FB: Empire 8

Started by admin, August 16, 2005, 04:58:21 AM

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D3viewer

#50535
Brockport's release on the new E8/LL Bowl Game.

http://www.gobrockport.com/news/2017/7/12/football-empire-8-liberty-league-team-up-for-new-york-state-bowl.aspx

"This will be an exciting new opportunity for our football program to participate in meaningful post-season play," said Brockport Director of Athletics, Erick Hart. "The ability to play a bowl game within the state will give our fans a chance to experience post-season football."

Maybe being nitpicky, but this game will not really be "meaningful", because it will not decide any type of championship, just who is the "best of the rest" in the 2 confs. Also not "meaningful" in the sense there is no advancement to another game, just like the ECAC Bowls...one and done. To me, "meaningful post-season play" involves a chance to win a championship or advance toward said championship.

The release also says Brockport will be withdrawing from the ECAC organization. I'm assuming that means they will not be able to participate in an ECAC game if they don't make this new game. So that will definitely limit their postseason opportunities even further. So maybe in that sense the new game will be more "meaningful" than an ECAC game (which Brockport has always embraced)

The official release is here .http://www.empire8.com/news/2017/6/27/football-empire-8-liberty-league-announce-nys-bowl-game.aspx

One comment stood out to me.
"The Liberty League is pleased to partner with the Empire 8 to provide a postseason championship opportunity for our student-athletes," said Liberty League Commissioner Tracy King. "This unique experience will provide our football student-athletes with a postseason experience that many of our student-athletes in other sports receive through conference tournament participation. We look forward to this great competitive opportunity."

I don't see this as an equal experience as conf tournament participation, because again, those tournaments provide an opportunity to win a bid to the NCAA playoffs. The participants of this new bowl game are picked after the NCAA field has been selected, and provide no such gateway, thus limiting the excitement.
Anyway.

HansenRatings

Different division, but similar sentiment. Here's a few articles I've read over the years that pretty well state how I feel about the "meaningless game" debate. I went 8-2 my senior year, and we finished second in the IIAC, with two wins over 9-1 conference champions, and two losses by a cumulative 4 points, and didn't make the tournament. If the IIAC/MIAC/WIAC/CCIW had some sort of bowl tie-in for us to get another chance on the field, I would have loved it. For the type of team who will get into this game, teams who feel are good enough to be in the tournament and feel they have something to prove, I'm sure they won't view it as a meaningless game.

http://coachingsearch.com/article?a=Pat-Fitzgerald-If-you-call-a-bowl-game-meaningless-you-never-played-or-coached-in-one
https://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2015/12/21/10629326/cure-bowl-2015-san-jose-state-georgia-state
http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18341630/bowl-games-mean-players-coaches
Follow me on Twitter. I post fun graphs sometimes. @LogHanRatings

D3viewer

I guess it all depends how you define "meaningful". I take the above definitions as extrinsically meaningful, not intrinsically. Cause if that were the case (and I agree any bowl game is intrinsically meaningful to the participants) there would no reason to mention the word" meaningful".( thus implying the previous bowl games (ECAC) were not meaningful). 

fisheralum91

I think you guys are reading into this a bit too much.
I think that we all agree that these types of games are a little bit of a let down- but its isnt really about us.
Its about the players, and now its about the fans by making the games much more accessible.
Now fans can make a much more manageable trip to watch their team play in the event that they dont make the NCAAs.

Bartman

Quote from: fisheralum91 on July 20, 2017, 08:25:36 AM
I think you guys are reading into this a bit too much.
I think that we all agree that these types of games are a little bit of a let down- but its isnt really about us.
Its about the players, and now its about the fans by making the games much more accessible.
Now fans can make a much more manageable trip to watch their team play in the event that they dont make the NCAAs.
I think this is a balanced post....If Hobart and Fisher just miss out on an NCAA berth, I think the players would like one more game, even if they played earlier in the season, and a one hour trip at the end of the season would be fan friendly and may even be better than a long trip and a drubbing in Ohio or Texas
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Bombers798891

Quote from: HansenRatings on July 19, 2017, 05:18:51 PM
For the type of team who will get into this game, teams who feel are good enough to be in the tournament and feel they have something to prove, I'm sure they won't view it as a meaningless game.


Possibly. But I've seen plenty of ECAC games featuring these types of teams, and while some fit your description of wanting to go out there and prove to everyone they were NCAA playoff caliber, there's also the possibility that they'll be disappointed and really not interested in playing what is essentially a consolation game on a mostly-deserted campus in potentially lousy weather the week before they're set to go home for vacation. Now, that's my educated guess based on a reading of effort and body language, as well as, in some cases, things I've heard second hand.

