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What a Long Strange Trip It's Been

First, I did not know that you cannot play other American teams on a foreign tour. I was forgetting this is not a pre-season tournament, but a different beast altogether. Thanks, Kyle, for that info.

Second, I live a good distance from Missoula, so am not privy to much of the information local Griz fans get--interviews, newspaper articles, gossip, et. al. Fans closer to the action probably don't feel as outside the program as I often do.

That said, I'd refer you all to an old old book, "Veeck as in Wreck." I mean, we're talking OLD here, because Veeck is the one who sent the midget up to bat back in the 50's; introduced fireworks to baseball games, and started Ladies Day, among his other innovations. But one thing Veeck said always stuck with me. "If you want to know about your baseball team, go sit in the bleachers--not in the box seats or up in the press box. Those are the true fans." And Veeck did just that--often. Some of his best ideas came from fans and cab drivers.

Down here, the Oakland A's baseball franchise has been a mess. They've traded away good players because of skinflint owners, failed to build a new ballpark, and suffered greatly as just across the Bay the Giants were winning three world championships. At just about the nadir of their existence, they hired a new team president, Dave Kaval, and he so far has been great. He eagerly meets with fans, and has adopted several of their suggestions. He's promised a plan for a new ball park by the end of the year, and until he fails on any of his promises, he's getting great reaction from the press, and is re-igniting a fan base that recalls the many great years the A's have had in Oakland.

I see fans as the base of the entire sports structure. No fans? Forget that sport! How many of you attend handball tournaments, or squash matches? They may be great sports, but nobody follows them. All by way of saying, if I were running the basketball program at Montana--a program that thanks to DeCuire is humming in almost all aspects, as I have pointed out ad nauseum--I would certainly have greater outreach to fans. Starting with this board--the bleachers, if you will. That's where the passionate fans reside. And right now, as of this moment, 2:20 p.m. Missoula time, on Monday, August 7, 2017, you cannot go to GoGriz and find a single score from games played Friday and Saturday nights.

And if you can't publish the final schedule yet, why not leak some games in advance? Do we have to wait until the final schedule is out to know that we'll be playing UCLA, Stanford and Washington? The basketball department happily told me about the UCLA game when I called in June. Why so secretive? Why do we have to have intermediaries like Kyle "report" what's going on?

Maybe this is not a big deal to you, but remember, God is in the details.
 
citay said:
First, I did not know that you cannot play other American teams on a foreign tour. I was forgetting this is not a pre-season tournament, but a different beast altogether. Thanks, Kyle, for that info.

Second, I live a good distance from Missoula, so am not privy to much of the information local Griz fans get--interviews, newspaper articles, gossip, et. al. Fans closer to the action probably don't feel as outside the program as I often do.

That said, I'd refer you all to an old old book, "Veeck as in Wreck." I mean, we're talking OLD here, because Veeck is the one who sent the midget up to bat back in the 50's; introduced fireworks to baseball games, and started Ladies Day, among his other innovations. But one thing Veeck said always stuck with me. "If you want to know about your baseball team, go sit in the bleachers--not in the box seats or up in the press box. Those are the true fans." And Veeck did just that--often. Some of his best ideas came from fans and cab drivers.

Down here, the Oakland A's baseball franchise has been a mess. They've traded away good players because of skinflint owners, failed to build a new ballpark, and suffered greatly as just across the Bay the Giants were winning three world championships. At just about the nadir of their existence, they hired a new team president, Dave Kaval, and he so far has been great. He eagerly meets with fans, and has adopted several of their suggestions. He's promised a plan for a new ball park by the end of the year, and until he fails on any of his promises, he's getting great reaction from the press, and is re-igniting a fan base that recalls the many great years the A's have had in Oakland.

I see fans as the base of the entire sports structure. No fans? Forget that sport! How many of you attend handball tournaments, or squash matches? They may be great sports, but nobody follows them. All by way of saying, if I were running the basketball program at Montana--a program that thanks to DeCuire is humming in almost all aspects, as I have pointed out ad nauseum--I would certainly have greater outreach to fans. Starting with this board--the bleachers, if you will. That's where the passionate fans reside. And right now, as of this moment, 2:20 p.m. Missoula time, on Monday, August 7, 2017, you cannot go to GoGriz and find a single score from games played Friday and Saturday nights.

And if you can't publish the final schedule yet, why not leak some games in advance? Do we have to wait until the final schedule is out to know that we'll be playing UCLA, Stanford and Washington? The basketball department happily told me about the UCLA game when I called in June. Why so secretive? Why do we have to have intermediaries like Kyle "report" what's going on?

Maybe this is not a big deal to you, but remember, God is in the details.
Click to expand...

Other games have been leaked too, such as traveling to Pitt.
 
mtgrizrule said:
citay said:
First, I did not know that you cannot play other American teams on a foreign tour. I was forgetting this is not a pre-season tournament, but a different beast altogether. Thanks, Kyle, for that info.

