OVC football poll has SEMO tied for seventh

We really need to win at least 6 games this year. 6 wins is a start, and then build on that. Everybody is hoping for a winner, unfortunately the main thing holding SEMO football back is Houck Stadium.

Counter Top, why would you care? If there is a Caps game, our print and radio media wouldn't attend anyways.

August 6th....

bulletman and joefrank: You guys just don't get it.

Have you seen the facilities at Murray? They're much higher tech than what SEMO has, but their FBall team is no better than SEMO's. Hmmmmm. Yeah, it must be the facilties.

Did you ever see the facilties at SIU back in 2000, when they hired Jerry Kill? They were WORSE than SEMO's, yet Kill was able to build a WINNER.....with BAD facilities. Then they finally upgraded everything and now have a brand new stadium. But the fact is Kill won with BAD facilities at SIU.

No more excuses!!

It's not the condition of Houck Stadium that's the problem. Like the old joke says the three main problems with it are location, location and location.

redhawks07;

Comparing SEMO to SIU is a bogus point and you know it. Coach Kill was hired to rebuild a once great program with crumbling facilities. While they had fallen on some hard times the school has a winning football tradition and even a national title under their belt to show potential recruits. Meanwhile the SEMO coach has equally crumbling facilities but also has to deal with the fact that the school has always sucked at football even when they were still Div. II. I don't know about you but I'd rather be a has been than a never was!

Data48, you are very misinformed of the SEMO football program prior to going 1AA. When we were Div. 2, SEMO was a perennial top MIAA Conference team. Look at the records until the mid 80's or so. I am an alum and former player and am proud of our football history until we made the move up in classification(which I think was a huge mistake.) We play Div. 1AA but fund Div. 2 and our facilities are subpar. Unfortunately our pipedreams of Div.1 in basketball has drug our programs into oblivion with the exception of baseball and track which hold their own. We need to decide to back and fund our football program with better facilities and fully fund the scholarship levels to compete with the rest of the OVC. We don't even have the full complement of scholarships available to our coaches. Contrary to your misguided statements, SEMO football was good for our level. It is not now, but can be if the powers that be will wholly support it.

semoh: Pretty good guess with 4 wins. Is 4 wins enough to keep Samuel around? This is the last year of his contract. What is enough for an extension?

semo ref;

I'm well aware that there was a SEMO football team in the 80's that had some pretty good seasons. You were obviously a part of it and I congratulate you for that. However I think you're letting your emotional attachment to that team affect your reading comprehension. I was making a point about using the winning traditions of a program as a recruiting tool for current players. I don't think a few decent seasons twenty-five years ago constitute a winning tradition. BTW, I 100% agree with the rest of your comments. If SEMO wants to be a Div. I program they should fund like one.

Going back to D2 would akin to going back from a good paying job you like to a low paying one you hated. It's a step backward. Never go backward! Keep plugging with good people and good things can happen. Keep things positive!

Players choose where they will play college ball mostly on where their best scholorship is and where they think they will win at and get a chance to be noticed by pro scouts. Talking about players not going there because of bad facilities is crap, think about what kind of facilities these kids had in high school. For the most part high school facilities can not compare to SEMO's unless the player came from a very large 5A school.

SemoSports, think about that a second. SEMO shouldn't be trying to compare itself to high schools!

And I can name numerous facilities in the St. Louis area at the high school level that compares to SEMO. Maybe not in the size of the stadium, but the quality by a longshot. The quality of facilities at SEMO is poor overall.

I just spent 6 weeks at D3 school, Public University about the same size as SEMO.

The football stadium holds 11,000 and has FieldTurf. The football locker room and coaches' offices are located at the stadium. They have a full athletic training inside of the stadium comparable to our main athletic training room. They have a video board. Press box is comparable to many in the OVC. They have 5 full practice fields for the football team including goal posts. Those fields are side by side and are within short walking distance of the stadium.

They have a beatiful softball field with a very nice scoreboard. A track/soccer complex with brand new surfaces, lights, and very nice scoreboard. They have a baseball field with lights, full FieldTurf infield, a clubhouse with locker room and coaches' offices connected to the dugout and another nice scoreboard. They have a separate "volleyball arena," a nice gymnastics practice facility, a nice wrestling practice facility, a basketball gym that the basketball teams get to practice in daily, and a full-size indoor track. Also, their main athletic training room has to be at least twice the size of our main athletic training room.

It is time the University makes a decision. Support athletics or not. SEMO goes through the motions currently and it is disappointing.

If we want to be a DI athletic program, we need to act like a DI athletic program. That means having the resources financially both scholarship-wise and team budgets, facilities, and staff.

