With the football team no longer traveling to Notre Dame, and the MSU and Ohio games being moved to the same year, the Michigan Marching Band no longer has a trip on odd years. This got me thinking about a new location that the band should travel to. For me, I believe that the bad should travel to Penn State every odd year. What are your thoughts?
Support MGoBlog: buy stuff at Amazon
Where should the MMB travel now that Notre Dame is off the schedule?
Has to be PSU. We have brought them there a couple of times.
at State College were all Homecoming games and their Alumni band took 2nd billing. I really doubt the band would have PSU as an option. Unfotunately, I was at all 3 of those game - but the drugs I'm taking are starting help me forget the games ...
It'll probably be Rutgers ...
Go Blue!
Maybe it'll change under Franklin, but I'm pretty sure JoePa had a no-opponent's-band policy, which is why I never remember PSU bringing their band to the Big House...
State College is tricky because they require the band to actually sit in the stands. In 2006, the MMB was slated to go because the football staff specifically asked for it. The travel and lodging was completely set up, the money was there, everything was all in line. PSU put the kibosh on it because they didn't have seating. If the MMB were to do State College (and it would be tough, considering it's a pretty lengthy drive each way and flying is cost prohibitive), the decision would have to be made quite early so PSU can plan on it.
To give a little background, B1G rules always allow for opposing bands or sanctioned pep bands (i.e., the MMB can't just informally send 15 kids with regular tickets and their instruments--it has to be approved), but it's on the host school to both approve it and have somewhere to put them. No one is ever going to flat-out say no, but there are legitimate reasons why proposed visits don't work out, for one reason or another.
Isnt MSU OSU only on the same year this year beacuse of the 2 in a row for MSU at home?
M is at MSU and OSU in 2014, and then both are home in 2015
Unless the Big Ten is going to give us two consecutive home games against MSU down the road to compensate, this is the new normal - MSU and OSU on the same yearly alignment.
Yeah, we're basically going to alternate awesome and terrible home schedules every year from here on out, if the Big Ten doesn't somehow rectify this. I don't understand how they couldn't figure out how to avoid this. Someone posted earlier pointing out that all they had to do was flip a couple of games (I think involving Indiana and Minnesota) and they could have had us hosting MSU next year.
I don't know if Brandon could have done anything. In the case of the OSU game, both schools were crying foul, and that was the conference's marquee matchup anyway - the media thought it was sacrilege to move the Game, too. In the case of Michigan-MSU, MSU probably has no problem with the game flipping over like this, and neutral observers probably don't care that much either way. I don't think the Big Ten intended to screw it up like this, but they probably also didn't really care to rectify it, either.
He could have said we are fucking Michigan and we want it changed. Brandon gets way to much blame here, but he should have pushed back hard on this.
I'd be inclined to agree, but my impression was he used a lot of his sway in that respect, what, a year before by demanding both that Michigan and Ohio State be in separate divisions and that The Game remain the last week of the season. DB went to bat hard on that. Sure, we're Michigan, but you can only go into the conference meetings swinging your dick around so many times before the other guys really start resenting you more than they already do.
I wouldn't get too upset about having back-to-back games in East Lansing as a byproduct of the confernece realigning and expanding. How do you make it a non-issue? Win those games.
Here's a plus side to the conference realignment--annual games with Penn State. That didn't always happen when the conference was at eleven teams and it certainly wasn't assured when Nebraska joined the conference either.
Michigan's Eastern Division Big Ten games are as follows for odd and even numbered years in the upcoming seasons:
Odd - Ohio State, Michigan State, Rutgers, at Penn State, at Indiana, at Maryland
Even - at Ohio State, at Michigan State, at Rutgers, Penn State, Indiana, Maryland
It's clear the conference ranked Michigan's top two opponents in the Eastern Division as Ohio State and Penn State--that's why those two games are home and away. I also suspect they wanted UM to play on the East Coast once per year, so that's why Rutgers and Maryland alternate as home and away games.
