Northwestern Experience

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DLguy

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There aren't many cities better to go to. Chicago is one of a kind and always fun. That being said. Northwestern has atrocious facilities. Their fanbase is terrible. Not even close to a sell out. Many fans don't have a clue about the sport. Student section was pathetic. And the stadium is a dump. Big screen is in a terrible location. And apparently 30 football scholarships go to cheerleaders dressed as football players. It was embarrassing to watch those kids on the sidelines. Even Northwestern fans are embarrassed of them. Worse tailgating experience ever.
 

DLguy said:
There aren't many cities better to go to. Chicago is one of a kind and always fun. That being said. Northwestern has atrocious facilities. Their fanbase is terrible. Not even close to a sell out. Many fans don't have a clue about the sport. Student section was pathetic. And the stadium is a dump. Big screen is in a terrible location. And apparently 30 football scholarships go to cheerleaders dressed as football players. It was embarrassing to watch those kids on the sidelines. Even Northwestern fans are embarrassed of them. Worse tailgating experience ever.
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Can you elaborate on this part?
 

DLguy said:
There aren't many cities better to go to. Chicago is one of a kind and always fun. That being said. Northwestern has atrocious facilities. Their fanbase is terrible. Not even close to a sell out. Many fans don't have a clue about the sport. Student section was pathetic. And the stadium is a dump. Big screen is in a terrible location. And apparently 30 football scholarships go to cheerleaders dressed as football players. It was embarrassing to watch those kids on the sidelines. Even Northwestern fans are embarrassed of them. Worse tailgating experience ever.
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So you had a great time?

We certainly can't allow students to have fun, can we?

You do realize your (UM's) enrollment (and fanbase) is more than SIX TIMES GREATER than NU's enrollment. 30K is good turnout for a school with only 8500 undergrads...a comparable turnout for the Gophers would be 180K per game.
 

We made the trip two years ago and had a great time. I like how simple the stadium is (natural grass) and the fans were very friendly. Chicago is also a fun place to spend a few nights.
 

Gladeskat said:
So you had a great time?

We certainly can't allow students to have fun, can we?

You do realize your (UM's) enrollment (and fanbase) is more than SIX TIMES GREATER than NU's enrollment. 30K is good turnout for a school with only 8500 undergrads...a comparable turnout for the Gophers would be 180K per game.
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Your logic makes zero sense. Legitimately zero
 


I'm sure it didn't help your experience any with the fact we got our a** handed to us
 

And yet! Here is a program that won 3 Big Ten titles from 1995-2000, won 9 games in '08, 8 games in '09, and 10 in 2012. They have beaten Wisconsin 3 times and Iowa 6 times between 2005-14. Honest question: would you rather have their stadium and records or our stadium and records over the past decade? ****I fully understand these are not mutually exclusive things, just pointing out that a sh!t stadium and marginal fan base don't hold back a program from good seasons that, with the right talent and schedule, could easily break out into a great one.

If Northwestern beats Michigan this week (tall order), I expect them to win the Big Ten West.
 

I thought the student section was interesting. I have a friend from high school that now goes to Northwestern and we met up at halftime. He told me that last week against Ball State the student section was full. I thought that was interesting. Why would they fill the student section for Ball State, but not for a B1G game?
 

Go4fan4ever said:
I thought the student section was interesting. I have a friend from high school that now goes to Northwestern and we met up at halftime. He told me that last week against Ball State the student section was full. I thought that was interesting. Why would they fill the student section for Ball State, but not for a B1G game?
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Maybe there were free tickets last week? Ball State was their first game with students back on campus.
 



GophersInIowa said:
Can you elaborate on this part?
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I was sitting behind the Northwestern bench about the 30 yard line. He's talking about a group of about 15 northwestern players that formed a circle and were bascially doing a "dance off" during the game. Not during play, but during timeouts, etc. If I was Fitzgerald, I might consider pulling some of those guys aside after the game and say, "focus, knock it off, etc". Looked bush-league. That and a bunch of other dancing, etc.

The flip side of it is that they were kicking our butts, and having fun doing it.
 


Go4fan4ever said:
I thought the student section was interesting. I have a friend from high school that now goes to Northwestern and we met up at halftime. He told me that last week against Ball State the student section was full. I thought that was interesting. Why would they fill the student section for Ball State, but not for a B1G game?
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Ball State was a night game.
 

