Raiders set for celebration of C-USA membership

[Harry]

MURFREESBORO - The University and Blue Raider athletics will celebrate the official move to Conference USA on July 1 and want to encourage all alums and fans to take part in this historic day.

Approximately 52 businesses and restaurants will be wearing specially designed tee shirts with the inaugural C-USA logo on July 1 throughout Murfreesboro and football players and staff will be handing out schedule cards and posters all day, hitting The Square, The Avenue, Rutherford Boulevard, Broad Street, Memorial Boulevard, and Church Street.

The official celebration headquarters will be at Sam's Sports Grill at the Stones River Mall where patrons will be greeted by Blue Raider cheerleaders and Lightning. President Sidney McPhee, Director of Athletics Chris Massaro, Rick Stockstill, Kermit Davis, and Rick Insell, will all be on hand at Sam's from 11:30 AM until 1 PM to answer questions and talk with fans and supporters.

The marketing department, Aspire, Alumni, and the BRAA will all be on hand as well at Sam's, while various football players will be signing autographs and distributing posters and schedule cards. There will also be other giveaways fans will not want to miss so make plans to attend today.

Ideastees will also be selling the official tee-shirt at their main store for $10.

Come celebrate one of the biggest days in Blue Raider history and learn more about our new conference members as MT embarks on a new era in collegiate athletics.

July 1 Timeline
7:00 AM: MT helmet displayed on Old Fort Parkway and C-USA banner will be up at intersection of Broad Street and Memorial.
10:00 AM - 11:00 AM: Football players and designated coach signing autographs and passing out schedule cards and posters at Reeves-Sain
11:00 AM - 2 PM: Plane will flyover Murfreesboro advertising the move to C-USA
11:30 AM - 1 PM: Sam's Sports Grill, the Official Headquarters
1:00 PM - 2:00 PM: Football players and designated coach signing autographs and passing out schedule cards and posters at Chick-Fil-A
4:00 PM - 6 PM: Plane will flyover Murfreesboro/Nashville advertising the move to C-USA

[FirefightnRick]

Not so sure about time and location, but at least it seems Masaro deems it pretty important to try and promote a new conference affiliation to grow his program's fan base similar to what La Tech did.

Rick

[LakeTravis]

Wish we did something like this.

Woof

[NM Green]

I love seeing the spirit of MTSU embrace CUSA. That University is down right proud of moving up in the college ranks. We have a quiet proud at best and some diehards are indifferent to this new opportunity. I think what that Southern Miss fan really wanted to say was, "Dang we are about to get drilled by La Tech, North Texas, MTSU and Western Kentucky in the not too distant future." You know they are holding their breath that they can get by the dirty birds of South Texas.

GMG

[NT91]

Is MTSU go with a new helmet in 2013?

[gksmith]

MTSU is the closest thing we have to a "rivalry" so I am glad they made it to CUSA.

[DeepGreen]

FAU is doing something similar. Is UNT doing something like this? Oh.......it's summertime.

http://www.fauowlaccess.com/articles/168/fau-to-party-upon-entering-c-usa.aspx

[meangreener]

I think the reason we're not having a party thing is because while we're excited to be CUSA, we really aren't that...pumped about it because fans are a little sour that everyone else jumped ship. Still, I hope that we do enough marketing to get people in the door who wouldn't normally come under the idea that it's a new conference, so come watch. We really need to be advertising CUSA more. But we won't.

[JKvsHimself]

I think the reason we're not having a party thing is because while we're excited to be CUSA, we really aren't that...pumped about it because fans are a little sour that everyone else jumped ship. Still, I hope that we do enough marketing to get people in the door who wouldn't normally come under the idea that it's a new conference, so come watch. We really need to be advertising CUSA more. But we won't.

I feel like what always hurt us in the non-sports fan's eye was that they had no reason to care about who we were playing in conference, so they would never show up to games. Maybe they could grab some new fans and even Denton residents if they advertised it in such a way as MTSU.

[untjim1995]

It should be celebrated in Mufreesboro--they got moved up into a conference that wasn't the dreg of FBS football, all within 12 years of moving up from FCS ball in 2001. This is as high on the foodchain as they can probably go, so it is worth celebrating. They will be playing teams that their fans ahve always cared about in WKU and UNT, plus they get Marshall and other schools closer to them in Old Dominion and Southern Miss, as well as UAB. That's a good trade up from Troy, South Alabama, Arkansas State, and ULM.

