Bison Fatigue

[Bisonator98]

Attendance is the sign of the times. People now days don't want to be tied to one place more then 1-2 hours if that. They can watch the games on TV, online, hell even on their phones now days while doing other things. They can catch replays whenever they want. It is what it is and it's only going to get worse.

[Professor Chaos]

Eh, For the players and the coaches playoffs are extra practices. If you can get as deep as the quarters thats as many as four weeks extra practices that squads that don't get into the playoffs don't get to have. If you're building players, that's a big deal. Its reps that other teams don't get and its how Good teams can climb the ant hill to great.

Different programs have different goals as well. For instance Austin Peay is a program that was 1-33 from 2014-2016. Their fan base, even if it's relatively small, has to be energized and their players and coaches have to be on cloud nine with this run to the quarterfinals (and counting). I guarantee none of them will view this season as a failure just because they didn't win a national championship. But they have a chance to win one and the only people who can take that away from them are the guys lined up across from them on the field and that has to be pretty damn cool for a program like that to come so far in so short a time.

Even here we saw a similar phenomenon in 2010. No one in their right minds would've pegged the Bison as a national title contender to start that season or even when the playoffs started. But all it took was 2 wins and a near miss to propel this program from the middle to the top of the subdivision. NDSU has a lot more going for it outside of that playoff run than Austin Peay does but the playoffs have value for a lot of programs that don't win the national title. Very few programs are "national title or bust" like we are.

[Hammerhead]

I am sure there is.. if your an opposing fan you aren't excited about playoffs or playing for natties.. unless its JMU the rest know these games mean nothing in the end..

So you're saying Bison fans shouldn't be excited when the men's basketball team is in the big dance or even if we win a game it's no big deal since we don't have a chance to win it all?

[KNOW IT ALL]

This issue mirrors the change/changes we see today in other sporting avenues. Go hunting and observe the age class in the field, very few teenage hunters or fisherman. If you live another 15-20 years you will have the lakes and fields to yourself. Those 50 and older will be leaving the sport and NOBODY is coming in the backdoor. Go visit some of the biggest sport shows in the region, you can count the number of people under age 20 looking or buying on one hand, they are generally walking down the middle of the isle texting with their heads down. It's a new changing, dying culture for sports, no immediate gratification means no INTEREST!!!!

[JMB]

So you're saying Bison fans shouldn't be excited when the men's basketball team is in the big dance or even if we win a game it's no big deal since we don't have a chance to win it all?

Holy crap, think of all the money we can save by shutting the basketball program down!

[ByeSonBusiness]

This issue mirrors the change/changes we see today in other sporting avenues. Go hunting and observe the age class in the field, very few teenage hunters or fisherman. If you live another 15-20 years you will have the lakes and fields to yourself. Those 50 and older will be leaving the sport and NOBODY is coming in the backdoor. Go visit some of the biggest sport shows in the region, you can count the number of people under age 20 looking or buying on one hand, they are generally walking down the middle of the isle texting with their heads down. It's a new changing, dying culture for sports, no immediate gratification means no INTEREST!!!!

Hopefully its just a down generational thing that cycles.

Might be time to blame the Gen X'ers and older millenials for bad parenting. Keep your kids engaged folks!

[Professor Chaos]

This issue mirrors the change/changes we see today in other sporting avenues. Go hunting and observe the age class in the field, very few teenage hunters or fisherman. If you live another 15-20 years you will have the lakes and fields to yourself. Those 50 and older will be leaving the sport and NOBODY is coming in the backdoor. Go visit some of the biggest sport shows in the region, you can count the number of people under age 20 looking or buying on one hand, they are generally walking down the middle of the isle texting with their heads down. It's a new changing, dying culture for sports, no immediate gratification means no INTEREST!!!!

So because there's fewer teenage hunters and fisherman it means that football is dying???

[bisonp]

So because there's fewer teenage hunters and fisherman it means that football is dying???

Pretty similar trend.

Lots of tickets available for this weekend, even more than last week. Attendance is really falling off a cliff this year and it's not just at NDSU. Does not bode well.

[Professor Chaos]

Pretty similar trend.

Lots of tickets available for this weekend, even more than last week. Attendance is really falling off a cliff this year and it's not just at NDSU. Does not bode well.

Can't argue that attendance is on the downswing and we're very likely to set another non-Thanksgiving weekend attendance low in the playoffs this week. But I don't think that necessarily means the sport is dying. ESPN is actually investing heavier in the FCS playoffs moving an additional quarterfinal to a national TV spot and moving the championship game from ESPN2 to ABC. To me that says that while fans aren't as interested in going to the games as they used to be they're more interested in tuning into watch it (at least more interested than whatever else ESPN had in those same spots in previous years).

The majority of crap FBS bowl games are terribly attended too but they continue to play them and are actually adding more all the time because TV money continues to flow in to broadcast them.

[stevdock]

I am sure there is.. if your an opposing fan you aren't excited about playoffs or playing for natties.. unless its JMU the rest know these games mean nothing in the end..

Well if that's their attitude and the team's attitude then they will never compete. The most important stretch of games in this stretch of national championships were the playoffs the year before with the loss to EWU. That year they got in to the playoffs, whether deserved or not, and then rolled through teams to get to EWU. We know how that ended but without that do we see 7 out of 8? Every other team out there needs to believe they can roll one season to the next like NDSU has the last 10 years now.