But we know teams turn down the chance to take part in ECAC games, so the "It's another game to prove ourselves!" argument isn't going to apply everyone every year. The difference is, those ECAC games were optional. This is not.

Dave 'd-mac' McHugh

In my experience, football seems more immune to the "don't really want to play this game" versus many other sports the ECAC has post-season tournaments for. Thus why the "bowl games" for the ECAC (bowl games being a football "thing" in general) never seemed to be in jeopardy over the years. They have always been popular and seem to have very good teams who just missed out more times than not. Whereas the other sports have tended to have less and less interest and with it less and less good teams participating. As a result, I feel (and have told those "in the know" the same) that the ECAC shot themselves in the foot, or cut their nose off despite their face, but screwing around the football bowl games. While there are a lot of factors I think were ignored as to why the bowl games needed to be left alone, attendance and fan support might have been the biggest. One of the largest reasons football bowl games work is football fans still show up. Again, bowl games in football is a thing. Thus, many schools, conferences, etc. can make up some of the money spent to host or travel to a bowl game with the paid attendance. This is NOT the case in a lot, if not all, of the other sports post-seasons.

I could go on and on about this, but one more football post-season game between conferences is something that does work because ... football. I think the ECAC, or those who talked the ECAC into the idea, were some how mistaken in thinking that "fixing" football would fix a lot of the ECAC post-season problems. It has only proven how out of touch many people really are with the ECAC's "status" in modern times.

I don't mean to go off on an op-ed here, but let me leave with this: I am not surprised more conferences are following what the Centennial and MAC started. The fact three New England conferences thought it better to participate in ONE game for two teams (out of three conferences) than participate in the ECAC bowl series is very, very telling. So, I am not surprised the Empire 8 and Liberty League have now joined the same ranks... and have a good feeling this will start spreading to more and more conferences, especially outside of the ECAC landscape.
Host of Hoopsville. USBWA Executive Board member. Broadcast Director for D3sports.com. Broadcaster for NCAA.com & several colleges. PA Announcer for Gophers & Brigade. Follow me on Twitter: @davemchugh or @d3hoopsville.

Bombers798891

Quote from: Dave 'd-mac' McHugh on July 20, 2017, 01:16:17 PM
In my experience, football seems more immune to the "don't really want to play this game" versus many other sports the ECAC has post-season tournaments for. Thus why the "bowl games" for the ECAC (bowl games being a football "thing" in general) never seemed to be in jeopardy over the years. They have always been popular and seem to have very good teams who just missed out more times than not. Whereas the other sports have tended to have less and less interest and with it less and less good teams participating. As a result, I feel (and have told those "in the know" the same) that the ECAC shot themselves in the foot, or cut their nose off despite their face, but screwing around the football bowl games. While there are a lot of factors I think were ignored as to why the bowl games needed to be left alone, attendance and fan support might have been the biggest. One of the largest reasons football bowl games work is football fans still show up. Again, bowl games in football is a thing. Thus, many schools, conferences, etc. can make up some of the money spent to host or travel to a bowl game with the paid attendance. This is NOT the case in a lot, if not all, of the other sports post-seasons.

I could go on and on about this, but one more football post-season game between conferences is something that does work because ... football. I think the ECAC, or those who talked the ECAC into the idea, were some how mistaken in thinking that "fixing" football would fix a lot of the ECAC post-season problems. It has only proven how out of touch many people really are with the ECAC's "status" in modern times.

I don't mean to go off on an op-ed here, but let me leave with this: I am not surprised more conferences are following what the Centennial and MAC started. The fact three New England conferences thought it better to participate in ONE game for two teams (out of three conferences) than participate in the ECAC bowl series is very, very telling. So, I am not surprised the Empire 8 and Liberty League have now joined the same ranks... and have a good feeling this will start spreading to more and more conferences, especially outside of the ECAC landscape.

That all may be true, and we can agree to disagree. I mean, I don't have attendance figures, and the Centennial/Mac games also served as a fundraiser for Special Olympics, which can drive up attendance beyond pure football reasons (which is all I'm really interested in. Cortaca may draw 10,000 people a year, but that's not football interest.)

I will stand by my belief, however, that as far as the E8/LL game goes, the conferences' crossover—not just in terms of games played against each other, but the fact that two teams just went from one conference to the other—is going to hurt the interest in this series. I think there's simply too much familiarity. Unless there was a record at stake, I'm not going to watch Ithaca play Alfred again.

Dave 'd-mac' McHugh

Sometimes familiarity actually makes these games a bit more interesting - my take.
Host of Hoopsville. USBWA Executive Board member. Broadcast Director for D3sports.com. Broadcaster for NCAA.com & several colleges. PA Announcer for Gophers & Brigade. Follow me on Twitter: @davemchugh or @d3hoopsville.