[ragpicker]

I think the reason we're not having a party thing is because while we're excited to be CUSA, we really aren't that...pumped about it because fans are a little sour that everyone else jumped ship. Still, I hope that we do enough marketing to get people in the door who wouldn't normally come under the idea that it's a new conference, so come watch. We really need to be advertising CUSA more. But we won't.

Very good point meangreener and one I have made before. We just have to get some advertising out there to our alumni base.

[meangreener]

We really need to advertise CUSA more. It's like we aren't even trying to get Denton interested.

[Eagle1855]

We really need to advertise CUSA more. It's like we aren't even trying to get Denton interested.

We need more posters up around town.

[North Texas Shep]

Wish we did something like this.

Woof

That is what I am saying! I am going to see if Oak Street Draft House will let us have a party there. Who is in?

[North Texas Shep]

That is what I am saying! I am going to see if Oak Street Draft House will let us have a party there. Who is inI

I am about to start a thread about this. Check it out!

[PlummMeanGreen]

It should be celebrated in Mufreesboro--they got moved up into a conference that wasn't the dreg of FBS football, all within 12 years of moving up from FCS ball in 2001. This is as high on the foodchain as they can probably go, so it is worth celebrating. They will be playing teams that their fans ahve always cared about in WKU and UNT, plus they get Marshall and other schools closer to them in Old Dominion and Southern Miss, as well as UAB. That's a good trade up from Troy, South Alabama, Arkansas State, and ULM.

For certain North Texas took the much more difficult road less traveled while other schools you mentioned (some in Texas) who only recently had to expand their stadiums to immediately move up to NCAA FBS level. And apparently not even be held to any serious NCAA attendance criteria to boot. Wasn't quite as easy for North Texas....we had to work at it but we made it work!

Some of us have talked often about the 1994 football season being one of our all time favorites in Mean Green Country and it was a special season because:

(1 ..............we "ALL" had to have a shoulder to shoulder solidarity" with massive purchase of football tickets as the major objective;

(2) .............we had the Eagle-Dome, ie, a humongous circus-like tent with great live entertainment. food and beverage;

(3) .............probably our wealthiest UNT alum Charn ????? from SE Asia bought thousands of football season tickets which I'm sure were obviously distributed around Denton County and

(4) ...........with the best part of 1994 being how we drew around 20,000 "real butts' in seats" per home game to regain our NCAA D1-A classification. (Almost forgot this..........the previous winter UNT officials added those Fouts Field end zone seats to meet stadium capacity criteria).

The 1994 MG football season: Remember George Dunham of the Mean Green Radio Network's famous "See Ya' Later McNeese State" radio call-out at Fouts when it was raining and our fans were still all over the place with an assortment of rainbow colored umbrellas in hand still sticking around for a darn good football game?

Is it time to "tow the line" again on the eve of our CUSA membership? Because of our CUSA membership, I plan on making 3-4 games this Fall and have already turned down DJ gigs (mostly weddings) around some of those home game dates.

Conference-USA membership is a pretty big deal and is special to me as I know it is for most of you on this forum. I personally hope we win the whole damn enchilada not 2 years from now........not next year, but this year! We have a good assortment of special talented Texas HS football products mixed with some from other states so...why the heck not?

GMG!

Edited June 26, 2013 by PlummMeanGreen

[JKvsHimself]

North Texas and a host of other schools will officially mark their entrance to Conference USA on July 1.

The occasion is one that a few schools, including UNT’s old Sun Belt Conference rival Middle Tennessee, will mark on the date the move becomes official.

http://meangreenblog.dentonrc.com/2013/06/unt-plans-to-promote-c-usa-move-during-july-4-celebration.html/

[FirefightnRick]

North Texas and a host of other schools will officially mark their entrance to Conference USA on July 1.

The occasion is one that a few schools, including UNT’s old Sun Belt Conference rival Middle Tennessee, will mark on the date the move becomes official.

http://meangreenblog.dentonrc.com/2013/06/unt-plans-to-promote-c-usa-move-during-july-4-celebration.html/

"UNT officials said this week that the school will also promote the move heavily in conjunction with the Kiwanis Club fireworks show that is moving to Apogee Stadium this year.

The event was previously held at Fouts Field.

The fireworks show might be a couple of days after UNT officially makes the move to C-USA, but it is also an event that draws people from all around the region. Hundreds of those people might not attend an event meant solely to celebrate UNT’s C-USA move.

UNT will promote its new conference on the video board at Apogee and try to educate the public on its new league and what joining will mean for the program..."

