USF-Kansas seen in 1.9-million households

The ratings are in for Friday night's 37-34 win against then-No. 13 Kansas, and the broadcast on ESPN2 drew a rating of 2.0, according to ESPN, which equates to 1,906,000 households.

That's not nearly the audience that tuned in for last year's Friday night ESPN2 showdown with West Virginia, which was seen by 2,604,000 households, then the second-highest ratings ever for a regular-season broadcast on ESPN2.

It's the highest-rated Friday night game this season on ESPN or ESPN2, though the previous two games were much lower-profile teams. SMU and Rice drew a 1.1 rating, and Navy-Ball State drew a 1.2 by comparison.

Comments

[Steve O'Neal]

I was at the South Carolina game and it was a great atmosphere. Right after that I was at the campground at Disney and there was a SC fan there. His golf cart was all decked out in school colors and even had the crowing rooster sound as a horn. The majority of fans at USF are great and will bring the very few bad ones in line. GO BULLS!

[G.A.]

I've covered two night games at South Carolina. Enjoyed the games there ...

[Ken]

Joe and others, it is clear that a few USF fans (I sure hope no one who reads much less posts here) behaved poorly at the KU game and especially toward KU fans. Don't make excuses for it--change it. Someone was quoted in the USF Oracle this morning attributing the ejections (and it might apply to the poor fan behavior more generally) to "amateur drinking." Perhaps.

[Reality]

Stay Classy USF Fan!

It is sad that the bandwagon has picked up some classless bums.

If you guys ever have the privilege, go to South Carolina some time..especially for a night game....sorry G.A., but you would have to do your game story under pressure, but the atmosphere is so worth it...that is what we need to strive to be.

[more professionalism]

steve, you obv didn't read my post above very carefully, nor my other posts last week - and your venom is noted. (and dismissed)

fwiw, which is nothing i'm sure, i am not a liar.

i also noticed, steve, that you posted under a different blog article on this very site about your own experiences of some very poor USF fan behavior at the KU game, as did bulliever.

if your fans would/did act like that toward kansas, i hope you can now understand what UCF fans experienced a couple of weeks ago.

if not, i'm sure i'll manage to get by.

well, i'm back off to read some more online articles from other schools' blogs and forums where the classless USF fan behavior is front and center.

[Steve O'Neal]

I remember someone saying that they would no longer post here when coach Leavitt and staff quit making statements regarding UCF. I also remember that same person state that they were talking about Coaches and staff, not fans. HMMM must have been a liar. How professional. Go ahead and post your sorry A** off. This will be my only post to you. Just pointing out the lies you told. Oh yea, UCF still LOST TO USF! GO BULLS!

[Joe]

Well, guess what? If you don't like the comments made by the "Home Team" fans, then don't go to the game. What do you expect from the home team when opposing fans come into a stadium?

I don't hear rude..I hear passionate people....fans who care about their team.

Go Bulls!

[more professionalism]

i was just about to link to this

http://www2.tbo.com/content/2008/sep/17/sp-ku-fans-decry-abusive-treatment/sports-colleges-bulls/ article when i read gobullsmasscomm's post.

i had never been to a USF game before the UCF/USF one on 9/6, and i had also never posted to any sports blogs before.

but i was compelled to post about the large amount of classless USF fan behavior that i witnessed before, during and after that game.

i posted about it only a little on this website, as i was mostly concerned with the unprofessional media remarks about UCF made by USF coaching staff and by grothe. for some reason i was getting the impression that the fan behavior was trickling down from leadership.

i posted more about my disgust with USF fan behavior at the sentinel site.

i am pleased to see that others from USF's own crowd and paper have taken the time to acknowledge this problem ((and that it can now be seen that my remarks weren't just some disgruntled UCF fan mouthing off without merit.))

[KG]

I am a USF alumn pre-football. I can tell you the fans have always been "routy" even during basketball season. See Louisville and the rules changed because of USF fans sitting behind opps. benches.

[Eric Cullison]

That is a disheartening article to read. That is a good find gobullsmasscomm. It really is a shame that there are USF fans that talk smack to cheerleaders and to people with children. I am all about talking smack to the other teams fans, but to throw things at people and to think that we are just some god team is rediculous. We dont want to be the next Florida fans or UCF fans.

[gobullsmasscomm]

USF fans might be the most vile creatures on Earth
posted by Tim Stephens on Sep 17, 2008
Ok, I exaggerate only slightly.

But the experience of Kansas fans visiting Raymond James Stadium last week confirmed what I saw with my own eyes at a USF game a few years ago: That Bulls fans often cross the line from fervent supporter and hostile environment to that of boorish, vulgar and vile degenerates with no respect whatsoever for visitors or any self-respect for how they represent the school they claim to support.

Even the Tampa Tribune has picked up on how the Bulls have become the Boors.

In between beer-bong chugs and frat-house immaturity, they act with the unbridled testosterone of chest-puffing steroids freaks whose jorts are too tight.

Read on ...

Some examples from the Kansas game, according to the Tribune:

KU alum Brent Kassing, 39, of Winter Park, attended the game with his cousin's family. In all, they had five children ranging in age from 4 to 15.

"I must have heard 'expletive you!' about 200 times," said Kassing, who complained to USF officials in an e-mail. "It was a terrible environment. I had never experienced that at an away game."

More from Pat Porzelt, a 1987 KU graduate who attended last week's game and described it as the "worst experience I've ever had" at a football game. She said a USF fan ran across the parking lot as she was walking into the stadium to yell at her.

"He sticks his finger in my face and says, 'Go home, you expletive Jayhawk sexual slur,' she said. "I expect to hear profanity, but it was the in-your-face hatred behind it that was different than any other stadium I've been at."