BarnBoy said:
I was sitting behind the Northwestern bench about the 30 yard line. He's talking about a group of about 15 northwestern players that formed a circle and were bascially doing a "dance off" during the game. Not during play, but during timeouts, etc. If I was the Fitzgerald, I might consider probably pull some of those guys aside after the game and say, "focus, knock it off, etc". Looked bush-league. That and a bunch of other dancing, etc. The flip side of it is that they were kicking our butts, and having fun doing it.
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Yup. They were just dinking around and dancing the whole game. They had planned dances. A Northwestern alum we were with says most fans can't understand why they get away with acting like fools. THEY say it is embarrassing

Also, I don't care how small your school is. You are ranked and undefeated. And within a short drive of a large number of your alumni. How are their not more people there?
 



BarnBoy said:
I was sitting behind the Northwestern bench about the 30 yard line. He's talking about a group of about 15 northwestern players that formed a circle and were bascially doing a "dance off" during the game. Not during play, but during timeouts, etc. If I was Fitzgerald, I might consider pulling some of those guys aside after the game and say, "focus, knock it off, etc". Looked bush-league. That and a bunch of other dancing, etc.

The flip side of it is that they were kicking our butts, and having fun doing it.
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Fitz doesn't care what players do during games on the sidelines so long as we're playing well. The bigger the game the bigger the party on the sideline. Color guys are always commenting on the more vibrant sideline party going on during games in successful years versus the last two years (the Black Plague).
 

Gladeskat said:
So you had a great time?

We certainly can't allow students to have fun, can we?

You do realize your (UM's) enrollment (and fanbase) is more than SIX TIMES GREATER than NU's enrollment. 30K is good turnout for a school with only 8500 undergrads...a comparable turnout for the Gophers would be 180K per game.
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Pretty touchy huh? Already forget you won the game and could be on your way to a great year?

We've been down to see 4 games at Ryan Field without much of a crowd at any of them. Had a good time every time. The stadium isn't much to look at but not really a bad view in the house. The area around the stadium is spectacular and the fans have always been more than friendly win or lose.

Oh, one other thing. The population of the Twin Cities Metro is 2.9 million. The Chicago Metro is 9.8 million. Too bad your focus is on alumni period.:cool:
 

Northwestern's football stadium is too big for their fanbase. However, while it did fill up, I was surprised to see that there was about 20% of the fan there at kickoff compared to halftime. With a #16 ranked team and the beginning of Big Ten play, I thought more people would be there for kickoff. Was a bit annoyed they mic'ed the band because of the 1-2 second delay it was producing. Understandable though given the size and location of the band, mic'ing them is the only option if they want everyone to hear them. Maybe they could work on getting that time delay down?

I will say the fanbase doesn't give up calls easily. When the refs reversed that touchdown, which was a good call IMO you could see the ball moved positions in his arm between him catching it and after he hit the ground, the fans were booing at every break in play for the next 5 or 6 plays until they scored. They did this while they were on offense! I can't imagine how long it would have continued if they hadn't scored and we got the ball. Also booing at us snapping the ball quickly when the interception was called incorrectly, like I understand we did that to prevent them from reviewing it, but Northwestern runs a hurry up offense! Had the roles been reversed the same thing would have happened.

My experience may be skewed given the loss, but I didn't have a lot of fun at the game. While the fanbase isn't mean, they weren't particularly friendly either.
 

Maybe Northwestern has got it's priorities straight. There IS more than your negative way to SPIN the CATS... Seems like overall they do it THEIR way and they do it pretty damn well.
 

I was there for the second time. I really like going to games there because it is so different. There is a certain innocence to the experience. It is like going to a D3 stadium to watch B1G football, well at least one team. Park for free in the neighborhood and have a nice walk to the game. Resturants and bars close by. Fans are nice and tickets are easy to get. It is how I imagine CFB in the late 50's or early 60's before it became such a big production.
 

DLguy said:
Yup. They were just dinking around and dancing the whole game. They had planned dances. A Northwestern alum we were with says most fans can't understand why they get away with acting like fools. THEY say it is embarrassing

Also, I don't care how small your school is. You are ranked and undefeated. And within a short drive of a large number of your alumni. How are their not more people there?
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SHORT DRIVE? NU has the second smallest number of B1G alumni in the Chicago area. Most students are from out-of-state or country and wind up taking jobs all over the world. Many NU fans travel great distances to go to NU football games. The flip side is we have fans scattered everywhere, and will bring a lot of fans to distant games and bowl games.
 


We had tickets in the Minnesota visitor's section, which was packed. No problem -- the entire section next to us was completely empty, as was much of the section next to that. So many of the Gopher fans used the extra section to spread out. There were other sections throughout the stadium completely empty. Too bad, because the Wildcats have a pretty good team and deserve better.

Awful game for us and not much of a football atmosphere, but we keep going back because Chicago can't be beat. Friday night was A-plus and Saturday was A-minus, only because we were tired from the early start.
 

