Taking the next step

[CappinHard]

Re: Taking the next step

I agree that one's perspective can become skewed when the team's biggest rival is the one having all of the success. To step back, I can't imagine what it feels like to be USD. Not to throw them under the bus because I hate them , but seriously. I'm sure they just want to get where we are and aren't even considering getting to where NDSU is.

[goon]

Re: Taking the next step

Looked at the population base within roughly 80 miles of Brookings. 410,000 people. This doesn't include communities like Mitchell or Yankton that routinely send many fans to Brookings for game day.

Yes, I understand that some casual fans from Sioux Falls may consider going to a D2 game on a Saturday in their backyard. However, until we create a culture where SDSU football is the market brand of choice in this region, we will have limited success with drawing casual fans.

Drawing fans from farther than 80 miles on a regular basis is not difficult to understand, once the culture has been laid. I live 2 hours west of Lincoln, NE and regularly do business up to 4 hours west of Lincoln. On Saturdays, it is common for my friends from this area to be in Lincoln, for the game and not at home watching it on TV. Every Husker game is on TV, so that can be difficult to compete with for many sports teams. Even the business I work at is a good representation. 85 employees, and our group has 10 season tickets for a game that takes roughly 7 hours to make the round trip with traffic, parking, and the headache of logistics. These fans budget roughly $250 per couple plus 10 hours of their Saturday to go to every home game.

I understand this is an apples and oranges comparison, but I share it to compare the culture. The culture is that every local TV and radio market focuses on Husker sports on a daily basis for at least 300 days per year. This is not having a segment on Husker sports, this is highlighting the latest developments on what happened a practice in Lincoln before highlighting a major local sporting event. It took time to build this market and obviously winning national championships was a key part of this. It was not the only key component. If it was, that market would have dried up multiple coaches ago.

We are on the right path with building the Jackrabbit brand. It has taken many steps and will take many more years before we can count on selling out a nearly 20,000 seat stadium on a regular basis. It will come, but it doesn't happen by making the leap to DI right away. It takes time after consistently qualifying for post season play, when the history before the jump to DI was rarely qualifying. It takes more time than 2 games to fill a gem of a stadium. My glass of beer is more than half full and I say "cheers" to all Jackrabbit fans be they rabid or casual fans!

I totally agree, I know many on here its their thing, but its like hunting season opener. Tahts a culture that many follow. SDSU football is like a fun thing to do when you don't have other stuff going on seems to be the culture. I think we are going in the right direction, but when hunting season opener is always more important to our fan base, we are going to have a hard time really growing that culture. same with the fair weather fans. Understandably older fans don't do well in those cold late Nov games, but some years we have had good teams and we have like 4000 for a game. I think the tailgating is going to help, but I think its going to take a lot longer then most of us would like to take to get SDSU culture to where we would like it.

Getting younger fans, like students and kids of alumni etc to games and grow that culture is really where we need to go. lets face it, I would guess we have an older then younger fan base by far compared to our peers. Those fans aren't getting any younger. When we are at certain football or basketball games, I look around and as younger alumni, we seem to be the smaller share of the seats. Maybe are busy with careers, and family etc that its not a major priority, but that's the million dollar question. How do you get young alumni, those with families or kids to go all in on that SDSU brand.

[goon]

Re: Taking the next step

I agree that one's perspective can become skewed when the team's biggest rival is the one having all of the success. To step back, I can't imagine what it feels like to be USD. Not to throw them under the bus because I hate them , but seriously. I'm sure they just want to get where we are and aren't even considering getting to where NDSU is.

One thing I pay attention too is when we are say, at the mall in SF or store, or some public event, count how many people you see in SDSU compared to USD clothes. I know its pretty unscientific, but SDSU outnumbers USD I would guess anywhere from 5-1 to 10-1.

We were at the fair for 3 doors down, would see several groups of SDSU people in SDSU clothes at a concert at the fair.....Didn't see one USD shirt that I was aware of. One thing is for sure, the fair does make for good people watching, that's like entertainment in its self.

[RabbitObsessed]

Re: Taking the next step

There is a lot of dumb in the original article. The stuff about recruiting outside of South Dakota? Like we haven't tried recruiting the kids he's talking about? One need only look through the past recruiting threads to see we've offered a number of those kids from Minnesota that have wound up at other programs. I'm glad its an opinion piece because there are hardly any facts in it and it doesn't have any research to back up the conclusory statements.