M.E............Minimal Effort.

Rick

[untjim1995]

"UNT officials said this week that the school will also promote the move heavily in conjunction with the Kiwanis Club fireworks show that is moving to Apogee Stadium this year.

The event was previously held at Fouts Field.

The fireworks show might be a couple of days after UNT officially makes the move to C-USA, but it is also an event that draws people from all around the region. Hundreds of those people might not attend an event meant solely to celebrate UNT’s C-USA move.

UNT will promote its new conference on the video board at Apogee and try to educate the public on its new league and what joining will mean for the program..."

M.E............Minimal Effort.

Rick

This shouldn't surprise anyone.

[MeanGreenTexan]

Are we really getting worked up over what Middle Tennessee is doing to celebrate their move to C-USA? Good for them. We're North Texas. No one around here is going to care that much unless we're moving to the BigXII.

Just win. It will do SO MUCH MORE than some measly "celebration" of moving to C-USA, which we've been doing for quite a while.

[UNTLifer]

"UNT officials said this week that the school will also promote the move heavily in conjunction with the Kiwanis Club fireworks show that is moving to Apogee Stadium this year.

The event was previously held at Fouts Field.

The fireworks show might be a couple of days after UNT officially makes the move to C-USA, but it is also an event that draws people from all around the region. Hundreds of those people might not attend an event meant solely to celebrate UNT’s C-USA move.

UNT will promote its new conference on the video board at Apogee and try to educate the public on its new league and what joining will mean for the program..."

M.E............Minimal Effort.

Rick

Maybe so, but it gives North Texas a chance to reach a number of people that they normally don't reach, or people that rarely keep up with North Texas. So the opportunity is there to capture some new fans if they do this right. That is a big if, but they should have coaches and players available much like what MTSU is doing, have season ticket specials and not just rely on people looking up at the scoreboard to gather information. In a nutshell, I think this is a great event to expose the masses to what is going on, but I'm worried that M.E. will take over and it will be an opportunity lost.

[KRAM1]

Maybe so, but it gives North Texas a chance to reach a number of people that they normally don't reach, or people that rarely keep up with North Texas. So the opportunity is there to capture some new fans if they do this right. That is a big if, but they should have coaches and players available much like what MTSU is doing, have season ticket specials and not just rely on people looking up at the scoreboard to gather information. In a nutshell, I think this is a great event to expose the masses to what is going on, but I'm worried that M.E. will take over and it will be an opportunity lost.

This...so many more people will be exposed to our new CUSA affiliation by combining these two events! Great and a great use of resources...in this the Denton community will actually be part of the CUSA celebration event. Certainly would not have been nearly as involved should UNT have done a stand alone event. Nice.

[PlummMeanGreen]

Back post-Indian wars and depridations, I called the UNT athletic dept. one day and suggested to former SID Doug Ray that the Denton Kiwanis Fireworks would be a great place to introduce the then "new" UNT HFC....one Corky Nelson. He concurred and Fouts was packed more than I'd ever seen it--Corky received a very, very nice ovation and even seemed to blush a bit it seemed to me. (I was on the field along with Doug and Corky and could see the blush) !

FAU or no other CUSA newbie will have as many at their CUSA coming out party as UNT will at the Kiwanis fireworks at Apogee Stadium.

Now a giant Apogee jumbotron and creative video production on the subject of our new CUSA membership by the video department over at UNT athletics could go a long ways in putting on a most positive presentation with this captive yet 'in the mood to celebrate" audience with UNT as guest host.

I think it will be a great intro to Denton and Denton County to our new era in Conference-USA. We want big crowds at Apogee, right? Well, we are getting one on the 4'th of July----make it count.

GMG!

Edited June 26, 2013 by PlummMeanGreen

[JesseMartin]

I'm of two minds about the whole thing. On one hand, it's smart to combine the two if done right. On the other hand...are they actually being "combined" in the sense where they're making a bigger event with additional "stuff" (you know, like how MTSU got 52 businesses involved, blah blah blah) or are they just saying, "hey, come to the event on the 4th which is exactly the same as it would be otherwise, except that we're going to make an additional announcement over the speakers in the middle of it"?

[FirefightnRick]

..or are they just saying, "hey, come to the event on the 4th which is exactly the same as it would be otherwise, except that we're going to (tell Vito we are making a big deal about it when in all probability we were just going to simply)...make an additional announcement over the speakers (..or flash it on the video board)....in the middle of it...(all along)"?

Winner!

Rick