I miss the Mason era too sometimes... so f!king what?!
Winning our non-conf games and winning the music city/sun bowl sounds awfully good right now. These 1/2/3 win seasons are testing the resolve of even the most hardy gopher football fans.
Jeez. I guess I may be the only one here to agree (other than the tasteless Kill remarks). Call it rebuilding, call it whatever. There is no excuse for losing to a team like NMSU. It has been 5+ years since a bowl win. I would enjoy just seeing us go to any bowl, even if it means a loss. Mason had us on the fringe of a big ten championship not to many years back. We haven't sniffed it since. Maybe I am just in a bad mood. Maybe I have a bad taste in my mouth due to that pathetic showing today. Either way, what Mason brought us really doesn't look bad right now.
Before the final moments of the fourth quarter, after the Royston interception was overturned this was pretty much the dominant thought in my head. This was the most winnable game on the schedule and we were at the time just gone down by two trys. And I couldn't help but say aloud what I wouldn't give to get back to the era of tromping through teams few people could locate on a map on the way to a low level bowl. Contemplating the game this morning, I feared that NMSU would cover the spread with their passing attack and maybe even go up early before the new coaches could get the kids settled and make some adjustments and that we probably wouldn't be able to cruise like we did during the glory days of Mason's Cream Puff binges. I, like everybody else, couldn't have predicted the emotional rollercoaster that the afternoon would bring. But make no mistake, this NMSU team would have been absolutely dismantled by the rushing onslaught of the Mason era. And I miss that.
Do I think Kill will get us back to Mason's level of competitiveness? Nothing in his resume would give me any doubt, that even with the more competitive nature of the league currently, Jerry will get us to a level of bowl contention. I think we also will return of an era of winning against lesser teams with ease, something that Brewster never seemed able to do. And running the ball. Lord! do I long for the day that we can run the ball well again, and I think we will see continual progress even this season on that front under Kill. But this afternoon I was missing the rolling of the creampuffs, with maroon and gold backs scampering all over the field, and the hapless young man in the rodent suit struggling through hundreds of pushups. I was missing those Mason Moments (and in my bitterly nostalgic state forgetting the wretched ones). Upon this very subject I sat musing, inwardly lamenting, at the moment Coach scared the bejeezus out of me and the other thirty thousand of us.
Like all of us, I want Jerry to take care of himself. Wish him a speedy recovery, and to implore him follow his own advice from the previous presser and mind his hydration [ dear lord man pour yourself another gatorade].
But I'd be lying to say that today in those sweltering stands I wasn't staring down the reality of losing a game we once would have frolicked through, and the grim tiddings it brings for the rest of the season, and was not longing for a previous era (the best a 30 year old gopher fan ever knew). 1, 2 and 3 win seasons do indeed sap the soul...
