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Our upcoming football schedule(s) seems to have some people asking, "Who is FAU and why are they playing such big schools?"

Heh.


Consider this AOL Sports Big Ten Football preview:
http://sports.aol.com/fanhouse/2007/08/01/big-ten-football-preview-07-the-schedule/

which says:

Weirdest Game: Minnesota at Florida Atlantic, September 15

It appears that the Gophers are going to be used as a smaller school's way of getting their attendance over the NCAA minimum for the season. Oh, and the same thing happened last year when Minnesota played their opener at Kent State.

FAU needs to average at least 15,000 per game to meet NCAA standards. FBS schools need to average over 15,000 per game every other year to meet the standard, and FAU didn't even make it to 10,000 last year. This game is at Dolphins Stadium in Miami, which seats over 70,000 (FAU's stadium seats around 20,000).

It's too bad, really. Howard Schnellenberger (pictured) has actually done a pretty good job building the FAU program from the ground up, and they could have a Sun Belt contender on their hands this season.

It's quite the mysterious trip for Minnesota. Big Ten schools seem kind of above traveling to play at Sun Belt teams. Not only that, but since most of the BCS schools seem intent on having at least seven home games per season, it seems odd that team from the Big Ten would waste that one road trip on such a lowly opponent.




The UF game, as we know, has lots of people buzzing. Here the 'Noles are talking about it, with the thread title "Why is UF playing FAU?":
http://forum.tallahassee.com/viewtopic.php?p=112801&sid=70e12190b919a0661cbf5a4dc7ebb27b

- I think it's great FAU is getting a chance to play UF. I live a few miles from FAU, I have watched it really grow. Those kids really try hard to be a better team each year. It's good for FAU to start getting the experience to play better teams for their future.

- Yep, just like UCF. They'll be tough by the time fsu decides to face them.

but then

- Now the UF vs. FAU game what a waste of game for UF… Yes, FAU needs this game, but UF doesn't and shouldn't schedule cupcakes on their schedule!



What's nice is that it brings FAU to light in Tally and for some ludicrous reason there are pockets of people at FSU that have never heard of FAU.

If we could get a game with UM and FSU in the next five years, that'll definitely turn some heads too. If the FAU/UF game is any indication, UM/FAU and FAU/FSU tickets would sell out like THAT.
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Welcome to Owl Country

On the way into Doak Campbell last year, students said they hadn't heard about Troy - a school three hours away. With 6:00 to play in the fourth quarter, I'm sure they figured it out.

The cockiness in Gainesville this year will be bad. When the 'Belt starts winning some of these games (maybe this year), the number of naysayers will diminish.

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Welcome to Owl Country

Welcome to Owl Country

You're right BMarkey, even though every school has it's fair share of homers, I think Gainesville may be the capital. The Gators can do no wrong in many people's eyes. Expect to get it bad up there, even though they should take the game in stride and laugh about it, they'll still bring it like we were UGA.

That's what I really liked about USC last year, the fans were really nice to us, I only had one negative encounter that entire weekend.
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Welcome to Owl Country


owlcountry said

Our upcoming football schedule(s) seems to have some people asking, "Who is FAU and why are they playing such big schools?"

Heh.


Consider this AOL Sports Big Ten Football preview:
http://sports.aol.com/fanhouse/2007/08/01/big-ten-football-preview-07-the-schedule/

which says:

Weirdest Game: Minnesota at Florida Atlantic, September 15

It appears that the Gophers are going to be used as a smaller school's way of getting their attendance over the NCAA minimum for the season. Oh, and the same thing happened last year when Minnesota played their opener at Kent State.

FAU needs to average at least 15,000 per game to meet NCAA standards. FBS schools need to average over 15,000 per game every other year to meet the standard, and FAU didn't even make it to 10,000 last year. This game is at Dolphins Stadium in Miami, which seats over 70,000 (FAU's stadium seats around 20,000).

It's too bad, really. Howard Schnellenberger (pictured) has actually done a pretty good job building the FAU program from the ground up, and they could have a Sun Belt contender on their hands this season.

It's quite the mysterious trip for Minnesota. Big Ten schools seem kind of above traveling to play at Sun Belt teams. Not only that, but since most of the BCS schools seem intent on having at least seven home games per season, it seems odd that team from the Big Ten would waste that one road trip on such a lowly opponent.




The UF game, as we know, has lots of people buzzing. Here the 'Noles are talking about it, with the thread title "Why is UF playing FAU?":
http://forum.tallahassee.com/viewtopic.php?p=112801&sid=70e12190b919a0661cbf5a4dc7ebb27b

- I think it's great FAU is getting a chance to play UF. I live a few miles from FAU, I have watched it really grow. Those kids really try hard to be a better team each year. It's good for FAU to start getting the experience to play better teams for their future.

- Yep, just like UCF. They'll be tough by the time fsu decides to face them.

but then

- Now the UF vs. FAU game what a waste of game for UF… Yes, FAU needs this game, but UF doesn't and shouldn't schedule cupcakes on their schedule!



What's nice is that it brings FAU to light in Tally and for some ludicrous reason there are pockets of people at FSU that have never heard of FAU.

If we could get a game with UM and FSU in the next five years, that'll definitely turn some heads too. If the FAU/UF game is any indication, UM/FAU and FAU/FSU tickets would sell out like THAT.

The comment about UF scheduling "cupcakes" is ridiculous. UF always finds a way to play one or two "lesser" teams. This dates back to the days of Spurrier when UF scheduled some pretty bad 1-AA teams as well as some of the worst 1-A teams in the country. Each year you can find one or two "cupcakes" on UF's schedule. They are notorious for scheduling weak non-conf. games because of the difficulty of the SEC schedule. For UF to schedule FAU shouldn't come as a surprise.

Here is a breakdown of "cupcake" opponents since 1993.

1993 Arkansas State, SW Louisiana
1994 New Mexico State, So. Miss.
1995 Houston, N. Illinois
1996 SW Louisiana, Ga. Southern
1997 So. Miss, Central Michigan
1998 The Citadel, NE Louisiana
1999 Western Michigan, UCF
2000 Ball State, MTSU
2001 Louisiana Monroe
2002 UAB, Ohio
2003 San Jose State, FAMU
2004 MTSU, Eastern Michigan
2005 Wyoming, La. Tech.
2006 UCF, Western Carolina

I would put the current FAU squad against any of those teams at the time that UF played them. The point being that this years FAU team is as competetive if not more competetive than those teams.

UF likes the easy games early in the season. The only thing about playing FAU is that the game comes late in the season so it won't be a warm-up game for UF.

GO OWLS!!!

2017 and 2019 Conference USA Champions
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