Guest Blogger: The Duke Dog Shelter for Battered JMU Fans
First of all, I would like to offer my deepest apologies to any children sitting within 50 yards of me at the game on Saturday. I know you’ve never heard any of those strange words you heard during the first overtime period, and I know that there are certain physical actions that were suggested by (a) certain fans (fan) that your parents might have a hard time explaining to you. You see kids, there are certain times when it is appropriate to address a situation in an assertive way, such as suggesting the coaching staff is anatomically incomplete or should attempt to do something that is not physically possible. One such situation (and please, please do not ever forget this) is when you have the ball on the 1 yard line in OT against a 2-4 team in your home stadium in front of 20,000 fans AND YOU LINE UP IN THE SHOTGUN (Pistol).
I swore I was going to buck the cranky old man moniker this time (I avoided the temptation to write an entire post on how only cowards run east/west and real teams run north/south). Here is my feeble attempt- MM coaches what I call “Witchdoctor Football”. A perfect example of this was during the Towson game. During the pregame interviews, Towson’s Coach talked about playmakers, strategy and motivating his players. Where was Mickey’s head? The wind. He talked about the wind. While everyone else in America is looking at pictures of the defensive alignments and feverishly scribbling X’s and O’s on the sidelines, MM is licking his finger and holding it up in the air (breaking for the occasional visor toss). Don’t turn the ball over, punt, play defense and play field position. “Witchdoctor football” reminds me of golf- it is more important to judge the wind, contour of the fairway, height of the grass, pin position and softness of the green than it is to just hit the damn ball as far as you can and try to get it in the hole with the fewest stokes possible (Consequently, MM is a scratch golfer). In the case of this weekend, “Witchdoctor football” must have included sacrificing a chicken (or half-naked eagle) and placing a hex on the Fighting Geeks’ kicker. I definitely give him my game ball.
We decided this weekend that JMU has got to be the WORST GOOD football team in the country. Even when we win (which we usually do), it often feels like we lost. Rather than be really excited about our win, we go to bed (or pass out) Saturday night frustrated about our dysfunctional offense, or our defense’s inability to defend the forward pass. Then we wake up Sunday morning and find out we are the #2 team in the nation, and come back for another weekend of purple pride, hot girls, fantastic tailgating and winning despite getting beaten in every statistical category.
At the end of the day, with all due credit to MM, “witchdoctor football” works. He rode that horse to 101 wins. If we need to start punting on 1st down or lining up for a hail mary from the one-inch line to win 101 more games and another national championship- so be it…I’ll just be sure to wear oversized dark sunglasses and long sleeves to cover the bruises.
P.S.- I would also like to extend a special you suck dart to masses of current JMU students who walked out on a 17-17 game against an in-state rival.
From a proud alumni who did not help build that stadium and program with literal blood, sweat, tears and hard-earned cash so you could treat it as “just pregaming for Fox Hills”.
Still don’t understand the JMU students at these games. So disappointing. I was on the team and on the field in 1999 when the fans tore down the goalposts…where did those kids go?
I drove up from Atlanta for the game and could not have been more let down by the crowd. The only time it got loud was on the final play in regulation and in overtime. My fiancée (a UGA graduate) was with me and was mystified that nobody cheered until it was third down. Frankly, it’s embarrassing. Maybe we should sponsor some sort of class on how to be a good crowd, because size alone clearly doesn’t matter.
I agree with everything (well, almost everything) said here. I do tend to be quiet during the games. But leaving the stadium with a tied game…or almost as bad, not showing up until half-way through the 1st quarter…I just don’t understand. Mickey does tend to take weather into account more than it actually impacts the game (heaven forbid if it is raining). But I couldn’t believe my eyes when they went shotgun on that goal-to-go from the 1. Note also that in the 2nd overtime we ran off-tackle from an off-set eye and got in from the three (with ease).
We won the national championship with a power running game, and now its all finesse.
I can assure you Mickey is no scratch golfer, he can maybe break 80 on his best day.
I find the fans leaving early issue very disappointing as well. When I attended JMU in the 80’s, even The Convo rocked with The Electric Zoo and basketball games actually sold out. (yes, I know our basketball team now leaves a lot to be desired and that’s a different subject, but it illustrates a big gap in enthusiasm between the past and today’s generation). Maybe if fans could divert their attention away from Facebook and their cell phones long enough to look up to see what was actually happening in the game, they would be more invested in it and be more inclined to see it thru to conclusion. We have a “no re-entry” policy at the games. It’s too bad we can’t have a “no exit” policy until the game is over. The Dukes are winning on the field. I appreciate the hand wringing and scrutiny of MM’s play calling, but maybe it’s time to shift some focus and start booing or scolding the fans as they get up to leave early in a tight contest. The coaches and admin need to challenge the student body and fans in general to step up their game as some other schools have done over the years. If that doesn’t work, then we can always resort to a $10k cash drop like GA State…LOL. Bottom line, the team is winning and deserves everyone’s full support. Go Dukes!!!
