Taking back The Spectrum

If you were one of the few people who actually came to the game Saturday, you might have noticed something among the student body that we've rarely seen this year... They were having fun!!!

Saturday night, the students basically said, "F*** it" and went back to doing the things that made The Spectrum the national sensation that it is. They tried playing by the rules laid out by Scott Barnes and Stan Albrecht, and the result was the crowd dying to become the shell of its former self that we've seen for most of this year. When the students were constantly worried about what might be "over the line" or "beyond human decency", the fire and hostility that makes it such a tough venue was lost.

Despite the loss, The Spectrum was back tonight, and hopefully back to stay. Apologies to Stan and Scott, but "suck" isn't a bad word. As the student section's ruthlessness increased over the years, so did overall attendance. The locals clearly do not mind the students' behavior, and if anything, it's a selling point for them.

USU might be reporting attendance numbers like 10,048 for Saturday's game, but if you were there, you'd know it was 7,000 at absolute most. That's both a case of students not showing up, and locals who bought tickets but didn't care enough to come. If the show put on by the student section remained a shell of what it was, along with the team's struggles this year, less of the locals are going to care to even purchase tickets in the first place for games they might not attend. And if the students were to continue to cave in to the demands of the administration, they won't much care to come either, like we've already seen this year.

You would hope that Stan and Scott could have recognized that you don't go and mess with a great thing, especially one that routinely gets your university mentioned as the best in the country... you would hope...

Kudos to the students for their "screw it, let's have some fun and make this stadium great" mentality. They've made The Spectrum great, despite Stan and Scott trying to diminish that greatness. Not only that, but the students have stuck their necks (and wallets) out for Barnes since he's been here. Barnes, in return, has tried wringing the students' necks over and over for their stadium behavior.

Oddly enough, The Spectrum's return to glory came on the night of a loss. But if Barnes will just keep out of this all from now on, that return to glory will come in a big way, especially now that the fans are hungry for dominance again after an all-around rough season.