Gophers need a chant

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diefirma

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Nebraska has "Go big Red"
Iowa has "Let's go Hawks"
Wisconsin has "Let's f@#k a dead..." Never mind. Moving on

I think the Gophers need a chant the entire stadium can get behind. I propose

"Go Go Gophers" or "Ski-U-Mah"

"Go Go Gophers" seems easy and has a flow to it. "Ski-U-Mah"* has some history and is unique


Discuss and comment

*Note from U of MN Website:

"This famous Minnesota phrase, pronounced SKY-YOU-MAH, is more than 115 years old. In 1884, two Minnesota rugby players, John W. Adams and Win Sargent, tried to think of a fitting team yell. They used the word “Ski”, a Sioux battle cry meaning victory, and combined it with “U-Mah” (representing the University of Minnesota and rhyming with “rah-rah-rah”) to create a team cheer. The phrase stuck and was incorporated into both official school songs, “Hail Minnesota” and more commonly in the “Minnesota Rouser.”
 

diefirma said:
Nebraska has "Go big Red"
Iowa has "Let's go Hawks"
Wisconsin has "Let's f@#k a dead..." Never mind. Moving on

I think the Gophers need a chant the entire stadium can get behind. I propose

"Go Go Gophers" or "Ski-U-Mah"

"Go Go Gophers" seems easy and has a flow to it. "Ski-U-Mah"* has some history and is unique

Discuss and comment

*Note from U of MN Website:

"This famous Minnesota phrase, pronounced SKY-YOU-MAH, is more than 115 years old. In 1884, two Minnesota rugby players, John W. Adams and Win Sargent, tried to think of a fitting team yell. They used the word “Ski”, a Sioux battle cry meaning victory, and combined it with “U-Mah” (representing the University of Minnesota and rhyming with “rah-rah-rah”) to create a team cheer. The phrase stuck and was incorporated into both official school songs, “Hail Minnesota” and more commonly in the “Minnesota Rouser.”
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A few years ago they tried getting the Ski-U-Mah chant going as a regular chant at the start of the games @ the Dome. Nobody got into it - it was a fail.
 

I think the first time those boys in North Carolina tried to fly they failed a few times too. We didn't have a 3 sided stadium in the dome, we didn't have Ski U Mah on the backs of the helmets and jerseys and we didn't give the chant enough time to progress. I say Ski U Mah is the way to go.
By the way, in 2000 Maturi tried to get the "We Are Minnesota" chant going like Penn State does. Boy i am glad that didn't catch on.
 

AuEGO4 said:
I think the first time those boys in North Carolina tried to fly they failed a few times too. We didn't have a 3 sided stadium in the dome, we didn't have Ski U Mah on the backs of the helmets and jerseys and we didn't give the chant enough time to progress. I say Ski U Mah is the way to go.
By the way, in 2000 Maturi tried to get the "We Are Minnesota" chant going like Penn State does. Boy i am glad that didn't catch on.
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I agree, they still tried that last year here and there and its a good thing nobody is buying it.
 

I try to stay away from hyperbole, but it is criminal that "Ski-U-Mah" is not ubiquitous for Gopher fans.

I was travelling on business to Chicago last fall and had time to go for a run. It was the night of the Vikings-Bears game on Monday night. An older man, and I assume his son were walking towards Soldier Field wearing Gopher t-shirts, and all I could think to say to them as I was running by was Ski-U-Mah. I got a "thumbs up" from the dad.

It is unique, it belongs to us, and us alone. Anyone can co-opt "We Are [fill in the blank]" No one can co-opt "Ski-U-Mah".

Think about it. There are very few teams that have a unique identifier as a chant.

I'm still of the opinion that Ski-U-Mah should precede The Rouser when the team comes out of the tunnel.
 




UVA does "Wa Hoo Wa", I would think we could do Ski U Mah. At USC the yell leaders hold up signs to lead U-S-C chant. Was that tried here?
 

I'm glad we have the offseason to discuss these important and hard-hitting issues.
 



Not sure about a chant, but one thing the U needs to get rid of is the "rah" (especially from the PA guy) at the end of the Rouser. It just seems so contrived and out of place. Abandon it, please.
 

dpodoll68 said:
I'm glad we have the offseason to discuss these important and hard-hitting issues.
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I appreciate much of what you post but I think that cheering is important in games. Football is a game of emotion and it is easy for even a casual observer of games to see the momentum shift back and forth. When a stadium is rocking to "Let's go Hawks" it helps Iowa keep or regain the momentum in a game. Does it contribute to wins? I am sure it does but it is impossible to quantify accurately. My guess is cheering helps win a game a year. This is a good question for an experienced coach.
 

diefirma said:
Nebraska has "Go big Red"
Iowa has "Let's go Hawks"
Wisconsin has "Let's f@#k a dead..." Never mind. Moving on

I think the Gophers need a chant the entire stadium can get behind. I propose

"Go Go Gophers" or "Ski-U-Mah"

"Go Go Gophers" seems easy and has a flow to it. "Ski-U-Mah"* has some history and is unique


Discuss and comment

*Note from U of MN Website:

"This famous Minnesota phrase, pronounced SKY-YOU-MAH, is more than 115 years old. In 1884, two Minnesota rugby players, John W. Adams and Win Sargent, tried to think of a fitting team yell. They used the word “Ski”, a Sioux battle cry meaning victory, and combined it with “U-Mah” (representing the University of Minnesota and rhyming with “rah-rah-rah”) to create a team cheer. The phrase stuck and was incorporated into both official school songs, “Hail Minnesota” and more commonly in the “Minnesota Rouser.”
Click to expand...