That left Indiana and Michigan State as the two remaining teams. I suspect the reason why they opted to have OSU/MSU either both at home or on the road is that it synched up with adding a major Western Division opponent, i.e., Wisconsin or Nebraska to balance out the home/road schedule. Here's Michigan's conference schedules from 2016 to 2019 when the Big Ten goes to a nine game slate (W stands for Western Division):
2016 (Home) - Penn State, Wisconsin (W), Maryland, Indiana, Illinois (W)
2016 (Away) - at Ohio State, at Michigan State, at Rutgers, at Iowa (W)
2017 (Home) - Ohio State, Michigan State, Rutgers, Minnesota (W)
2017 (Away) - at Penn State, at Wisconsin (W), at Maryland, at Indiana, at Purdue (W)
2018 (Home) - Penn State, Wisconsin (W), Nebraska (W), Maryland, Indiana
2018 (Away) - at Ohio State, at Michigan State, at Rutgers, at Northwestern (W)
2019 (Home) - Ohio State, Michigan State, Rutgers, Iowa (W)
2019 (Away) - at Penn State, at Wisconsin (W), at Maryland, at Indiana, at Illinois (W)
The portion of the schedule that Brandon can control is the non-confernce portion of it. The 2014 slate doesn't look very impressive and it looks even worse because the home game with Michigan State was moved back to East Lansing.
But from 2015 to 2019, you'll note that there are no MAC teams on the schedule (Ball State was moved to the 2020 season). UM is moving away from Miami (Ohio) and Bowling Green to play Hawaii, UNLV, Cincinnati, etc. Competition wise, that's something of a step up for the teams on the lower end of the non-conference schedule scale.
I am pleased to be in the East Divsion, and I agree that playing PSU annually is a plus. Just wish they didn't have to bunch up MSU and OSU like this. It was nice for our fans to have one of our rivals coming to town each year.
Give them a weekend in NYC.
if by weekend in NYC you mean a 12 hour bus ride out there on friday, couple hours of practice, the game, and then a 12 hour bus ride back.... because thats how that trip would probably end up
I think the "bad" should travel to Columbus and stay there.
"This got me thinking about a new location that the band should travel to."
This is MICHIGAN, Sir...and we don't end our sentences in prepositions.
...I was setting someone up for the classic joke...
This got me thinking about a new location that the band should travel to, asshole.
Sheesh.
you gotta give a guy more than 2 minutes when you have a setup like that to reply to. Asshole... ;)
The MMB tried to go to Penn State several times in the early '00s. The issue was that PSU wouldn't give them sufficient seating in the stands and wouldn't put them on the field. Maybe with new leadership they'll allow the MMB to go there, though it is a very long trip by bus.
If not PSU they'll probably travel to wherever is closest, since shorter trips are cheaper and the AD foots most of the bill. West Lafayette, Bloomington, and Evanston will be the likely destinations.
The Final Four.
Duh.
I also read somewhere that Maryland doesn't allow opposing bands in their stadium, which is supremely stupid. Maybe the conference will force them to drop that idiocy.
Given that we are financially bailing out their athletic department, they should be willing to budge on some of their policies.
So I can't blame them. If I remember correctly, they didn't have much of a band themselves when I lived there.
I'd be shocked if it weren't Penn State.
But Penn State is weird. On two different occasions, the MMB had requested to travel to Beaver Stadium for some huge games and PSU said no both times. They said yes in 1999 and 2001 but no in 1997 and 2006. So I guess it will depend on what mood they are in. They never say no to OSU's band going to their place.
I'm surprised the conference does not have a uniform rule about this.
Please say no again PSU! Besides, doesn't the band have awful seats in the stadium? Far from the playing field?
2001 was extra messed up because the MMB committed to going, then all of the sudden Athletics agreed to the Cold War on the same day and wanted the whole band there. The MMB had to send a pathetically small pep band to State College, and the rest of the MMB to the Cold War. The only problem was the MMB had agreed to do a fundraiser concert at some high school in Pennsylvania, and the school was really banking on the money it would have brought. The MMB cancelled, they cried foul, and the whole thing turned into a press release crossfire between Michigan and this random high school in Bumblefuck, PA.
TO YOUR MOM'S HOUSE.
OR DAD'S
I really wish they could travel to all away games.
Some schools do send a pep band to every away game.
Then Michigan should do that. I'd like to hear the fight song every time Michigan scores.
I hear it inside my head.
(My imaginary friend sings it to me)
quite a bit ... We do sing The Victors after every score !
Go Blue!
That is greatly appreciated, but it cannot be heard on TV. I understand the costs involved with traveling, but...but...but....I WANT THEM THERE!
To whichever David Brandon Special game they have that year. Like the Florida game in Dallas.
Do you mean Alabama?
Space, bitches. Space.
Evanston would be fun. There's always such a large Michigan turnout there it would feel exactly like a home game (minus ~60,000 people).
The Rose Bowl. Where else?
Just on the odd years?
Would you leave them home on the even years? We don't want to burn the band out making them travel to the Rose Bowl every year.
Why would the band go to the Rose Bowl? Wouldn't they be at the college football playoff?
