Keep The Feet Planted Firmly

It’s almost time folks. We are only weeks away from the start of perhaps the most anticipated season in WVU history. Both as a team and for a few individuals, I don’t remember us ever receiving this much attention. But just as we’re getting lots of hype, equally we’re getting lots of nay-saying. Of course, that doesn’t bother me one bit. Analysts and sports writers don’t decide the outcome in college footb….er, never mind. That’s for a later discussion.

What I have seen a lot of in reading about this team and this season is the comparison between this WVU team and the team from a few years ago. The article on CollegeFootballNews.com in the previous post alluded to the 2004, 8-4 season as though it were a disappointment. And they aren’t the first to do so.

My response….

What? Disappointing?

Before this season gets underway, what every Mountaineer fan needs to do, for their own health and for the health of this program, is take a step back and think about what it means to be a WVU fan and think real hard about how we define a successful season and a ‘disappointing’ season.

If you had come to me a few years ago and said that we were going to have a “disappointing” 8-4 season, I wouldn’t even understand the syntax of that sentence. How do you have an 8-4 season and a New Years Day Bowl birth and call it a bad year?

I’ve watched college football for years and every year my stomach would turn when I saw analysts talking about how programs were in ‘rebuilding years’ or having ‘down’ periods when they only won 8, 9, or even 10 games in a season. All I could think was how I would love to win like that every year. What else can you call that but success?

Apparently the fans of those programs thought differently, though. Coaches at powerhouse schools were chased out of town because they lost 1 or 2 games a year. In some cases, if they lost to their conference rival (i.e. Big Ten rivalries) it didn’t matter how many games they won they were on the hot seat. How could these fans not appreciate what their programs had accomplished? They won and they won consistently. They couldn’t win a national championship every year, but every year they were contenders. They were on the map. Hell, up until a few years ago, they were the map.

These fans, critics and analysts didn’t appreciate the experience of winning with these teams, but more importantly, they didn’t appreciate the experience of losing. Granted, it might be because they didn’t have as much practice as others. But without the losses, the wins just didn’t mean as much.

And that’s not what I want to see happen to us.

After all, isn’t that what being a WVU fan is all about? Isn’t that why we have that flying WV tattooed on our hearts like a badge of honor? Not because a few guys at ESPN have jumped on the bandwagon, trying to be the first ones to say they called it when the improbable underdog makes a run at the prize. But that’s not why we are so proud.

We are proud because we remember where we came from. We are proud because we went 3-8 just 5 years ago. We are proud because we went 16 years between bowl wins. (And, by the way, how sweet was that win when we finally got it?) There is a brotherhood (and sisterhood, ladies) of Mountaineer fans; a common love that binds us together like family because we’ve been through the good and the bad. Its the bad times that make the good seem even better, and the good times make the bad seem almost nostalgic.

I hear a lot of analysts say that we aren’t going to sneak up on anybody like we have the last couple of years. And they’re right. We are moving up the echelon of the college football ranks. But I still remember a time when it was a big deal if we even got the opportunity to play on national television. It was an event, and usually a massacre. But it was us and we were on TV. Everyone in the country got to watch us play. Even though we got blown out by Ohio State or Miami or Penn State, the exposure made me proud. On that day, people everywhere knew we were here.

And now here we are again. The scene has changed so dramatically, and I recognize that and I appreciate our current level of respect. Make no mistake, I don’t want to sell this team short. They’ve got the talent to play for the whole shebang. Nor am I trying to cushion the blow for myself and everyone else if they lose a game or two. But I have made a conscious effort not to buy into the hype. I will cheer every game, one game at a time and most importantly, I will remember that an 8-4 season is a winning season. Period. For the sake of this football program, as true Mountaineer fans, don’t allow yourselves to forget that either.