Second, I live a good distance from Missoula, so am not privy to much of the information local Griz fans get--interviews, newspaper articles, gossip, et. al. Fans closer to the action probably don't feel as outside the program as I often do.

That said, I'd refer you all to an old old book, "Veeck as in Wreck." I mean, we're talking OLD here, because Veeck is the one who sent the midget up to bat back in the 50's; introduced fireworks to baseball games, and started Ladies Day, among his other innovations. But one thing Veeck said always stuck with me. "If you want to know about your baseball team, go sit in the bleachers--not in the box seats or up in the press box. Those are the true fans." And Veeck did just that--often. Some of his best ideas came from fans and cab drivers.

Down here, the Oakland A's baseball franchise has been a mess. They've traded away good players because of skinflint owners, failed to build a new ballpark, and suffered greatly as just across the Bay the Giants were winning three world championships. At just about the nadir of their existence, they hired a new team president, Dave Kaval, and he so far has been great. He eagerly meets with fans, and has adopted several of their suggestions. He's promised a plan for a new ball park by the end of the year, and until he fails on any of his promises, he's getting great reaction from the press, and is re-igniting a fan base that recalls the many great years the A's have had in Oakland.

I see fans as the base of the entire sports structure. No fans? Forget that sport! How many of you attend handball tournaments, or squash matches? They may be great sports, but nobody follows them. All by way of saying, if I were running the basketball program at Montana--a program that thanks to DeCuire is humming in almost all aspects, as I have pointed out ad nauseum--I would certainly have greater outreach to fans. Starting with this board--the bleachers, if you will. That's where the passionate fans reside. And right now, as of this moment, 2:20 p.m. Missoula time, on Monday, August 7, 2017, you cannot go to GoGriz and find a single score from games played Friday and Saturday nights.

And if you can't publish the final schedule yet, why not leak some games in advance? Do we have to wait until the final schedule is out to know that we'll be playing UCLA, Stanford and Washington? The basketball department happily told me about the UCLA game when I called in June. Why so secretive? Why do we have to have intermediaries like Kyle "report" what's going on?

Maybe this is not a big deal to you, but remember, God is in the details.
Click to expand...

Other games have been leaked too, such as Pitt.
Click to expand...
 
If Montana's currently known schedule was "leaked," then it was done on a public broadcast by Montana coach DeCuire.

Below, I have re-posted information I previously posted on egriz. It's been public since it was first announced.

#1 -- On April 19, Missoula talk show host Gus Tootell had an informative and entertaining show with Montana coach Travis DeCuire and assistant Chris Cobb. It's well worth listening to. Here is the link to the podcast of the show. Simply scroll to April 19 and you'll see the title of the show, which mentions Mr DeCuire and Mr Cobb by name.

http://1029espn.com/podcasts-2/

#2 -- A day or so after that radio interview, I transcribed and POSTED the following information about Montana's 2017-18 schedule, which had been announced live, on that show by coach DeCuire (I'm being a bit redundant here for emphasis!). This information wasn't "leaked." It was broadcast on Mr. Tootell's show by coach DeCuire. I am re-posting what I posted here on egriz word for word:

I listened to the lengthy radio interview with coaches DeCuire and Cobb, very well conducted by Gus Tootell of Missoula ESPN radio. Coach DeCuire said that all but three non-conference games for next season have been confirmed (not all dates are set). Of the three yet unscheduled games, two will likely be home games against non D1 opponents, with the intent to schedule one with a D1 opponent. Please note that the Legends Classic games were announced by coach DeCuire.

Otherwise, the non-con schedule will be played roughly in the following order:

• Home opener v.s. a D1 opponent (in Missoula)
• 2-3. Home games v.s. non-D1 schools
@ Penn State in game 1 of the east regional of the LEGENDS classic at State College, PA
@ Pittsburgh in game 2 of the east regional of the LEGENDS classic at Pittsburgh, PA.(Montana will NOT play in any games at Barclay Center)
@Pepperdine University in game one of the west regional of the LEGENDS CLASSIC hosted by Pepperdine U.
• AGAINST Oral Roberts University in west regional game 3 of the LEGENDS CLASSIC hosted by Pepperdine U.
• AGAINST University of California Santa Barbara (UCSB) of the LEGENDS CLASSIC bhosted by Pepperdine U.
• Cal State University Northridge (CSUN) in Missoula
• University of California UC Riverside in Missoula
@ Washington
@ UCLA
@ Stanford

#3 -- On July 17, the Legends Classic web site posted the official schedule of the sites and games for the Legends Classic. This story was also on GoGriz. Here is the link:

http://www.gazellegroup.com/main/legends/old-rivalries-renewed-legends-classic-schedule-finalized/

#4 -- During the interview with Mr. Tootell, coach DeCuire openly discussed the Costa Rica trip the team's on right now. I encourage you to listen. He's very excited about the opportunity, and describes it in depth. So... this is public information (along with other info in the interview) that Mr. DeCuire announced on April 19th. It's my belief that he would be very open to talking to any local journalist about the Montana Grizzly hoops program as soon as he returns from Costa Rica. Every time I've talked with him he has been very willing to talk (very enthusiastically, I might add) about the Montana Griz basketball program.

