talking about a serious market presence in Denver. They just need to figure out how a lot more of these people to the Fort on Saturdays. That is such an untapped resource its downright pathetic.

 

[sackman]

65,000? No kidding. Where did you get that figure? That is CSU's only remaining card in this whole expansion equation IMO. 65,000 alum in this market combined with whatever CU has and then you are talking about a serious market presence in Denver. They just need to figure out how a lot more of these people to the Fort on Saturdays. That is such an untapped resource its downright pathetic.

The problem is that even with 65,000 alumni in Denver, CSU only manages to get about 15,000 to the game in Denver. Most of those are people who would normally go to the game in Ft. Collins anyway. This gets back to what I was saying about the CSU admin needing to step up. There needs to be an effort to connect with these alumni. CSU isn't a terrible school, in spite of what a lot of people around here would tell you. For whatever reason, they do a horrible job of connecting with their alumni and getting them engaged.

 

[Jens1893]

I honestly think some people on here care more about CSU and their well being than most CSU fans or their administration.

 

[FlatironsBuff]

I honestly think some people on here care more about CSU and their well being than most CSU fans or their administration.

No ****. i certainly would like to CSU succeed. I liked the games where both teams were pretty good. But CU is on the rise and CSU seems to be a sinking ship. That is too bad. I think if Cu does get back to pounding them on a regular basis it could be the death knell for CSU. If they didn't play CU they might keep more interest in the program for longer in the year. But too many fans dissapear as soon and the CU-CSU game is over (expecially when CU wins). CSU has to figure out how to raise attendance and coaches salaries. More wins mean better recruiting, and more wins, and more itnerest and more money. But they have to get that ball rolling. And right now I have the impression that while the ball may be rolling up in Ft. Fun, it appears to be rolling the wrong direction.

 

[Dark Bohner]

No ****. i certainly would like to CSU succeed. I liked the games where both teams were pretty good. But CU is on the rise and CSU seems to be a sinking ship. That is too bad. I think if Cu does get back to pounding them on a regular basis it could be the death knell for CSU. If they didn't play CU they might keep more interest in the program for longer in the year. But too many fans dissapear as soon and the CU-CSU game is over (expecially when CU wins). CSU has to figure out how to raise attendance and coaches salaries. More wins mean better recruiting, and more wins, and more itnerest and more money. But they have to get that ball rolling. And right now I have the impression that while the ball may be rolling up in Ft. Fun, it appears to be rolling the wrong direction.

I honestly used to care to an extent and was happy to see CSU succeed. But that changed when I saw that not only was that not reciprocated, but was in fact the exact opposite. Most would like to CU fail miserably and would dance in glee in the streets if that happened. I know not all CSU fans are like this, but I think it is safe to assume the majority are given all the evidence. After dealing with these types personally, I am now reciprocating that stance. CSU football can vanish for all I care. I know it is a harsh stance, but they brought it on themselves with their attitude towards CU.

 

[dply]

I honestly think some people on here care more about CSU and their well being than most CSU fans or their administration.

My three favorite CFB teams used to be:

1. CU
2. AFA
3. CSU

CSU fans made it to where I dislike CSU. I think that is only because it's played at Invesco though. It brings out the worst in both fan bases. Plus they rushed our field. I'll never like them after they did that.

 

[fatbuff]

I understand you missed the follow-up post, so here it is:

Also, did some further research and CSU has 17 winning seasons between 1950 and 1997. CU had winning seasons in 16 of 17 of those years. Granted, CU had winning seasons 70% of the time over the course of those fifty years, but I took my "blinders" off. Happy?

Pretty ****ing petty of you to point out a difference between '96 and '97 in a 15 year analysis. Further, there is something known as a "trend," where you take the most recent data and examine which way it is "trending." This is typically more useful than examining data from sixty years ago when CU played DU regularly. But, those numbers are above for Jack Sparrow's valued consideration.

Are you saying that csu only has good teams when CU is good?

 

[azbuff]

I'm saying that the numbers suggest that there is some correlation between CSU's success and CU's success. But it doesn't really matter.

And for everyone on here saying that CSU isn't our rival: you sound an awful lot like a certain red-clad fanbase to the East.

 

[sackman]

And for everyone on here saying that CSU isn't our rival: you sound an awful lot like a certain red-clad fanbase to the East.

As of right now, CSU is our only rival. We don't have Nebraska on our schedule for anything for the foreseeable future. Not in football. Not in basketball. women's soccer, volleyball, tennis - anything. They're history. As I've pointed out before, we've played CSU more than any other school in our history - by a lot. CSU IS our rival. The problem is that they're going to be in a world of hurt here pretty soon. I see this evolving in such a way that CSU becomes even more irrelevant than they currently are. I think it's healthy to have a good solid rivalry with another school. Maybe Utah becomes that school for us, maybe not. Right now I think that's kind of artificial. A true rivalry won't emerge for at least 10 years, maybe longer. In the meantime, we don't have any marquee games on our schedule that the guys on ESPN can comment on and say "Throw out the records when these two teams get together". That's too bad.

 

[Liver]

bah. this whole "rival" thing will sort itself out.

right now, the pac12 team i hate the most is cal because they kicked the **** out of us last year (altho, perhaps i should thank them for helping in a small way to precipitate the fall of d-2 danny). after a season or 2 in the conference, it will become evident to all of us who we hate the most and a rivalry will develop. the recipe varies but usually involves some bad acts by fans and/or players, along with trash talking, several perceived miscarriages of justice, and various levels of revenge.

for all we know, in a couple years, we'll think satan himself supports stanford or someting.

i can't wait to find out who the real debbil is! it will be fun.

 

[TimmyDUBs]

caxed

 

[Deleted member 807]

CSquared is a piece of work. God bless this Iowa guy who bleeds pumpkin and alfalfa.

Here's a couple of strategies that might help CSU:
1) Move CSU to Denver. If the alumni won't go to the school, then bring the school to the alumni. CSU would be a much more formidable advisary if they abandoned the Fort, merged with Metro State and DU and played all of their home games in the Mile High City. This strategy would galvanize CSU as the STATE university. The Metro and Denver based alum would create a critical mass of fans who could have a better chance of putting butts in seats.

2) If you can't beat 'em, join 'em strategy. Change the state charter to consolidate the CU and CSU systems into a monolithic regional behemoth. The joint entity would be the single, uncontested pride of the state. This manouver allows for the consolidated CU fan base to jump into the arena of being a capable of drawing 70,000 fans per home game. The joint fan base would travel even better, too. With the provential squabble resolved through merger, the joint program would have even better footing to compete more effectively against Oregon, U$C and the top tier of other BCS conferences. Such a behemoth would have the chance of being the source of regional pride much more than the couple 3-9 or 5-7 programs that CU and CSU have become.

Option 3 is the piss-n-moan death spiral. CSU can keep perpetuating this "brother vs brother" rivalry facade and reminisce of days gone by, as both programs slip in national stature. This inertia based response completely ignores the current economic situation that severely handicaps CSU and keeps CU from paying top dollar for coaching talent and building an indoor training facility. (I know, I know. Tradition, "never will happen", blah, blah, blah)

 

[dio]

I oppose merger, but would accept forceful annexation of those turds.