Email this to Coach Kill. He is open to creating a better game day atmosphere.
 

diefirma said:
I appreciate much of what you post but I think that cheering is important in games. Football is a game of emotion and it is easy for even a casual observer of games to see the momentum shift back and forth. When a stadium is rocking to "Let's go Hawks" it helps Iowa keep or regain the momentum in a game. Does it contribute to wins? I am sure it does but it is impossible to quantify accurately. My guess is cheering helps win a game a year. This is a good question for an experienced coach.
Click to expand...

Please don't take offense diefirma, as I didn't intend any. I just wish there were more substantive things to discuss. It's the nature of the offseason beast, I know.
 




I'm all for the Ski-U-Mah chant. It's one of the oldest cheers in college sports. It mostly survives as part of the Rouser. The question is, how do you establish a cheer? What have other schools done? It doesn't seem that you can simply tell the fans "Ok, here's the cheer, and here's when you use it." You really have to get the fans to buy into it. I don't know if right now is the easiest time to get a new cheer going, I think if the Gophers can win some games, the crowd may be more receptive to a cheer. If we can get the student section enthusiastic again, then perhaps the team can work with student groups to get the cheer going.
 



I thought Sky U Mah was Chippewa for "rebuilding year"

Regardless of it's origin (and meaning), it is unique to us and should be a bigger part of the Game Day experience.
 

MNGoldenGophers1 said:
Get us the USC cheerleaders and I can live without the chant.
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Except for the ANNOYING cheer leader dude with the loudspeaker who talked the whole game, the only negative to the USC game-day atmosphere when we played them last year.
 

dpodoll68 said:
Please don't take offense diefirma, as I didn't intend any. I just wish there were more substantive things to discuss. It's the nature of the offseason beast, I know.
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No offense taken - I am VERY thick skinned. I actually agree with you - this is a subject for the off season. Maybe I'll send my suggestion to Teague and see what happens.
 


Ski-U-Mah is one of the rare things we have that is unique from everybody else in the country. Just because fans didn't get into the cheer squad's lame effort doesn't mean the effort should be abandoned.

"Hook 'em Horns" isn't all about a cheer at a game. It's more than that, and everybody at the U can -- should -- make it part of their day. When Joel Maturi used to send e-mails it would say "Go Gophers" at the end. Say "Ski-U-Mah" instead. Add it (in places that make sense) to all Gopher athletic marketing.

It's marketing and branding. That's all it is. Maybe the new AD knows something about that.
 


Slightly off-topic, but......

when I was in HS, and we would have pep fests, the one phrase guaranteed to bring dead silence was when one of the cheerleaders would announce that "We have a new Cheer." Invariably, it would be some long, complicated deal that no one could follow. If they wanted to get people yelling, they had to go back to the tried-but-true "Red-White" (school colors) or the classic "We've got spirit, yes we do. We've got spirit; how about you?"

My point - keep it simple. I agree that, if we want a better game-day atmosphere at the Bank, it has to start with the student section. The U has to find some way to have a packed, rowdy student section. (alcohol?)
 



Keep it simple and old school. KILL! KILL! KILL!
 


Parski1 said:
A few years ago they tried getting the Ski-U-Mah chant going as a regular chant at the start of the games @ the Dome. Nobody got into it - it was a fail.
Click to expand...

It was also tried at TCF as well and it failed miserably.

badgergopher said:
UVA does "Wa Hoo Wa", I would think we could do Ski U Mah. At USC the yell leaders hold up signs to lead U-S-C chant. Was that tried here?
Click to expand...

Again, yes that was tried at TCF as well. The problem was they also used the scoreboard, which was not in sync with the signs the cheerleaders were using. It was a clusterf#$# and ended badly.

I think with persistence and a plan it could work and be an awesome chant.
 

pharmacygopher said:
It was also tried at TCF as well and it failed miserably.



Again, yes that was tried at TCF as well. The problem was they also used the scoreboard, which was not in sync with the signs the cheerleaders were using. It was a clusterf#$# and ended badly.

I think with persistence and a plan it could work and be an awesome chant.
Click to expand...


I like this idea for the reasons stated before - it's simple, it's distinctly ours and it's a great message (Victory U of M!) There's no reason we couldn't get it going at TCF if they had the scoreboard & cheerleaders coordinated (or just drop the scoreboard, except to alert everyone to the field).

Further, this could carryover into the concourses, on the streets. Someone could yell out Ski! Someone else U! A 3rd Person Mah! You could have it going all over the place.
 

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