Maybe somebody who has been around since the DII days can fill the rest of us in. When it comes to staff, how many positions have been added and still exist today since going DI? How have the facilities been upgraded, improved, and added since making the move?

Great post redhawkstudent, I agree with everything you said.

Lisa Pace, former WBB assistant coach has a website, kind of interesting stuff.

http://www.coachpace.com

I used the term Steal, because I know Ball state should roll the redhawks, maybe they can pull an App State-Michigan scenario from a couple years ago. Anything big to get this program going..

bommerang, what has changed since 03 and 04? The turf has gotten older, the paint has fallen off the stadium, the scoreboard has been reduced, the sound system has gotten older. What upgrades have been done? The gameday locker room and athletic training room which are used 5-6x a year. What else?

These coaches can win games. They can prepare the players to win games. They have to be given the resources to get the best players and they are not given that oppotunity.

Broken promises won't win football games.

I hardly follow this blog anymore, so I don't really know if you are a regular or not, so don't think I am coming at you with this or anything, I'm not --

Semo basketball has a great facility, but they haven't won jack in a number of years.

Could we use a facility upgrade? Sure, who couldn't.

Willie Ponder, Eugene Amano, Dimitri Paterson, Dan Connolly and Edgar Jones all used our p*ss-poor facilities to help them get in the NFL.

The sound system sucked when those guys were here, heck it sucked in the 80's when I was a student. The scoreboard issue has to do with construction, not funding. The paint has been falling off since the 40's, and believe it or not, the stadium actually looks alot more appealing than it did just 5-6 years ago even (you may not believe that if you weren't here, but it's the truth).

Excuses, excuses, excuses - the scoreboard sucks, the field sucks, the paint sucks - blah blah blah. Get some players and win some dang games! Period.

Go Redhawks!

gomer, boomerang claimed the facilities were worse in 03 and 04. That's what I'd like to know how things have changed. Go ahead-answer that.

I'm not gonna speak for boomer but the locker room has improved and some of the weight room equipment has been improved too. You can't say nothing has changed or hasn't even slightly improved when they just got a brand new locker room, have nicer workout facilities in what used to be the rec center south, and have upgraded numerous pieces of weight equipment over in Rosengarden.

I haven't seen anybody saying Houck and Rosengarden are the Taj Mahal. Somewhere along the line you have to win with the hand you're dealt. If these coaches didn't think they could win with these facilities when they got here, they should have packed up and left right then. If they think they can win with what we do have, we should hold them to that standard. Believe it or not I'm rooting for them.

Those uniforms are like what my high school wore in the mid-90's! I believe I was told that's about how far back SEMO's go. Every other sport I'm sure has gotten new uniforms several times since football has.

The new locker room is too small. They've moved the weight room from the Rosengarten Athletic Complex down into the gymnasium at the South Rec. I read earlier in the summer that the University has put out for bids for a new scoreboard, but no completion date been determined.

Believe it or not, I actually like Houck Stadium. I've been to several in the OVC and Houck could be one of the better stadiums in the conference. But the fact that the team has to travel all over campus to do anything just doesn't make sense. And the University had the opportunity to correct that, but didn't do it.

I look forward to seeing the new weight room set-up. Hopefully Coach Lee is able to turn that facility into a good tool for all of the athletes.

I believe the locker room in New Hall is used by the Southeast football team, the Cape Central football team, and possibly the visitors for soccer at times. There was talk for awhile of the locker room and athletic training room being shared by football and soccer for game-day use.

Things are gradually improving with the athletic department. Schaefer will keep things improving as long as he is here. Coach Nutt looks like he was a pretty good hire. Samuel knows that he has to get it done this season. Same for Ishee.

But there is still an overall lack of vision and commitment to the department and, I believe, within the department. It is not just the big things. It is also the little things. I'll give you two examples of "little things" that I think illustrate an overall problem. Some will just laugh at these things. But I think it shows a failure to think broadly about our programs on a D-1 level in 2010. (1) The athletic department moved into new offices across the street from Houck. There is one little redhawks flag by the door. Otherwise, you can't tell that it is even a university-owned building. They need a nice sign, red and black, with the logo. Nothing too expensive, just visible and professional looking. But they have a 25 dollar flag. (2) The "invitations" or flyers came in the mail this week about the Booster BBQ. They were one single sheet of paper (not that big of a deal). But they were YELLOW and BLACK. No red to be found. How is that for marketing or branding to potential donors?

Again I know these are little, minor things. But when you put enough of them together, it is no longer minor.

