Just hope all of you complaining about attendance were there as I was. If you were not, why complain?
Game attendance is cause and effect result and is plain as these program observations:
1. Years of mediocre records with same HC/staff without discernable improvement in goals.
2. Lack of conference championships in CUSA/Sun Belt (30 years outright, 16 since last co-championship with plus one year already on the way). MT is effectively out of championship contention by October 31 in most years with this regime.
3. Coaches and administrators indifferent to fans expectations such as lack of transparency to take questions at coaches or post game shows or other suggestions to make MT better. Who knows what else has been ignored from fans and supporters over the last decade. My suggestion is look at UTK and learn how to win and build a program.
4. Institutions in our television/regional market improved their football fortunes in recent years (such as UTK, Memphis, WKU, and UAB).
5. Losses to Vanderbilt (2015, 16, and 18), inexplicable FCS losses, losses to WKU, plus overall losing bowl record under this coaching regime. These are games fans remember! This coaching staff has earned what success they have on the bottom feeders of the conference along with some FCS wins. Occasionally, this staff will win a game like Miami and Georgia Tech to keep a spark of hope alive, but those wins get quickly erased with games such as McNeese state.
6. De-emphasis of the Blue Raider radio network coverage throughout Middle Tennessee (such as loss of WMOT 89.5).
7. Football facilities allowed to get aged/almost threadbare without significant improvement. Our stadium largely looks the same as it did back in 1998...thats almost twenty-five years now! Peer institutions such as UNT, UAB, Charlotte, and ODU have fresher looking and nicer facilities. We also do not have an IPF as many on our level has already. Our proposed improvements maybe will bring us to the mid 2010's. And yes, Tennessee Tech in beautiful Cookeville, Tennessee has a nicer video scoreboard than MT currently.
8. Administratively, we have granted ill-advised coaching contracts which handcuffs us to make changes where it is too expensive/difficult for us to consider fresher and rising star talent. HC isn't really held accountable for improvement (really cause of #1) towards earning championships. Charlotte made a HC change a few weeks ago without much hesitation. Weak AD supervision and ineffective/indifferent Cope leadership that tolerate mediocrity are part of the root causes.
9. The C-USA implosion and our leadership not navigating us proactively to the MAC or another established conference. Replacement teams will be FCS teams moving up to FBS such as Jacksonville State, Kennesaw State, and Sam Houston State. It doesn't allow us to be in the same light as P5 or really even G5 competition and we are behaving more like our FCS days in the OVC. I viewed USM, UAB, and Marshall as our peers, now they are moving forward and probably ahead of us.
And why should "Jack and Dianne fan" feel enthusiastic about MT football given these features and repeated miscues? With all this, how in the world can we establish credibility to stand competitive with SEC caliber competition in recruiting or on the field winning a game? If we can't win hearts of 37132 and 37130, where else can we win to fill stands? Why give money and valuable resources (businesses) when often its effect and impact is squandered away?
The empty steel stands show for what it is: Program Failure.