In my opinion, it is NOT just the students who arrive late, leave early or just don’t come at all BUT I have noticed a lot of empty seats in the non-student sections. I can understand this for the early non-conference games but when you get in conference and especially with rivals like W&M, UR, etc. I am expecting a packed house that is loud and in frenzy-mode. Also, what has happened to all of the streamers? There seem to be a lot less of these in the air after scroing drives this year. I chalk this up to the streamers not being made available to the fans entering the stadium. There used to be bags of them sitting around for fans to grab. I would like to see an abundance of streamers available for the last two home games – Homecoming against Georgia State and the game for the State Cup against ODU in November (Yes, they have moved the game for the State Cup to Harrisonburg this year because our friends in Blacksburg and Charlottesville do not seem to be interested in football this year)!
I get frustrated with all the students leaving too, but let’s not say it’s all the students, haven’t left a game early in 4 years.
Hey now, not all of us leave early. And those current students that do stay are just as frustrated with the current habits of the JMUnation. Most of them can’t even get simple football edict (like cheering pre snap while we are on offense) correct. However, many of us still do care and love our Dukes to the bitter end. If you are ever getting down about JMUnation come join us in the front rows of section five and help us educated the freshmen on why a real football fan sounds/looks like.
Obviously, anyone that cares enough to be reading The JMU Sports Blog is generally not part of the problem. I love everyone’s enthusiasm on here. We just have to keep pushing these important issues until our dedication and enthusiasm become contagious to everyone else.
Keep up the good work!
Go Dukes!
Good point Steve J. Go Dukes!
Hear Hear Steve J.
Thank you for pointing out the suckitude of our fans. It frustrates me to no end that we can’t make a little noise when the other team has the ball. It frustrates me even more when people head for the exits in the 2nd half of a close game.
Granted, there are times when our fans can be decent. The App State game a couple years ago was pretty good. I thought the Montana playoff game was pretty good. But with a large student body, a good size (relatively) local alumni base, and people that really care and love their school, we should be able to make winning in Harrisonburg much more difficult for opposing teams.
I’m not just pointing a finger at the students, though. While they don’t do their part, us old farts in the non-student sections need to get off our butts and do something about it too.
If I win another prediction contest this season, the post will be entitled “JMU Football 101: Introduction to being a Football Fan”
… and I still think that running anything other than a sneak or dive on the 1 yard line is a totally gutless call. I understand that the 2nd OT period was going into the student section (the ones who were still there), but still…the football bible clearly states you always go for the win at home and ram it in from inside the 1, unless you are playing Alabama or the New England Patriots.
I agree with you 2004 Duke. They won it in the end, but I thought they should have shown some guts and ended the game right there.
Yeah they were going into the empty student section in the 2OT; well except for the band and they have to be there.
I am utterly disgusted with a large majority of the students at football games. If you need to text/facebook/talk on your cell phone just don’t come next time. I would rather not see you to begin with than leave in the 3rd quarter to do what drink beer…….get a clue you got all night and tomorrow to guzzle down a few beers. Show some school spirit and sac-up!!!! Yeah the alumni could always do a better job but when us old/family guys can out-class the existing student body, that is a sad day indeed.
Speaking for the band, just because we have to be there, doesn’t mean we don’t want to be. Considering that football games are the only time we perform (save a couple performances at high school competitions), we wouldn’t be in the band if we didn’t enjoy the games. And yes, we are just as disappointed in the students who leave early. From the band seats, I have a great view of the student gate. What really bothers me is the students that are leaving at the end of THE FIRST QUARTER! Why even bother showing up? Before this season, I had season tickets for 4 years. I would never dream of leaving early. Even in 2009 against Villanova (L 0-27) we stayed until the final whistle blew. Best way to get students to stick around next year, is to win it all this year. See you guys in Frisco!
Some of the fans leaving early is unavoidable with our party culture and gender split. Being a Duke from the North, I also get a laugh out of the fans in the crowds who can’t take the slightest chill or drizzle. But I think JMU could do a much better job of making the games feel more important by getting more information out about the team and the league. I came to JMU really excited to cheer on a winning football team and go all-out, but besides going to the games, I couldn’t find much to do as a fan. I knew next to nothing about other games happening in FCS during the week, and couldn’t really follow the development of individual players due to the difficulty of finding stats or analysis. From Sunday through Friday, I felt like there was nothing for a Duke fan to do, and so, unlike the NFL, my excitement about the game didn’t build up during the week. I didn’t find this blog until I was a junior, and The Breeze coverage isn’t much, so I had little to no storylines to watch and not many places to go for intelligent JMU football discussion. I wish JMU made statistics more available – when I go to NHL games I get a few pages of Notes with relevant stats and storylines for the week from the team. I think something like that could really help fans get into the games more. A lot of JMU students only know Mickey, Thorpe, and maybe Scott, and nothing about the teams we play against, so it’s not too surprising to me when they start walking out at a 10-7 halftime to get wasted or whatever. It’s annoying to see the crowd slowly empty even in close games, but it’s pretty hard work to become an informed, passionate JMU football fan. Students need a sense of the history, the competition, the players, and a narrative to build it all around to really make the football games great. Right now we just get by on school spirit and having a good team. Could JMU show highlights of scoring plays from the other CAA games on their video screen? I’d love that, or, say, if we were hosting Richmond, we should be showing highlights of the Scottie McGee game on the board before the game.