I wish there was a way to know you're in the good old days before you've actually left them.

[Bayside44]

We used to play every team in the conference twice a year. You knew all the players. All the coaches. You felt like you knew them.

Apathy has set in for me. I love the community here otherwise I might completely check out of basketball. I wish the football team was 7-2 instead of 6-3, but on that side I see hungry young coaches are recruiting and the shine hasn't worn off.

Basketball I just don't see much of a difference with the end of JB and Red. We may be even backsliding even more since the talent is supposed to be better.

Recruiting alone is 180 degrees different.

 

[NKR1978]

Recruiting alone is 180 degrees different.

It seems better. Kiyan is huge, but I hope we don't overreact if he chooses USC.

 

[FRANKIEFAN]

What was the team hotel in Hawaii last year?

I'm about to book my honeymoon and want to make sure that I do NOT choose that one. Probably going to to the big resorty Hilton.

 

[Bayside44]

It seems better. Kiyan is huge, but I hope we don't overreact if he chooses USC.

Him aside it's been a while since we've seen talent like Freeman w/ a sidekick like Choppa. I get Judah was ready made.

 

[FRANKIEFAN]

We used to play every team in the conference twice a year. You knew all the players. All the coaches. You felt like you knew them.

Apathy has set in for me. I love the community here otherwise I might completely check out of basketball. I wish the football team was 7-2 instead of 6-3, but on that side I see hungry young coaches are recruiting and the shine hasn't worn off.

Basketball I just don't see much of a difference with the end of JB and Red. We may be even backsliding even more since the talent is supposed to be better.

Yeah. The only thing keeping me sane is that I don't like college basketball anymore its on par with NBA, WNBA rando Euro soccer leagues etc. I'm sure Feb/March interest will pick up. Us being terrible and Uconn not even having to play a close game in March is all of it 99.99% couldn't care less about NIL or roster turnover. Their run in 2014 after the way our season started absolutely crushed me the last two weren't nearly as bad as that one or 2010 and Butler giving them a title. Didn't bother with a preview magazine this year. Wonder if there will even be a Saturday before the end of football when I deposit a few hundred bucks and pick games. Used to religiously follow the sport and SU fandom was just the cherry on top.

NCAA Lacrosse and NCAA Football I still enjoy and can watch games 24/7. I assume at some point I'll become a fan of college hoops again. I'll still watch us anytime I don't have some other conflict no matter how awful we get. Sucks the starting guards are so terrible bc its an interesting forward group and the bench is OK too.

 

[dasher]

We used to play every team in the conference twice a year. You knew all the players. All the coaches. You felt like you knew them.

Apathy has set in for me. I love the community here otherwise I might completely check out of basketball. I wish the football team was 7-2 instead of 6-3, but on that side I see hungry young coaches are recruiting and the shine hasn't worn off.

Basketball I just don't see much of a difference with the end of JB and Red. We may be even backsliding even more since the talent is supposed to be better.

Let's see what everyone is saying next year when that schedule is played.

 

[NKR1978]

Let's see what everyone is saying next year when that schedule is played.

The football schedule or basketball? I know football is brutal.

 

[M2MPrinciples]

The quote has been ringing true in a lot of aspects in life lately. Didn't sign up for getting older.

Being a sports fan really rubs it in:

Broadcasters referring to any athlete over 33 as past their prime.
Seeing the kids of athletes you followed as a teenager becoming high-major athletes.
When you're older than the youngest MLB manager.

I give Tom Brady 20 years tops to start hawking reverse mortgages.

 

[NKR1978]

Being a sports fan really rubs it in:

Broadcasters referring to any athlete over 33 as past their prime.
Seeing the kids of athletes you followed as a teenager becoming high-major athletes.
When you're older than the youngest MLB manager.

I give Tom Brady 20 years tops to start hawking reverse mortgages.

Seeing the kid of an athlete who was a freshman when you were a 3L become a high major prospect is a bit of a mindf.

 

[dasher]

The football schedule or basketball? I know football is brutal.

football

 

[NKR1978]

All true.
The move to the ACC started it.
The Orange gave up their identity and the meaning of battling in-conference rivals.

I look forward to the annual G-town game but wonder how many students or recent fans have any idea of the rivalry and how important this game used to be.
It was one of the top 3 rivalries in all of sports...up there with Duke-UNC and Yankees-Red Sox.

There is not and will never be a real rival in the ACC (barring some bizarre incident).
Those "Beat Duke" shirts are an embarrassment.
Everyone wants to beat them.
And to Duke, Syracuse is now just another second or third rate conference team they have to play.
Their rival is UNC.

Larger than life coaches?
How great would it be in a conference where SU fans roared at Danny Hurley and Rick Pitino and insulted Ed Cooley?
But the real Big East was the good old days.

There would be some of the old intensity and meaning if the Orange were competing at the top level of the ACC. Not like the good old days...but somethng.

And this new era of paid athletes and new players every year does nothing for loyalty or the old experience of seeing players develop and become stars.
The game is now mostly teams that happen to wear the names of colleges on their uniforms and where the players' names change every year.

But a fan is a fan.
So I look forward to the G-town game (with great apprehension this year).
I (still) LOATHE G-TOWN!

Go Orange!

We were rolling in the ACC until we were put on probation. The 2015 season wasn’t great but we had a great roster and recruits heading into 2015-16. Then JB got old when we were done and the luster was off the program.