Win more? Duh. We all want to win more. However, we should also recognize we are having the best stretch of football played in Brookings since the late 50s and early 60s. Of course we want to get better and climb the mountain.

Yeah, it read (and was edited) like a message board post and not something to actually be published on any kind of serious site.

[Nidaros]

Re: Taking the next step

I have a Jackrabbit flag flying in Tyler, MN if that counts

I think we also have a Jackrabbit radio affiliate in Pipestone. I know Tyler talked about them last year in his postgame show when they did the affiliate spotlight.

You bet your you know what it counts. I just started a thread about the passing of one of SDSU most loyal alumns Jim Pederson a Tyler native. He was a man of kind words. What a wonderful man!
The reason I mention western Minnesota in our comparison with NDSU, is that the first game I attended in Fargo was in 1987 and I noticed tons of vehicles with Minnesota plates. This was something, I did not notice in Brookings on game day since I started following the Jacks on a weekly basis in 1986. In the last few years I spent a great deal of time in the Fargo area. A person living in Fargo often works in Minnesota and vise versa. Being where one city limit ends and another begins. The mobility across state lines is so common that guys like scbison do not think about it. Contrast that with Brookings and Lake Benton, nearly 30 miles apart and the area is all family farms with a dwindling population. It is quite the contrast and no potential for athletic attendance compared to the area around Fargo and to the east.
I commend JackJD for working to build more support in Watertown, and Jackmd for working in Yankton. I think we have made great progress in the past few years in building support. Mitchell, I understand has always had a good SDSU following and when I drive in from Arlington to games, I am passed often by at least one #4 license which indicates there is a following in Huron. We are getting there.

Lastly attendance at the Dana, was better than 75 percent for the Drake game and about 88 % for the Cal Poly game. These are good numbers in my opinion. Not the best but definitely good.

[SF_Rabbit_Fan]

Re: Taking the next step

There's a couple of things about this. We're dissatisfied with playoff results over the last couple of years. We're frustrated that we lose in the first or second round. The reality is winning in the playoffs is EXTREMELY hard. We suffer from being too close to NDSU to realize how good our success has been recently to be honest. Since we became eligible for the playoffs, we went from a program who had only made the playoffs once, ever, to making it four years in a row and winning two games there. However, this happened at the same time that NDSU has won 5 straight national championships, something that has NEVER BEEN DONE BEFORE. Being that they are our rivals, it makes what we have done seem poor or barely making it by, because of how grand their accomplishments are. It's like you had a brother, and when you made your first million in a year, he goes on to make his first billion in a year. It's going to make your accomplishment seem insignificant in comparison. Which in the end is a great thing for us. Without them doing what they have I'm not sure we push as hard to get to where we are now, nor do we have the expectations that we do today, which is awesome. But here's some numbers to put it in perspective for you. UNI and Montana are two teams with impressive playoff history's of success and making deep runs. They get a lot of home games. But their playoff records are barely over .500. It's extremely hard to win in the playoffs. Let alone being sent on the road for every game except one.

The reality for us is the ONLY way we consistently make it deep in the playoffs is if we get a seed because of where we get sent. NDSU isn't on the run they are on if they don't get to stay home throughout the playoffs. There's no debating that. Their only playoff loss is when they had to go to Eastern Washington. SDSU actually has more playoff wins in true road games than NDSU has. We also have just as good of a home winning percentage. Undefeated. Doesn't make our playoff success even in the same stratosphere, but it illustrates the point. We didn't get home playoff games because CAS was a dump and we couldn't bid enough to get home games. There isn't a team in the country that can go on deep runs by getting sent to Montana, NDSU, and Eastern Washington every year. None. Home games=playoff wins. When we got to have EIU at home with an NFL QB and we destroyed them. So I believe we have already done a large part of what was needed in building the DJD.

We need better athletes overall. The disadvantage that we were at before the DJD is incredible. I know of a person who was on the team that got their first recruiting postcard from SDSU that had a picture of CAS on it and threw it in the trash because they thought it was from a DIII school. Now with being able to have our coaches on a level playing field for recruiting, it should make a massive difference.

The last thing is I think we need to see the coaches start to be more proactive similar to Coach Otz to get fan involvement, especially from the students. I do think they are starting to do that though. That's just as important for getting home playoff games. If we don't have the fans then we can't bid what we need to to compete with other teams with large stadiums. The fans will come with winning, but fans can help with it as well by allowing us to have home playoff games.