According to the Tribune, the unruly fans even aimed their nasty insults at the KU cheerleaders. And account comes from, no less, USF star quarterback Matt Grothe.

"I didn't appreciate it," Grothe said. "Some idiot of ours, every time a KU cheerleader walked by, he yelled a sexual slur over and over to each and every one. Yelling at a cheerleader? Those poor girls don't know why they're getting yelled at. It's like me going up to that guy's mom and calling her that. Is he going to like that? They should just be happy with us winning games."

Two Sentinel staffers, friends of mine, attended the Kansas game by purchasing tickets and sitting in the stands. Chris Hays, the Sentinel's NFL editor, described it like this: "It was an atmosphere of drunken, disorderly people and it was not limited to any section. It was the entire stadium. There were a lot of different cases where people were imitating sex acts in front of children -- very, very inappropriate behavior, I don't care how old you were.

"I would probably go back to a game, but I don't think I would want to go all decked out representing a different team [than USF]. It was a scene of mayhem all around. There was a drunk guy I thought was going to fall off the balcony 10 times, and security did nothing but watch the guy."

Hays' eyewitness report is similar to my own experience sitting in the stands at a USF game in 2003, long before I became the editor of college sports at the newspaper.

The group of visiting fans that I sat near was cursed throughout the game, virtually after every play. The drunken USF fans above them challenged them to fights and threw beer cups at them multiple times. They cursed in front of children. One knucklehead even threatened to punch a teenager, at which point security was called in to calm the situation. I witnessed visiting fans being cursed at as they attempted to tailgate and walk into the stadium.

The vibe of surliness and aggression was palpable.

I've attended college games at stadiums known for some of the most wild atmospheres in the country, and I have never witnessed a fan base more belligerent than USF's. It is a road trip I would recommend any visiting fan just skip.

It's sad that a few (or maybe more than a few) idiots threaten to give a bad reputation to all who attend the games. But I am not surprised.

The USF program comes with a high sense of entitlement. Because of the schools' fast rise in football and the fact that it hit the BCS conference lottery through no achievement or track record deserving of it, its fans have the bravado and arrogance of far more accomplished programs. Those same fans have not had to experience the inevitable ups and downs most programs endure, nor did they have to experience long stretches of losing that accompany most programs' rise to the top. They are spoiled. They have no humility. Some of them have no class. A few of them have no shame.

I'm also going to guess that a few of the monsters have no legal ID, if you know what I mean.

USF needs to get a grip on its fan behavior before it becomes known more for its boors than its Bulls.

Hays sums it up well.

"It may have been the best college football game I've ever seen live," he said, referring to USF's 37-34 victory. It was exciting and the atmosphere at the RayJay can rank right up there with the best venues in the nation when the 59,000 strong are cheering their team. It's just too bad that the action wasn't limited to the field."

[pch]

Regarding the lack of promotion....I was in a hotel in DC and could not find ESPN2. Got into my room toward the end of 4th (about 11 pm) and turned on ESPN Sportscenter. They acted like there wasn't even a game on. Baseball, baseball, baseball. Only ran the score in the ticker every couple of minutes.

When they finally got around to their "coverage" it was brief. Like seconds.

I understand there is a whole world of sports going on out there, but this comes back to ESPN's lack of tpromoting their own programming. I kind of expected a cutaway to the final seconds.

Nada.

[Sailingbull]

Greg,

I wasn't expecting it to come close to the promo that the USC / OSU game got. However, I was expecting to hear at least something about it. Nothing, no comercials and the crews barely even mentioned it on the College Football Daily shows last week.

[oldgreengold]

I can't remember any pre-game hype by ESPN, so I guess the audiece exceeded expectations based on the relative lack of "promotional buildup" compared to Ohio State-USC. Gosh, I'm sure we should be surprised that anyone watched the game. Probably a lot of those people thought they were tuning in to the Ohio State-USC game and were surprised when they found out they had been fooled by ESPN into believing that was the only game on last weekend.

[Steve O'Neal]

I'm with Bulliever and Stacy on this one GA. Not saying it was as big a game, but in the days leading up to the game there was practically no mention of it by ESPN. Seeing as how there was NO other game on Friday to compete with 2 top 20 teams with 2 Davey O'Brian watch list QBs going against each other, seems stupid not to at least promote a game on your own network.

[Steve Stacy]

Bulliever didn't imply that he thought the coverage of USF/KU would or could be COMPARABLE to the USC/OSU game. He just (rightly) pointed out that the overwhelming majority of ESPN's coverage (rightly) focussed on the game out West.

[Bulliever]

OSU is SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO overrated!

They got their butts beat twice in the National Championship game...And I honestly believe we could beat them this year...so does my dad...Who is an OSU alumn and has season tix...

[G.A.]

Do you guys really expect USF-Kansas to get play comparable to USC-Ohio State? You've got two top five teams, the most recognized year-in, year-out brands in college football, playing on a Saturday night on ABC -- network prime-time TV. Arguably the single biggest nonconference game of the entire season. There's no way that's going to get nearly the promotional buildup that USC-Ohio State is going to get.

[Bulliever]

Well, ESPN never hiped the game...ALL we heard about ALL week and ALL weekend was OSU v USC...

So, that would be the fault of ESPN and their poor marketing....

Sad too, because it was definately a great game...I was even suprised it did not make the "ESPN Game of the Week" . Our game was a nail biter all the way down to the final seconds...

It will be interesting to know what happens with the Thurs. PITT game and the Sun. UCONN game...

GO BULLS!

[MAL]

700,000 people missed a hell of a game.

[Windbane]

That still seems pretty good. It's gotta be higher than most Friday night games.

I said all week that the hype wasn't the same as last year. That's why it wasn't a sellout, too.

[hi]

that's 1.906 million more than UCF could wish for