 

[OttoMets]

Cuse basketball is an unbelievably important part of this city's identity. Winter comes around and if you are not an outdoors type then it severely reduces the entertainment options here. Basketball is the one thing that can bring the entire community together no matter their background. I am that outdoors type, and two things I would have not thought possible 15 years ago are now the unfortunate reality: we get hardly any serious snow in the winter, and the basketball team is flirting with being totally irrelevant. To have both of those key aspects to the city's identity fade away at about the same rate is more depressing than I thought even possible. My core memories of Syracuse all involve the snowy winters and watching basketball at a packed house in the dome. The younger generation not having the opportunity to make those same memories depresses me like crazy. Winter is something this area should be looking forward to, not dreading.

This is a really relatable take. And a huge drag.

 

[cuseattle]

What was the team hotel in Hawaii last year?

I'm about to book my honeymoon and want to make sure that I do NOT choose that one. Probably going to to the big resorty Hilton.

Congratulations!

 

[sususpicious]

I wish there was a way to know you're in the good old days before you've actually left them...​

I can definitely connect with the sentiment of this thread.

Natalie Merchant and 10,000 Maniacs said it well in the song "These Are the Days:"

These are days you'll remember
Never before and never since

It kills me to realize that when SU's good old days were happening, I didn't sufficiently savor the moments...

And at this point, the words "never since" unfortunately ring very true as I look at what seems will happen to this team (and potentially the program?). Things look as though they might get a lot worse before they get better.

So I guess when (if?) that "rebirth" occurs, I'll be sure to sing loudly "These Are the Days" and stop and realize how lucky I am to be an SU fan...

(Apologies for being so damn maudlin.)

 

[Brooky03]

I’m in my early-mid 30’s, so I’ve never had high hopes for our football team. I was too young during the McNabb years to really know what was going on. I’ve always expected that we’re never going to be a top 10 team because you just can’t recruit the dogs you need to a private school up north, in a state with virtually no home-grown talent to pick from, particularly linemen. I have a big disconnect with football fans who seem to expect that the program will get back to some kind of prominence. I expect .500 and consider anything better than that a pleasant surprise.

Basketball is obviously a different story. My first actual memories of watching games are circa 2000 or 2001. So the championship in 2003 spoiled me. I thought we’d be winning a championship every 10 years or so. That could be influencing my belief that Syracuse will get back to that level in the not-too-distant future. FWIW, it’s easier to compete in basketball than football. NIL is still a huge unknown, but Cuse has one of the largest fanbases and a good amount of wealth to pull from with the right combination of factors. We don’t have to climb a mountain to be relevant again. It’s more like a medium hill.

 

[pfister1]

You don’t know that for sure

Given that the next stage may last for all eternity I’ll gut this one out for as long as I can.

 

[kirbivore]

 

[DoubleDee]

It all ebbs and flows. Over the course of history, Syracuse football comes and goes. There are good eras and bad eras. I believe this is true for most schools. Even Bama was crap at times.

The Boeheim era is one of those flows for basketball. Now we will ebb.

 

[swish7]

It all ebbs and flows. Over the course of history, Syracuse football comes and goes. There are good eras and bad eras. I believe this is true for most schools. Even Bama was crap at times.

The Boeheim era is one of those flows for basketball. Now we will ebb.

Football has twice had 20 bad for 10 good. I'd take a more balanced flow.

Should've left P alone. Should've left JB alone. Or, if you're not going to leave them alone, then be serious about your coaching search.

 

[DoubleDee]

Football has twice had 20 bad for 10 good. I'd take a more balanced flow.

Should've left P alone. Should've left JB alone. Or, if you're not going to leave them alone, then be serious about your coaching search.

Agree. Never should have touched the P era. Ride it out.

 

[swish7]

Agree. Never should have touched the P era. Ride it out.

At the time, we didn't imagine it could get worse. It got much worse.

 

[miamicuse]

Around 120AD, the Roman Empire at it's absolute height. No one knew that was the golden ages. Fast forward to 1453 when Constantinople fell to the Ottoman Empire, they knew that was the end and no going back but total annihilation. Yeah I have been drinking this morning.

 

[CuseCPT]

 

[Dave]

The crazy thing is we have not one, but two McDonald’s All Americans on this roster with probably one or two on the way next year.So goes The “ no talent” argument.

It would've been more appropriate had Andy Bernard gone to Colgate instead of Cornell, but the quote fits perfectly.

I'll be blunt. Syracuse is a has-been athletic program in football and basketball. I started really understanding sports in 1986 and graduated from SU in 2001. Local boy. I thought that was baseline for SU sports. Looking back, SU peaked in 1995-1996. Runner up in hoops, young McNabb beats Clemson 41-0 in a legit bowl game, and men's lacrosse was in the middle of one of the most dominant runs in any college sport. I thought it was the norm, it was really just a golden age.

I guess it made me an entitled fan. I look at the names on the jerseys and I expect SU to thrash BC in football, and for our walk-ons to be able to beat Colgate in basketball. I don't blame the kids at all. They are doing their best, but they just aren't the level of athletes we used to get. Can you imagine our best player from a basketball team in that era and transferring to another team and not starting?!?! The reality is that is our current level of talent. It is what it is. By the eye test, SU and Colgate looked evenly matched. It looked like a hard-fought matchup between conference peers.

I have some hope that football might be headed in the right direction. For hoops, instead of Andy Bernard, I'll quote Dalton from Road House, "It'll get worse before it gets better."

I think many knew that when the legend retired it was going to be a jump into the unknown. Landing on excellence was a long shot.

 

[tbonezone]

I think many knew that when the legend retired it was going to be a jump into the unknown. Landing on excellence was a long shot.

JB made us totally irrelevant in the ACC. it was past time to go.