FB: Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference

[SagatagSam]

On the SJU article earlier this weekHeres what I would do:

1.  Rather than spending money on new turf, I think they should rip up turf, put the natural turf back in, call it the Clemens Natural Bowl ---forget about domed stadium stuff.

2.  Also, lets bag the "this Johnnie scoring drive is sponsored by...."  that is totally cheesy

3.  Deconstruct the north end zone stands---let students sit on the hills, also gives us another opportunity to see the rat pack repel from mcneely spectrum

4.  Fire Jimmy

5.  Recruit the HS student athletes that are hungry, underdog types that play their guts out on the field week end and week out and root out the sense of complacency.....

1. The SprinTurf is here to stay. I'm not saying that I like it better, but it's far more economically sensible for SJU to maintain.
2. I see your point with the sponsorship of every little thing in the broadcast. But, I'm afraid that is par for the course across college football.
3. I think having the temp bleachers in the north end zone are ok. But, I would argue to get rid of the temp bleachers they put in front of the southwest hill behind the Johnnie bench.
4. No disagreement here. I've always had pleasant interactions with Jimmy when I've talked to him. But, then again, I've never had to play for him. The guys that I've talked to that played for him certainly have more criticism than praise for him.
5. I think the recruits the Johnnies are getting are as a result of the not-so-aggressive recruiting strategy by the staff. Gary does a great job. But, there is only so much he can do when the message from the rest of the staff is, "Come to SJU and play for a legend." I've always hated that sales pitch. No one ever wants to be great by mere association (i.e., I'm great only because I shared the same gridiron as a college football's winningest coach). SJU needs to encourage guys with some fire in their bellies to come to SJU to better themselves and to demonstrate that they are as hungry as the Johnnies of '63, '65, '76 and '03.

[SJU60TX]

Lets not forget:
62
75
77
89
91
93
94
2000
2001
2002 as well

All very good teams as well

[SagatagSam]

We've got to set the bar high. Those teams were all fantastic. I say set the bar as high as we can.

[sfury]

I emailed Frank R. and Ryan at SJU to see if they'd be able to track this down. This has to be one of the biggest Johnnie comebacks under Gagliardi. 17, not a ton. But can anyone remember a bigger one? Old-timers? There have been dozens of seasons when they haven't even trailed by 17 at any point. But I can't really recall a bigger one. 14 is about as far behind I remember Johnnie teams being where they come back for a victory. Probably impossible to track down but pretty interesting. And something to hold onto in this tough season, at least.

And how about Bruns coming in after going 0-7 with three picks to lead the winning drive?

[SagatagSam]

I emailed Frank R. and Ryan at SJU to see if they'd be able to track this down. This has to be one of the biggest Johnnie comebacks under Gagliardi. 17, not a ton. But can anyone remember a bigger one? Old-timers? There have been dozens of seasons when they haven't even trailed by 17 at any point. But I can't really recall a bigger one. 14 is about as far behind I remember Johnnie teams being where they come back for a victory. Probably impossible to track down but pretty interesting. And something to hold onto in this tough season, at least.

And how about Bruns coming in after going 0-7 with three picks to lead the winning drive?

I remember the bigest almost comeback when SJU was down 23 at the Natural Bowl against UWEC in 2004. Then we had Alex Kofoed's grand entrance party. But, again, that was an almost comeback.

[57Johnnie]

I emailed Frank R. and Ryan at SJU to see if they'd be able to track this down. This has to be one of the biggest Johnnie comebacks under Gagliardi. 17, not a ton. But can anyone remember a bigger one? Old-timers? There have been dozens of seasons when they haven't even trailed by 17 at any point. But I can't really recall a bigger one. 14 is about as far behind I remember Johnnie teams being where they come back for a victory. Probably impossible to track down but pretty interesting. And something to hold onto in this tough season, at least.

And how about Bruns coming in after going 0-7 with three picks to lead the winning drive?

Coming back against the Oles at the 2007 Homecoming comes to mind. I think we were down by 14 in the 4th quarter. 

[SagatagSam]

Coming back against the Oles at the 2007 Homecoming comes to mind. I think we were down by 14 in the 4th quarter. 

Nope, 57. The greatest lead STO held in that '07 game was 9 with 10:18 left in the 3rd quarter.

[sfury]

Ryan said he has 4th quarter and halftime comebacks documented but will try to find entire game ones. He's a bit busy today, though - four sports going on. Life of an SID.

[SagatagSam]

Good man, that Colonel Klinkner. I guess that bachelor's degree in history and master's thesis on the history of SJU football is paying off!

[SagatagSam]

I guess I shouldn't complain about my Department of Defense computer not having the proper software to load the Johnnies webcast.
It could be much worse. Here's what came up when I tried to load the UST webcast:

"Web sites prohibited from access by Fort Benning computers include:
Denied Website Access
Sexually Oriented Sites
Hate Speech Sites
Gambling Sites
Criminal Skills Sites
Cults/Sects Sites
Illegal Drugs Sites
Extreme Sites"

I knew there was something a little risqué about the USTd dance team, but c'mon! 

[USTBench]

Congrats to SJU for clinching .500

[SagatagSam]

Congrats to SJU for clinching .500

Your sarcasm is noted.

Congrats to the Toms for the first back-to-back undefeated regular seasons since the mid 1960s.

[sfury]

Congrats to SJU for clinching .500

Zing.

But Bench, did it really take five hours to think of  that one? St. Thomas' devotion to teaching creative thinking skills to its students again on full display.

Zing.

The Tommies...moving up to No. 2 in the country after the Mount Union scare? Probably not, but with that game and Whitewater's escape last week it does seem like there's at least a chance it won't be an all-purple title game for a seventh straight year. Well, those two purples anyway.

[sfury]

Wonder if anyone heard the end of the Johnnie game on the Oles' station, KDHL? I can imagine what their radio guy, the legendary Mike Morrissey, sounded like. He can even outhomer Mark. He couldn't have been real pleased.

[stanbob]

Congrats to SJU for clinching .500

Wasn't too long ago a .500 season would have been a tommie BENCHmark.