STFU and Let Temple Build a Stadium on Campus

One week of college football was enough to fall in love with the sport all over again, like we do each fall. Last week, we saw a 34 point comeback in the second half and a double overtime thriller that ended on a failed two point conversion…and that wasn’t even part of Saturday’s slate of games. No year of college football is the same, and it’s time for some new stories to be written.

For the AAC, the new season brings another chance to strengthen their campaign to become the 6th “power conference”. Unfortunately, while the American has seen plenty of talent in its brief existence, it has merely been a stepping stone for coaches to launch themselves into a spot with a major Power 5 program. The top of the AAC is a lot like a bunch of crabs in a bucket, fighting tooth and nail, ripping each others limbs off to get out. The top schools are on the cusp of breaking through, garnering the national respect and recognition they so desire. They are a few tweaks away from having a legitimate case for a Power 5 conference to scoop them up and take them to the promise land filled with money trees.

One of the tweaks some of that would help a couple of these schools would be a new stadium. For instance, check out USF’s plan for a new state of the art stadium. If you’re familiar with Tampa, you know they play “home games” 45 minutes away from the actual school:

Now that’s pretty effin cool. If I’m a recruit, I wouldn’t mind playing four years there. But this shit, ain’t gonna get it done:

That is Temple University’s current football stadium situation and wow, is that just plain ugly. To be fair to Temple, they are also considering building a brand spanking new, $100 million stadium right on campus. While it would absolutely be an upgrade over this half ass effort, the stadium campaign has hit a few snags.

The first of said snags is the money. Reportedly, after estimating the stadium would cost $100 million, that number is actually going to be a lot higher. I don’t blame the Board of Trustees for throwing up the red flag on that one. I won’t even pay for extra chicken or Guac at Chipotle. But, another issue the university has run into is backlash from a portion of the student community who is highly opposed to the stadium construction.

These people, when they aren’t campaigning for Bernie Sanders 2020 or looking for a bridge to live under once they get their arts degree, spend their time protesting the stadium on campus. They are the kids who just don’t get it. Better team= more television time= more applicants= more money. It is not a hard concept to grasp. The year Temple won 10 games including their first 7 and ended up on College Gameday was the same year the university set a record for total number of applicants. I would bet all the money I just paid Temple to go there that maybe, just maybe, there’s a correlation there. Let me know when the Temple mock trial team is prime-time on ABC on a Saturday night and I’ll be sure to tune in.

Look, I know it’s 2017 so everyone has to be mad about something, or everything, all the time. This is where I have to draw the line when you interfere with my football. Here’s the oppositions arguments discredited as quickly as possible:

• “Think about the locals!”
  • Yeah, think about all the jobs a stadium would create for them.
• “Where would you put an enormous stadium at in the middle of the city?”
  • I would hate to destroy the picturesque, scenic environment that is North Philadelphia. You’re not exactly cutting down the Red Woods Forest here.
• “It will cause so much traffic!”
  •  Have you ever been a game up in State College? There’s going to be traffic. It’s Philadelphia, I think we will handle it.

You didn’t cut seven sports teams so you could fall to the middle of the pack in a conference for the island of misfit toys and play on ESPN3 every weekend. Build your stadium and get yourself to the ACC so you can watch the money roll in. Go Owls.