Right now I'm in a wait and see position for the coaches and whether or not we are truly at a plateau or not. One or two years isn't a plateau. Losing to NDSU during their championship run isn't a plateau. If catching NDSU is the goal, and you use beating them and winning a national championship as the way to measure if we are catching them instead of it meaning we have caught them, then it's going to appear to be a plateau for a while because of how far behind we were when this whole thing started. Because that's the finish line. If your only measure of progress is crossing the finish line instead of landmarks along the way, you're never going to appear to be gaining ground until the finish. That's why deep playoff runs are difficult to measure. The last season of Sumner and Zenner was quite possibly the best SDSU football team we have ever seen. Even bison fans admit that team could have won the championship had it not gotten sent to Fargo. But they ended up losing in the final minutes up there. Does that mean that that season wasn't progress for us? Just because they had to play the national champions at their place? On a neutral field it's not unfair to say they have a great shot of winning that game.

In the end give me a couple years before I can truly say we have plateaued so we can see the true affect of the new stadium.

Must spread rep. Very interesting to see the playoff records of UNI and Montana. Really puts things in perspective.

[thumper_76]

Re: Taking the next step

I was at the Pentagon for a basketball tournament and I met a guy from Brandon. He said that he thought that all SDSU-USD games should be played in Sioux Falls. If they were, he would go and it would draw more SF fans.
I was at a Augie game earlier this season and there are other positives going there. It cost $8 to get into the game and you could sit at the 50 yard line. I think those tickets are around $40 at SDSU. I understand you can budget your money for that but if you are a young (just out of college) married couple, you might have other things to spend $100 on than a football game. Maybe a few years down the road when they are more established they can afford the games. The product is better but it also is more of a financial strain on some people.

Yes the game is more expensive. And yes it is a better product. This is the biggest mindset we have to fight to grow the fanbase, and it starts with our own fans to be honest. Everybody, everywhere, has something they can spend $100 on. It costs a hell of a lot more to go to a Husker game than stay in Sioux Falls for an Augie game, but there's still a TON of people making the treck to Lincoln. Why is that? Because it's worth that to them. The reality is the majority of people on this board spend more money on their cell phone bill than season tickets would cost them. The fact that our own fans on here are comparing the cost of a SDSU game vs an Augie or USF game is the problem.

Our own fans don't believe that our game day is more worth comparing to a Gophers game than a DII game. I understand people have bills. I work in sales selling a product that is literally ten times more expensive than our competition costs. I deal with this mindset every day. My number one objection is face when helping the people I manage close a deal is I can't afford it. The reality is they all CAN afford it, they just don't think it's worth the money. If they want it enough it they figure out a way to make it work. How do I get them to that point? Make it exciting and fun enough that their emotion makes it worth it to them. It's the same thing with a game day atmosphere. THATS why I argue so passionately about tailgating rules. The reason people go to big time games is the atmosphere. If the atmosphere is great enough it's not a debate between a DII game, it's about what to do to make it work.

That's why the Gameday atmosphere is so important. That's why a noisy and fun student section matters. That's why we can't have the attitude of if you need to drink then don't come. That's why we need to have a big time mindset to make OUR Gameday THE event in South Dakota for EVERY home game. That's what it is in Fargo. That's what it is in Missoula. You know why they have huge attendance? It's not because they have fans just show up to only watch the game. Their Gameday atmospheres are the best in the division, and I would argue a very large portion isn't from during the game. It's the pregame and post game activities. That's what their core is built around. Because those people are the loud and rowdy ones at the game. They create the environment during the game that sweeps along the casual fan and gives them an experience along with the team that they never forget. Do you have more fun watching a game, even on tv, with a group that is quiet and is seldom more exuberant than a quiet fist pump, or with the people cheering their ass off jumping around? Which group do you want to attract? A secondary question: Do you think that those teams somehow have a more affluent fanbase to draw from to afford their tickets? Or maybe the game is to the level of importance that they aren't deciding between what teams game to go to, but instead are deciding how they are going to make their attendance happen?

[Southeast]

Re: Taking the next step

If making the playoffs is being in a rut every year, about 100 other programs in the country would love to be stuck in that rut.

.

As much as it sucks to fall in the first couple rounds, there is a lot of truth to this.