Where does the band want to go? I would want to see the band go to PSU, but if I were a band member, I wouldn't mind going to a different school as well. If we go to E.L & Columbus every two years, maybe on the off years, we could go to PSU & have the other trip vary. For instance, going to Nebraska, Wisconsin, Rutgers, and Northwestern on a rotation could be pretty neat.
Do we get 2 home games against MSU in a row? I know we won't, but should we?
Also agree that Penn State makes the most sense. A Rutgers/Maryland would be interesting for a welcome to B1G football tradition to those schools and nice for east coast alum though. Northwestern would probably just be hilarious.
Well we clearly "should" get two home games in a row out of fairness but that would make the entire exercise of going to East Lansing two years in a row pointless. The point is to get the game in EL in even years and AA in odd years so if they played two straight road games the schedule would go back to the way it was before.
MSU/OSU should always flip.
They could work it out year-by-year, like when we play Northwestern or Purdue (middle of nowhere, but the stadium isn't actually that bad for its size). Fuck going to Indiana.
Penn State is the obvious one. Maybe they'll do a better job than in previous years.
Just send them to ComicCon and they'll never bitch again. That, or Wrestlemania.
Send them to Dallas every year, even if we aren't playing there.
For 2015 I would send them to Maryland and Penn State
I look at it this way: If the MMB could do railroad trips to Minneapolis in the 40s, and was still going as far as Minneapolis, Madison, Champaign, and West Lafayette on a regular basis as late as the 1980s, there's no reason most schools aside from Maryland and Rutgers should be off the table. Aside from the pep band trip to PSU in 2001 and the full-band trip to Champaign in 2000, it's been 100% East Lansing, Columbus, and South Bend for 15 years. There are reasons for that, but the status quo is changing in a number of ways.
Sure, you don't want to go through the expense to send 250 people to Bloomington, but there should be some wiggle room to do something interesting for the team, the band, and the fans here and there. Northwestern, for instance, could be fun for the huge Chicago alumni contingent. And it's not a pushover game anymore.
You, sir, are spot on. M's band-in band speak-has a legacy equally formidable to those that suit up infootball gear, relatively speaking of course. Our band's tradition is,and I have no way of measuring this, is probably as great to those that follow this type of stuff than is our football program's inarguable tradition of no. 1 based on the most solid of criteria, including accomplishments you are all aware of, but just in case an outsider is lurking and wants to argue, I'll make it simple: all-time no of wins, all-time winning percentage, wrestled away from ND at the same time-mid 70s- as they were closing in on all time wins. As we distanced ourselves in terms of all-time wins, the College Football Warehouse added to our prestige by compiling an all-time SOS, measured by mathematical data for every year the game has been played, and once again we finished no. 1. My reaction, after reading this and considering our head-to-head advantage against ND-and who can really argue that is not the most decisive measure?- is they were awared a lot of NCs that should have been ours. in regard to wins, the winning percentage title was finally ours w/in a few more decades. They can certainly claim what they want but they have no data to support their purported claim of most NCs excecpt Rockne's appeal to the AP, which they use as unequivocal proof, but still refuse to acknowledge their premature crowning in '47 prior to the bowl games and subsequently reversed in Michigan's favor by "their only recognized source for such proclomation." You simply can't have it both ways, saying, "The AP is the only recognized source(no matter the number of catholic writers at that time) but when they vote against you refuse to recognize it. ^Sorry, their hypocrisy in that regard always gets me going. Back to the band. They have, I believe, not unlike those they support on the field, led the way for over 100 years on what a college marching band should be. They gave their fiercest rivalry the script Ohio, perhaps as a spelling lesson, but once ,repeated every Saturday thereafter. Damn, times were simpler. You could actually do nice things for your opponent like the above and a stadium full of OH boosters giving Mr.Harmon a standing ovation, probably considered sacrilege today. ^In Bo's book, Tradition, he devoted an entire chapter to how important the band was to his team. The long-time director would often ask Bo if the team needed the band after a particular practice. If Bo gave a nod in the affirmative, just as the entire team were hanging its collective head after a brutal practice, those heads would soon rise in unison when they heard the familiar music of The Victors as the band marched their way toward the practice field and as difficult as that particular practice had been the team immediately remembered where and why they were. Along with owning claim-as voted,by well everyone that counts- as possessing the greatest fight song in college sports, many forget the first public playing of this song was led by none other than John Philip Sousa, the only Director of the Marching Band we were tested on in elementary school. Fuck, this band has the song, the history, the introduction of same introduced by the greatest conductor of such music in that era that it has earned the right to play where and when it wants within budgetary boundaries. The Director of the MMB is held to the same level of esteem by his colleagues as former M fb coaches were. Further needn't be said.
Huh, well, there's that.