NCAA Football La Monroe Football

Angry spectator on line one, Mr. Brand.

A few years ago, the NCAA put in an attendance requirement for teams wishing to play Division I-A football. Any program that dipped below an average of 15,000 spectators per game, be they actual or "paid" (ie: fake) spectators, over a two-year period would get the boot.

Despite several schools falling below the prescribed minimums, no one has gotten the axe, and part of that is because of stunts like this:

Louisiana-Monroe, which entered into a five-game agreement with Arkansas in 2003, will be paid $500,000 for a game in Little Rock on Sept. 6. Part of Arkansas' deal with Louisiana-Monroe allows Louisiana-Monroe to be designated as the home team and use the crowd count for its home attendance figures.

Google Maps reveals that Monroe, Louisiana is actually six miles closer to Little Rock than Fayetteville is, so there's not much the NCAA could do about this without kiboshing the ability to count "neutral site" games at which your school has six fans and the other school has sixty thousand entirely.

Which they should do, because what's the point of this rule if you're just going to let teams that are clearly not capable of living up to it skate?

(via the Wiz)

You're probably looking for a punchline given the headlines above, but no... seriously:

Citing the 9-11 terrorist attacks and Pearl Harbor, Alabama coach Nick Saban said Monday his team must rebound like America did from a "catastrophic event." In this case, that would be an embarrassing 21-14 loss Saturday to Louisiana-Monroe. "

Changes in history usually occur after some kind of catastrophic event," Saban said during the opening remarks of his weekly news conference. "It may be 9-11, which sort of changed the spirit of America relative to catastrophic events. Pearl Harbor kind of got us ready for World War II, or whatever, and that was a catastrophic event."

This is not quite a direct comparison -- Nick Saban, despite what LSU fans might tell you, is not history's greatest monster -- but it is high up on the list of embarrassing things coaches have said over the past 10 to 15 years. Even leaving aside the "America, eff yeah!" aspect of things, losing to ULM is just losing to ULM and not, say, a nation-altering surprise attack by foreigners, no matter how many kids on the ULM team speak Cajun. Trust me: I'm a Michigan fan. You get over it.

I do love "Pearl Harbor kind of got us read for WWII... or whatever." I can't remember if that was Korea or 'Nam or what; I coach football! Grrrr!

SEC fans are accused of being many things: obnoxious, overbearing, and boastful make the short list. One not-so-endearing trait is a tendency to beat our own chests a little too much when comparing ourselves to other conferences. We feel, right or wrong, that the SEC is the toughest conference in college football. Usually, it's true. (Hey, I'll contribute to the stereotype! Why not?)

Well, Alabama's 21-14 loss to Louisiana Monroe took a lot of air out of our collective balloons today. The Tide have long been considered one of the SEC's most storied programs, despite their lack of recent success. People notice when the Tide lose.

Losing to FSU, a bad team in one of the nation's worst conferences (ACC) was bad enough. Losing to Louisiana Monroe is a new level of awful.

And nobody saw it.

Louisiana Monroe 21 - Alabama 14

Say what ? !

I didn't see it, so I'll leave it to Tide fans to tell us what happened. But as I scroll down the box score I see an Alabama tailback with nearly 100 rushing yards (not bad). I see John Parker Wilson with almost 70% completions (not bad). I see a ULM tailback with 33 carries netting only 2.8 yards/carry.

Typical SEC blowout, right? Apparently not.

It took a while, but one of those cupcakes finally caught up to an SEC team, and boy what a team - Alabama! The Tide are one of the three to five biggest names throughout college football history. And they lost to what amounts to a directional school. I mean, there are probably plenty of people in Louisiana who have no idea where Monroe is, and yet their football program took down mighty Alabama.

Well done.