Winning will take SDSU football farther, but I wonder how long it would take to consistently sell out games even if we were reaching the semi-finals/finals every couple years. Is that enough in South Dakota?

It is going to take some time for the greater Sioux Falls area to really embrace the local DI sports scene. Down here in the southeast, it's all Nebraska. Tons of South Dakotans that did not even consider going to school there are packing up every saturday and driving south. The bars advertise that they will be showing the Nebraska games on their signage and Husker flags, shirts, and vehicle stickers are everywhere. SDSU and USD are the "cute little 1AA programs nearby". I'm not sure if we'll ever shake that stigma with this bulky group of sports fans. Basketball has a much better shot because the teams play with the "big boys" when it really counts instead of just one novelty game when it's basically still summer.

In summary, be patient because this is not going to happen in a year or two.

[SF_Rabbit_Fan]

Re: Taking the next step

Hold on, hold on, hold on.

Is the guy who wrote the article about SDSU taking the next step the same "journalist" who spread rumors about Daum leaving? Then got all self righteous when people called him out for spreading false rumors?

HAHAHAHA

This guy exists to stir the pot. That's what talk show radio personalities do. Mission accomplished dude.

[Nidaros]

Re: Taking the next step

Hold on, hold on, hold on.

Is the guy who wrote the article about SDSU taking the next step the same "journalist" who spread rumors about Daum leaving? Then got all self righteous when people called him out for spreading false rumors?

HAHAHAHA

This guy exists to stir the pot. That's what talk show radio personalities do. Mission accomplished dude.

Another way of looking at it is that he has made many of the loyal posters on this board stop and evaluate where our program is going. I am not totally please with play on the field but am pleased with attendance. Its not bisonville in quality or quantity, but we are getting there. If not this year than next.

[thumper_76]

Taking the next step

In my fairly worthless opinion, in order to really attack the Sioux Falls market we need to get a relationship with one of the two radio stations down there, and we need to shake the stigma of being a "small time" school. I about fell over when I read Zimmer say on his live chat that an Augie game is a better value than an SDSU game right now. I get that he need to be unbiased, but good lord really?

Personally I listen to a lot of sports talk radio. Apparently so does a decent amount of Sioux Falls considering they have two sports talk stations. It would be HUGE if we got a relationship with one of those stations, and got a two hour show during the drive home or over the noon hour or afternoon that had a daily SDSU show like NDSU has gotten. Right now at best we get a half hour of superficial coverage at best down there, while they report excessively on high school sports and the DII teams. If we could get a show on one of those stations that would talk just SDSU and also give input on the conference and who good teams are and aren't it's going to do a couple things. One, it will elevate the perception of SDSU by having our own daily show on a FOX or ESPN radio station, just like the Huskers do. Two, it will help our casual Sioux Falls fans learn what the big match ups are and help them learn how good of a conference we are in, and help them to realize this isn't some DII line up of teams. Three, if you listen like I do, you have sports on the radio over anything else because it what you listen to. I even put up with being around bison drivel all day in Fargo here. But as a casual fan, the more you are around and submerged in your team, the more invested you become. Well pick up casual fans, and be able to grow our fanbase with people who didn't even attend the school this way. At least have it go through the school year. From the start of football till the end of baseball. I can't see how that could be a bad thing for us. Listening on the radio to other games across the country, even Robert Morris and Dusquene have their own coaches show on the radio. Don't you think we should be a little more big time than Robert Freaking Morris?


Edit: we also need to get our games on one of those stations too.

[Nidaros]

Re: Taking the next step

As much as it sucks to fall in the first couple rounds, there is a lot of truth to this.

Winning will take SDSU football farther, but I wonder how long it would take to consistently sell out games even if we were reaching the semi-finals/finals every couple years. Is that enough in South Dakota?

It is going to take some time for the greater Sioux Falls area to really embrace the local DI sports scene. Down here in the southeast, it's all Nebraska. Tons of South Dakotans that did not even consider going to school there are packing up every saturday and driving south. The bars advertise that they will be showing the Nebraska games on their signage and Husker flags, shirts, and vehicle stickers are everywhere. SDSU and USD are the "cute little 1AA programs nearby". I'm not sure if we'll ever shake that stigma with this bulky group of sports fans. Basketball has a much better shot because the teams play with the "big boys" when it really counts instead of just one novelty game when it's basically still summer.

In summary, be patient because this is not going to happen in a year or two.

