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Message: [QUOTE="Skinny.Atlas, post: 26912, member: 370"] What we lost in attendance during the Maloney era, we never got back. We lost alumni support. Attendance data shows a steady decline from Schwartzwalder's last winning season (1970) through Mac's first winning season (1983). Maloney was at the helm for more than half of those years. (There was a big jump in attendance when the Dome opened in 1980, but even after that, the losses and downward attendance trend continued until we became a winning program again under Mac.) The thing you really lose out on during the non-winning years are not the bandwagon jumpers (they go away and come back with ease depending on if you win or lose), it is the students who become die-hard alumni supporters. If you were a freshman in 1969 or a senior in 1985, your team had a losing record over the course of your four years. You didn't dedicate yourself , as a student looking for the full college experience when your team was going 2-9, 2-9 ('73, '74). You missed out on the thrill and joy experienced by the class of '59, '60, or '61. How great was it to be an SU student during that period. If you were a student during the Maloney era, you looked for fun in places other than Archbold Stadium. Those kids that went to SU in 1974, didn't go to games in '74 and they didn't come back on their 10 year reunion in '83 and go to a game and they didn't come back in '93 or '03. Winning football was not a part of their experience. I'm sure there are some die-hard fans on this board that graduated in the '70s or early '80s but there are not enough of you because your classmates never experienced winning football. I bet the clas of '61 is one of the strongest group of SU football fans because they saw big wins every Saturday when they went to school. For comparison, why does Penn St get 100,000 fans every game and we can't draw 50,000...no losing era, no Maloney. From World War II to 2003, a Penn State student never experienced a losing program. We lost 15 years of potential great alumni, die-hard football fans from class of '73-'85 and free tickets won't bring them back...but it could introduce current SU students to an exiting college experience they won't forget for the rest of their lives. Make them fans now and they will carry this program for the next 30 years. [/QUOTE]

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