I can't speak for the coaches, BUT I'd bet that -- if we egrizzers convened a new Montana Hoops Fan Club composed of the egrizzers on this board -- and if we invited coach DeCuire to speak to us as fans... I'd bet that he'd say: "When & Where: I'll be there."
 
citay said:
Still no results on GoGriz, Tuesday, Aug 8, 3:30 p.m., for games played Friday and Saturday.
Click to expand...
,

Football Spring game, and scrimmage box scores were not featured on GoGriz.com either, and they were played in Missoula and Butte, and football is a waaaayyyyy bigger deal than basketball. There was a story on the spring game with some stats, but no box score.

Complain to Learfield Sports (I think) about coverage on Gogriz, be assured though that nothing will happen because Learfield could care less.

This is not just a Griz thing either. Kent State's page had an article written on Jul 7, even says to refer to their web page for updates while they were in Costa Rica.....and there is nada, zip, zero, zilch. On interesting piece I did see was that Kent State also played McGill University from Canada who was also there. I suspect that is another game we could have played since KSU was also playing Laurentian.

And get this, Kent State's twitter account has....yep, you guessed it nada, zip, zero zilch on the games in Costa Rica. You can learn a lot about their golf team though.

edit...The Bowling Green newspaper did have a running blog, and story on their participation against Laurentian tonight. The gym (pretty nice) is in the story at this link...

http://www.bgdailynews.com/sports/w...cle_e918939b-3a6d-54a2-aa43-29e638fb788d.html
 
Here's how Western Kentucky covered it.

http://www.wkusports.com/index.aspx?path=mbball

Course, it's easier to ballyhoo a win than a loss. Note: Laurentian looks like they were tougher than we thought.
 
citay said:
As I posted earlier, I felt that taking advantage of the NCAA's rule of one foreign trip every four years was a great idea, another merit badge in the coaching tenure of Travis DeCuire. It would give the team extra time to practice, to share an international experience, to bond as friends and teammates. And you would think that playing the national team of any nation would be a good thing, given they probably have been provided governmental funds to travel and compete, and are stocked with the best players that country can produce, however small that country is. It all sounded so great for us Griz nuts.

So our kids fly all day Thursday. Have you looked at a map? That's over 4000 miles, the equivalent of flying San Francisco to New York and back to Chicago. Then the very next night they play not the Costa Rica national team--HUH?--but a local-yokel "club" team, before travelling again, after one grueling flight and a game the night before, to play Laurentian University in Canada, a school that's a four and a half hour drive north from Toronto! (No, we didn't play them there, thank God!) Now,I know nothing about them, except that I'd be surprised if the school has produced a single NBA player. (Okay, surprise me!) Then our kids go to a zoo, see some crocodiles, assist at a charity, and fly back home, Chicago to New York and back to San Francisco. All in five days.

Meantime, the results of these games are delivered this way: Courier via Tica bus to the Mexican border; Greyhound bus to Boise; stagecoach to Missoula, where somebody announces the results to Kyle Sample, and he posts it to his Twitter account, with details to follow the next day. I mean, c'mon! Is there not a single member of our travelling entourage with a Twitter, Instagram or Facebook account?

But here's the crazy thing. Our friends from Laurentian University make essentially the same trip to Costa Rica. I know they're not under NCAA rules, but here's their schedule: They're there for one full week, and they play Montana, Western Kentucky (twice) and Kent State. HUH? You mean those teams are all there at the same time, but we play only a local-yokel "club" team and Laurentian? Why can't we stay an extra few days and play those teams too? Wouldn't those be great tests for our kids?

As I say, what a long strange trip it's been. For those on this board who care, I will be following up on this, going to my "sources" in quest of answers. I'm guessing, as always, I'll be following the money trail: Lack of funding. I probably need to go back and read in more detail that story about how this trip got funded. But, jeez, it seems if you have one opportunity every four years to take your team on an international jaunt, this is the cheapest, stupidest, worst possible way to have done it.

http://www.thesudburystar.com/2017/07/19/voyageurs-mens-cagers-get-early-start-on-season
Click to expand...

What will it take Citay? We're so far behind WKU and Kent State how will we ever catch Gonzaga and Wisconsin?

Do you work and the Napa cheese and whine shop?

Heard it's smoky and no bball kids got in trouble in Missoula last weekend though.
 
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