Right on!! , I know about the Husker mania. I was exposed to it on a daily basis from 1985 to 2005 living in Columbus.I could not figure out, moving in from Chicago, that a large daily paper like the Omaha World Herald would dwell so much on a college football team, but after all they dont have the White Sox, the Bears and Cubs to write about. When I found out that I could pay 40 dollars for a season ticket at SDSU instead of buying a scalper ticket for the same prize in Lincoln, I pointed my car north and never regretted it one bit. Sure it was D2 and our teams were average at best, but believe me its gotten much better the past few years and it will continue to get better. One thing that no one has mentioned is the turnover in coaching staff. That sometimes can slow things down. We might be going through that now, but I am sure things will work out. The following in SF right now is double what it was in the 1980's and it will get better. Some of those SF natives got to get over that the world revolves around themselves. A little fresh air with a trip to Brookings might help them out.

[SF_Rabbit_Fan]

Re: Taking the next step

In my fairly worthless opinion, in order to really attack the Sioux Falls market we need to get a relationship with one of the two radio stations down there, and we need to shake the stigma of being a "small time" school. I about fell over when I read Zimmer say on his live chat that an Augie game is a better value than an SDSU game right now. I get that he need to be unbiased, but good lord really?

Personally I listen to a lot of sports talk radio. Apparently so does a decent amount of Sioux Falls considering they have two sports talk stations. It would be HUGE if we got a relationship with one of those stations, and got a two hour show during the drive home or over the noon hour or afternoon that had a daily SDSU show like NDSU has gotten. Right now at best we get a half hour of superficial coverage at best down there, while they report excessively on high school sports and the DII teams. If we could get a show on one of those stations that would talk just SDSU and also give input on the conference and who good teams are and aren't it's going to do a couple things. One, it will elevate the perception of SDSU by having our own daily show on a FOX or ESPN radio station, just like the Huskers do. Two, it will help our casual Sioux Falls fans learn what the big match ups are and help them learn how good of a conference we are in, and help them to realize this isn't some DII line up of teams. Three, if you listen like I do, you have sports on the radio over anything else because it what you listen to. I even put up with being around bison drivel all day in Fargo here. But as a casual fan, the more you are around and submerged in your team, the more invested you become. Well pick up casual fans, and be able to grow our fanbase with people who didn't even attend the school this way. At least have it go through the school year. From the start of football till the end of baseball. I can't see how that could be a bad thing for us. Listening on the radio to other games across the country, even Robert Morris and Dusquene have their own coaches show on the radio. Don't you think we should be a little more big time than Robert Freaking Morris?


Edit: we also need to get our games on one of those stations too.

I agree. 99.1 does remote shows all the time (often well outside South Dakota). How realistic would it be to do a show from Club 71 every Friday before home games?

One thing the sports-talk-listening fans could do: call in when they talk about SDSU. Let them know we exist.

[thumper_76]

Taking the next step

I agree. 99.1 does remote shows all the time (often well outside South Dakota). How realistic would it be to do a show from Club 71 every Friday before home games?

One thing the sports-talk-listening fans could do: call in when they talk about SDSU. Let them know we exist.

There no way that the host down there would do that I would bet. I've tweeted at him about doing more SDSU stuff and his response was "we just had Stig on", yeah for a ten minute interview. And that's the total of your SDSU coverage all week. That and he thinks he's too big time to do a remote from SDSU. He's too busy doing remote locations at the super bowl to lower himself to our level /sarcasm

[goon]

Re: Taking the next step

I agree, on the radio coverage. one thing I would love, would be after the game to have like even a half hour or hour radio show talking about the game, having fans call in, talking about conference etc. I really like the break down that Tyler does on the radio broadcast once the game is done, but after the cal poly game, until we finally got out of the lot, the post game break down was over and they were signed off and were hadn't even gotten out of town for our hour drive home. maybe there isn't the demand or the cost of doing it, but having a after the game radio program would be huge IMHO. I listen to classical radio in the background of work just because I cant have to keep it down so doesn't bother others, but also ESPN and such I rarely find what they are talking about that interesting for as long as they do. The local guy Jeff something or other on 99.1 I cant say I agree with much of what he says, but he does seem like he would rather talk about the gophers then any thing in SD when I have listened.

The TV production has been great, Tyler doing his weekly show, the jackrabbit journal on midco is great. coverage on Midco for summit league and football etc are really good for what they do, but radio could sure use more weekly coverage.