Skip the Dance, But Don’t Miss the Game

Winter seems to be bearing down on the valley. The first traces of snow can be seen on the tops of the mountains. It’s cold. And my classes suddenly got a lot harder. All of it is just signs of the times I suppose, which makes me think of two things: inversions and basketball season.

I hate inversions. I think someone should do a study on how an inversion makes people depressed. At least they have that effect on me. It’s ugly and it’s not healthy. Every time I pass an idling, parked car in the winter, I just want to kick its tires and kick its owner too. I hate inversions.

The only solace I take throughout all of my anger is the joy of watching our men’s basketball team. I love the Spectrum. Games are crazy, students really get into it and we win. Maybe that’s most of the fun – we actually win. And the crowd plays a big part in that.

Every time you read a newspaper article about a USU men’s basketball game, it always mentions the crowd. Just this week, I looked at ESPN’s Web site to check out the preview of the WAC conference. It said:

“Utah State owns visiting teams like Oprah does daytime television ratings. The Aggies have lost two or fewer home games for nine straight years and are 98-9 in seven seasons under [Coach] Morrill in the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum. It seats more than 10,000 and is an absolute nightmare for anyone not wearing navy and white.”

And this year, instead of Cal-State Fullertons and Cal-State Northridges of the Big West, we get the Nevadas and Fresno States of the WAC. I’m excited. But in the meantime, we bide our time with football season.

Coincidentally, the football team’s coach, Brent Guy, attended an Aggie basketball game as one of his first exposures to USU. Needless to say, he was impressed. Who wouldn’t be?

After the football team’s win against UNLV, Guy said to a Statesman reporter, “We want to turn Romney into the Smith Spectrum. We like to have it loud and intimidating.”

Of course, it’s always a lot easier to cheer on a winning team, Coach.

But USU, at one time, did have the powerhouse football team in the state. Why can’t we return to the old glory days? Our basketball team smashed each of its in-state foes (Utah, BYU, Weber State) by an average of more than 20 points last year. Wouldn’t it be fun if our football team did the same?

We might be a way off of that goal, but we do have good playmakers out on the field and a coach with his head on straight. But we could always use a good crowd to back them up.

We pulled out a close game against our Mountain West opponent, UNLV. The crowd really got into it. But you still look around and see a lot of empty seats. If we packed Romney Stadium, that place could really get rocking.

After the victory, Coach Guy and the team came over to the student section to sing the school song. It was kind of fun. It’s something we’re not really used to with our football team, you know winning and all. But they want us to be part of the game.

So, while everyone goes about complaining about a Homecoming dance, I say no big deal. Cut a rug if you want. If you don’t, don’t sweat it. Most of us can’t dance anyway. But we can cheer on our team.

So go ahead and skip the controversial Homecoming pseudo-dance if you want. But whatever you do, don’t miss the football game. They need our support.

Show ’em your “A” game.

Jon Cox is a senior majoring in print journalism. Comments can be sent to jcox@cc.usu.edu.