Gladeskat said:
SHORT DRIVE? NU has the second smallest number of B1G alumni in the Chicago area. Most students are from out-of-state or country and wind up taking jobs all over the world. Many NU fans travel great distances to go to NU football games. The flip side is we have fans scattered everywhere, and will bring a lot of fans to distant games and bowl games.
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You are correct. They are in the same situation as Stanford expect with crappy weather.
 

Iceland12 said:
Pretty touchy huh? Already forget you won the game and could be on your way to a great year?

We've been down to see 4 games at Ryan Field without much of a crowd at any of them. Had a good time every time. The stadium isn't much to look at but not really a bad view in the house. The area around the stadium is spectacular and the fans have always been more than friendly win or lose.

Oh, one other thing. The population of the Twin Cities Metro is 2.9 million. The Chicago Metro is 9.8 million. Too bad your focus is on alumni period.:cool:
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Size of the Metro area doesn't matter (see Lincoln, NE, and Iowa City, IA). That is particularly true if the college is in a metro area with pro sports teams. The size of the alumni pool DOES matter. Minnesota has FAR more alums in the Twin Cities Metro area, and even the larger Chicago Metro area, than NU does.
 


RailBaronYarr said:
And yet! Here is a program that won 3 Big Ten titles from 1995-2000, won 9 games in '08, 8 games in '09, and 10 in 2012. They have beaten Wisconsin 3 times and Iowa 6 times between 2005-14. Honest question: would you rather have their stadium and records or our stadium and records over the past decade? ****I fully understand these are not mutually exclusive things, just pointing out that a sh!t stadium and marginal fan base don't hold back a program from good seasons that, with the right talent and schedule, could easily break out into a great one.

If Northwestern beats Michigan this week (tall order), I expect them to win the Big Ten West.
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+1 Amazing the success they've had compared to the Gophers at such a small school with higher academic standards and zero facilities.
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
+1 Amazing the success they've had compared to the Gophers at such a small school with higher academic standards and zero facilities.
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And yet in basketball, where it's much easier to succeed than it is in football as a smaller school, they've been able to accomplish next to nothing.
 

Breakin' The Plane said:
And yet in basketball, where it's much easier to succeed than it is in football as a smaller school, they've been able to accomplish next to nothing.
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Very true. However, the future looks bright in BB with Chris Collins at the helm.
 

Gladeskat said:
Size of the Metro area doesn't matter (see Lincoln, NE, and Iowa City, IA). That is particularly true if the college is in a metro area with pro sports teams. The size of the alumni pool DOES matter. Minnesota has FAR more alums in the Twin Cities Metro area, and even the larger Chicago Metro area, than NU does.
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Bullsheeet, unless you think that the stands at Lincoln, tOSU, Penn State, Iowa City etc. are only full of alumni. ;)

Can see why you'd want to take that stand. The NW Administration doesn't think like you do, and no, I don't think that you do either. It's a pretty lame schtick.

The Administration in the past at least has put up billboards, radio ads, newspaper ads etc. talking about how "Northwestern is Your Big Ten Team". Hasn't been real successful. Reading the Tribune and SunTimes it seems to be more of a subject of ridicule than a solid marketing position.

A better question is, if you want to honest, why do you think that only alumni and immediate neighbors care to come out to see a good Big Ten team and the millions within an hours drive don't give a damn about them? You know, the way they do at successful programs all over the country?
 

Iceland12 said:
Bullsheeet, unless you think that the stands at Lincoln, tOSU, Penn State, Iowa City etc. are only full of alumni. ;)

Can see why you'd want to take that stand. The NW Administration doesn't think like you do, and no, I don't think that you do either. It's a pretty lame schtick.

The Administration in the past at least has put up billboards, radio ads, newspaper ads etc. talking about how "Northwestern is Your Big Ten Team". Hasn't been real successful. Reading the Tribune and SunTimes it seems to be more of a subject of ridicule than a solid marketing position.

A better question is, if you want to honest, why do you think that only alumni and immediate neighbors care to come out to see a good Big Ten team and the millions within an hours drive don't give a damn about them? You know, the way they do at successful programs all over the country?
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I'll tag onto this that while I was there I saw a lot of "Northwestern, Chicago's Big Ten Team". Is this a new thing they've been trying to push? It doesn't seem very effective if not a lot of fans live in the Chicago area.
 

Breakin' The Plane said:
And yet in basketball, where it's much easier to succeed than it is in football as a smaller school, they've been able to accomplish next to nothing.
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Basketball isn't a cerebral sport, so the nerds aren't good at it.
 

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