Navy Football

It appears from the anecdotal posts on this thread, that lots of mids really dislike attending football games? Why? I get that it takes away some of your free time on Saturday. But so do lots of things, such as watch, training for SEALs, certain ECAs. It's not as if people are really doing a lot of studying on Saturday afternoon. It's only 5-6 games and it's not as if this is only "mandatory fun" you have at USNA. Why the "hate" for football (just curious).

Curious in part b/c, our day, we rather looked forward to games. Maybe it was b/c we were of age to drink alcohol at the tailgaters . . . ???
 
Dr. Strange Love said:
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We’re cable cutters and we don’t pay to stream ESPN.

My wife and me would be sitting center and 1st row on the north end grassy end zone .... Someone tell me afterwards if they see a Ghost-Like wisp of a person running out in the grassy area to catch a PAT or 3pt-FG ... that would be me in spirit.
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I can see you now. Great catch.
 
usna1985 said:
Curious in part b/c, our day, we rather looked forward to games. Maybe it was b/c we were of age to drink alcohol at the tailgaters . . . ???
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This.
As an in season athlete, I wasn't required to attend them but I marched on and attended just about all home games during my four years by the bay and that was well before tailgating was practiced as it is now.
 
usna1985 said:
It appears from the anecdotal posts on this thread, that lots of mids really dislike attending football games? Why?
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Yes, the tailgators (with alcohol) were certainly a benefit. It was a good chance to socialize with Upperclass and recognize them as humans instead of monsters (or worse). In fact, the whole football game experience, from march on through return to Bancroft was pretty good.

As a Midshipman, the only thing that I didn't like about football games was uniforms.. Of course it was necessary, but unfortunately uniforms don't always give you a chance to dress for the weather. I recall Summer Whites not being warm enough (and getting dirty), or SDB's being too warm.; and nothing was warm enough for Army Navy in Philadelphia. (On the other hand, Summer Whites were fine for A-N in Pasadena in 1983; sunny and warm, and the game was over in the first 3 minutes--the party after was EPIC !)
 
The other problem with uniforms at games is that USNA has to decide really early what the uniform should be. Unlike civilians, who can dress in layers and carry coats, rain gear and blankets into he stadium, mids must start out with something and stick with it. Thus, if the weather changes, you're stuck. Sometimes, USNA leadership knows the weather will change, but what to do?

IOW, if the game starts at 3:30 and it's sunny and warm as you march over, whites are perfect. Wearing your jacket would cause you to "die" of heat exhaustion. Then, the sun goes down, mids are on the shadowy side of the field, the temperature drops . . . suddenly, you're freezing but still in whites. Or there's an unexpected shower.

In our day, we had to "carry rain gear." It was this 12x8 plastic package that contained your raincoat and cape (think Batman). Carrying offered flexibility but it was a pain and made it likely you'd lose it somewhere along the way.
 
Ahhhh...Carry Rain Gear .... it had to be pretty wet to actually wear it, because it smelled really bad !
I think the Midshipman have much better rain coats now.

Was having breakfast at Chick N Ruth's on game day a few years back, and a group of USAFA Cadets came in...their raingear was way better than ours !
 
usna1985 said:
It appears from the anecdotal posts on this thread, that lots of mids really dislike attending football games? Why? I get that it takes away some of your free time on Saturday. But so do lots of things, such as watch, training for SEALs, certain ECAs. It's not as if people are really doing a lot of studying on Saturday afternoon. It's only 5-6 games and it's not as if this is only "mandatory fun" you have at USNA. Why the "hate" for football (just curious).
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Mids only "hate" football games because we're almost duty bound to "hate" mandatory fun. 90% of mids gripe about mandatory attendance, but I'd say at least 85% of mids actually enjoy the game.
 
I think part of the issue is that, for us, life in the Hall totally sucked (especially as a plebe). So a football game was a chance to have some fun. The games were also at 1330 and almost never televised. So, they were over by around 1600, which still allowed for plenty of liberty time. Also, in our day, plebes had to return to the Hall for muster at 1830 on Saturday. If we won the game, that formation was waived. (There was no such thing as an overnight/weekend for plebes in our day). Having to come back for muster totally sucked, so we would trade some of our free time for the chance to have the rest of the day/evening off.

As an aside, it was really bad for later classes b/c the team lost most of its games in our upperclass years (no relief from formation). And the drinking age was raised starting in around 1984, which created a different vibe for tailgaters.
 
I still remember the one time we had liberty on a Saturday before the game. I think it was the first game of 1982 season versus Virginia after George Welsh left Navy to become coach at Virginia. It was being televised as a 1530 or 1600 kickoff. We got like 2 hours of liberty between lunch and formation for march over, so everyone went into town and played "beat the clock". Needless to say, that was a mess. Don't think that ever happened again.
 
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