ITH radio

I kind of agree with both sides of this one.

I could see this game as having an impact on recruiting too. Say you're Coach Swanstrom and you beat Alfred in the opener then again in the NYS "Bowl" and you're recruiting a kid who's looking at both schools. In theory the whole, "well we went 2-0 against them" could sway some kids / families.

I do think however it could back fire a little if say IC drew Fisher, who they would have played 4 weeks earlier.
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dlippiel

Quote from: HansenRatings on July 19, 2017, 05:18:51 PM
Different division, but similar sentiment. Here's a few articles I've read over the years that pretty well state how I feel about the "meaningless game" debate. I went 8-2 my senior year, and we finished second in the IIAC, with two wins over 9-1 conference champions, and two losses by a cumulative 4 points, and didn't make the tournament. If the IIAC/MIAC/WIAC/CCIW had some sort of bowl tie-in for us to get another chance on the field, I would have loved it. For the type of team who will get into this game, teams who feel are good enough to be in the tournament and feel they have something to prove, I'm sure they won't view it as a meaningless game.

http://coachingsearch.com/article?a=Pat-Fitzgerald-If-you-call-a-bowl-game-meaningless-you-never-played-or-coached-in-one
https://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2015/12/21/10629326/cure-bowl-2015-san-jose-state-georgia-state
http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18341630/bowl-games-mean-players-coaches

Great post!

Bombers798891

In reference to the links Hansen posted, remember when comparing D-I Bowl games to this:

Division I coaches almost all have financial bonuses tied into getting into the postseason/number of wins. Heck, in 2014, Arkansas State's Head Coach could have earned a one-year extension on his contract if his team won 8 games against FBS opponents. Not to mention, they get a lot of extra practices (I mean, so do the teams in this game, but not as many) which is almost never a bad thing. And for the types of teams making these very low tier games, this might be the players' only chance all season to be on national TV, get national press coverage.

There are a lot of other things going into play when a mid-major type program wins that 6th game to become bowl eligible, that don't come into play with this game, and didn't with the ECACs. I don't think it's even apples to oranges in terms of a comparison.

Also, Pat Fitzgerald is automatically docked 10 points for using the "If you never played or coached, you wouldn't know anything about it" argument. While it has more merit here than elsewhere, it's still a poor argument

Jonny Utah

Quote from: Bombers798891 on July 24, 2017, 08:49:38 AM
In reference to the links Hansen posted, remember when comparing D-I Bowl games to this:

Division I coaches almost all have financial bonuses tied into getting into the postseason/number of wins. Heck, in 2014, Arkansas State's Head Coach could have earned a one-year extension on his contract if his team won 8 games against FBS opponents. Not to mention, they get a lot of extra practices (I mean, so do the teams in this game, but not as many) which is almost never a bad thing. And for the types of teams making these very low tier games, this might be the players' only chance all season to be on national TV, get national press coverage.

There are a lot of other things going into play when a mid-major type program wins that 6th game to become bowl eligible, that don't come into play with this game, and didn't with the ECACs. I don't think it's even apples to oranges in terms of a comparison.

Also, Pat Fitzgerald is automatically docked 10 points for using the "If you never played or coached, you wouldn't know anything about it" argument. While it has more merit here than elsewhere, it's still a poor argument

There is also a difference between playing a "meaningless" bowl game in Miami vs. Utica, NY or Worcester, MA.

Bombers798891

Quote from: Jonny "Utes" Utah on July 24, 2017, 09:33:52 AM
Quote from: Bombers798891 on July 24, 2017, 08:49:38 AM
In reference to the links Hansen posted, remember when comparing D-I Bowl games to this:

Division I coaches almost all have financial bonuses tied into getting into the postseason/number of wins. Heck, in 2014, Arkansas State's Head Coach could have earned a one-year extension on his contract if his team won 8 games against FBS opponents. Not to mention, they get a lot of extra practices (I mean, so do the teams in this game, but not as many) which is almost never a bad thing. And for the types of teams making these very low tier games, this might be the players' only chance all season to be on national TV, get national press coverage.

There are a lot of other things going into play when a mid-major type program wins that 6th game to become bowl eligible, that don't come into play with this game, and didn't with the ECACs. I don't think it's even apples to oranges in terms of a comparison.

Also, Pat Fitzgerald is automatically docked 10 points for using the "If you never played or coached, you wouldn't know anything about it" argument. While it has more merit here than elsewhere, it's still a poor argument

There is also a difference between playing a "meaningless" bowl game in Miami vs. Utica, NY or Worcester, MA.

Right. I mean, there's a reason schools declined the opportunity to participate in these games. That's incredibly rare for D-I teams.

fisheralum91

Utica NY is beautiful in December! ;D