The Virginian-Pilot
©
NORFOLK
When is Foreman Field going to rock?
So far, Old Dominion has played 16 games at refurbished S.B. Ballard Stadium at Foreman Field. At times, it has been quiet enough during play to carry on a conversation.
Danielle Buxton, president of the Monarch Maniacs, wants to change that.
She hopes a tradition starts tonight when the Monarchs host Massachusetts in their first Colonial Athletic Association home game. Kickoff is set for 7:07 p.m.
"My biggest thing, my biggest challenge, is to try to get the students to stand up throughout an entire game," said Buxton, a senior majoring in sports management and communications. "Too often we get a comfortable lead, people sit down, and the next thing you know they've started talking with the person next to them and lost track of what's going on out on the field."
There have been exceptions. For the opening game of the inaugural season, in 2009, the crowd was electric. When I-64 rival William and Mary made an appearance in 2010, the place was full of enthusiasm.
But typically, many fans have been late to arrive and early to leave, if they come at all.
Two weeks ago when Hampton University visited Foreman Field, the in-house crowd was 12,157, although the day's bad weather was likely a factor.
ODU officials hope tonight's forecast - clear skies and an expected temperature of 59 degrees at kickoff - and the added bonus of a "blackout" will rev the crowd.
"When we had the 'whiteout' last year for the William and Mary game, it really got the crowd charged and created great energy," ODU coach Bobby Wilder said. "I'm hoping the same thing happens with the 'blackout.' "
Buxton has no illusions of having the entire stadium stand throughout the game, but hopes that in the not-so-distant future some type of tradition, something along the lines of Florida State's tomahawk chop, catches on with ODU fans.
If ODU rips off someone else's tradition and makes it their own, the Monarchs won't be alone. Oklahoma's famous "Boomer Sooner" fight song is a rip-off of Yale's "Boola Boola."
It happens.
And years later nobody is the wiser.
Notes: ODU T Ryan Jensen, expected to miss Saturday's game because of a torn biceps, has been practicing this week and is expected to play.... DT Ronnie Cameron has been named as one of 127 candidates for the National Football Foundation's National Scholar-Athlete Awards.
Rich Radford, (757) 446-2463, rich.radford@pilotonline.com
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Tradition
Try to establish a unique tradition. It really looks lame and stupid when the Fightin' Gobblers take the field in Blacksburg and the team has to touch the "hokie stone". Like Clemson did have have "Howard's Rock" in place about 50 years ago. Be more original than the Fightin' Gobblers please!!!
ODU Tradition
It has been and continues to be a tradition at ODU games, whether football or basketball, to arrive late and leave early. They have not figured out what half time is for. It is a rude tradition, which I hope will go away before basketball season starts and I have to persevere those late comers while trying to watch the game from the second row back. Like theater, if the fans are not in their seats at the start of the game, the staff should make them wait to be seated until intermission. Maybe that would convince them to be on time. The worst offenders are the aka Big Blue Club members who languish in the bar till the game starts and then appears as if they own the place, disrupting the view of fan already seated.
It will help her cause if
It will help her cause if ODU security doesn't kick people out for standing too much. It happens, in the student section no less. And not because they're obnoxiously drunk.