Get the fans in the city excited, Southeast marketing team has done some good things, Maybe more promotional things for kids, kids bring parents, more fans bring gameday electricity, red balloons to all the kids to release when semo scores. Band warm-ups where fans can watch, (Band should be in full uniform, this is D1 !) fight songs before the game, Player walk, start a tradition of some sort, Nebraska uses Tunnel walk, Wisconsin-"Jump around" after 3rd quarter, Byrant Denny at Florida State rocks with war chant, throwing spear onto field, Set the bar high, Get a red-tailed hawk to fly onto the field, shoot anything crazy! Lead the OVC in gameday experience! Won't necessarily bring wins, but might create a buzz.

FB attendance is actually pretty good early in the year, and for homecoming, and family weekend.

Didn't the OVC used to have a tv deal for fb? Now they have a deal through this Wazzo, only offered in KY. Last year they had a Westwood One contract for an OVC game of the week via radio. A long time ago, SE Fb did have a few games on one of the small stations, Ch49? It was only a game or two.

I strongly agree with redhawkstudent. A lot has to do with the location of the University...well at least Houck Stadium. The team really has nowhere to walk from, unless you drop them off by bus at the end of the street in front of Houck and let them walk down street into the stadium. At one time the team was dressing at Rosengarten, but I suppose that has changed with the new endzone building. I think they also dressed just acorss the street at the Redhawks Success Center when they converted that old gym into a locker room on game-days. That was just before the new building. Regardless, you're not going to make a big deal about the team just crossing the street into the stadium. Nothing to see there.

I've been to SEMO games at EIU and their game-day experience is pretty good, but it doesn't compare to the atmosphere at SIU. Now they have the perfect set-up. They actually had the "Player Walk" which was lead by the Marching Salukis. They march from the SIU Arena, right thru the tailgate area into McAndrew Stadium. I'm sure things will be equally as good with the new stadium. To be fair, their game-day atmosphere has ONLY been good since the team started winning. Before that, say prior to 2002, IF fans went to the stadium on game-day, most people just went to tailgate and didn't even bother to stay for the game. But everything changed when the team started winning.

Something else I'd like to see changed is adding words to the "Southeast Fight Song." Right off hand, I can't think of any other school that doesn't have words to their fight song.

SemoSports, read my post again and you'll find the difference...

There are words to SEMO Fight. At least someone posted some on you tube. There is a clip with the 4 or 5 schools that use "Stand Up and Cheer" as their fight song, and the words to them. The clip says that there are no words for it, but someone posted them below in the comment section. They look very plausible to be something. If someone made them up, I don't know?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrKkvGBHx...

Here were the posted lyrics:

Fight, Red-Hawks, Fight For the Southeast banner, On-ward to Vic-to-ry For the Red & Black Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight, Red-Hawks, Fight Show your colors true! Go on to Vic-to-ry! Go on to Vic-to-ry! Your spir-it will shine through

Here's a response regarding the question about lyrics to the Southeast fight song taken from the university's "Rumor Mill":

Monday, November 23, 2009

QUESTION:

I remember a few years ago the Rumor Mill said that someone was writing lyrics to the Southeast fight song(s). I haven't heard anything lately. It still sounds like: Dah--dah-dah--dahdahdahdahdahdah, (clap) (clap) (clap)... Go Southeast! (clap) (clap)...God Bless America! Dah-dah-dah-dah! (or something like that, I wasn't a music major.) Any updates?

RATING:

more true than false

RESPONSE:

Shad Burner, director of Alumni Services at Southeast, says he has spoken with John Shafer, Southeast director of Athletics, and Tom Meyer, president of the Southeast Alumni Association, who both feel strongly the Fight Song should have lyrics. In fact, a Southeast alumnus drafted lyrics to the song a couple of years ago, that have been considered. Burner says the Alumni Association is hoping to lead the effort to finalize lyrics to the Fight Song in 2010, but whether they will be those written by the alumnus or a variation on them has not yet been determined.

Let's hope we are not having this discussion about turning things around again next year. Need 5-6 wins THIS year or the cycle continues.

Coca Cola - Attendance is not the problem with the football program. If you actually go to a football game when the weather is nice, you'll be pleasantly surprised at the turnout . . . especially for the Sept. and early Oct. games, as well as homecoming. If the team can just consistently be around .500, attendance will be just fine. Same for basketball too, in my opinion.

Come on gomer, don't you know by now that Cap baseball is THE most important local sport. We could devote more time to SEMO, but why, when we have the Caps to cover. Did they get beat yet today?

"Counter Top, why would you care? If there is a Caps game, our print and radio media wouldn't attend anyways."

Weird, I attend every year and see print, radio and tv there.