I was born and raised in El Paso, in far West Texas. Not quite the end of the world, but you can see it from there.
El Paso is home of the Sun Bowl, home stadium of my favorite team on the planet, the UTEP Miners. I grew up watching bad football and great basketball seemingly every season. That changed in the late 1980s when current Athletic Director Bob Stull became the head football coach prior to the 1986 campaign. The good guys went 4-7, then 7-4 in 1987. 1988 was a great year, as the Miners won 10 games and actually made it to a postseason bowl game.
But at 1-10, 1985 was another lost season for UTEP football. The one highlight was a 23-16 upset win at home over BYU. Head Coach Bill Yung got sacked during the season. The Miners actually played the final game of the '85 schedule in Australia against the Wyoming Cowboys, who had already fired Head Coach Al Kincaid.
The game was played at VFL Park (now Waverley Park, training grounds for Hawthorn) in Mulgrave, Victoria, a suburb of Melbourne. 19,107 curious Australians came out to watch the game, and to watch the Miners give up a two-touchdown lead and fall to the Cowboys 23-21.
I was reminded of this game because California and Hawaii played in Sydney at the start of this current college football season. It was actually the first college game played this season. The Bears beat the Rainbows 51-31 on August 27, 2016 at ANZ Stadium, formerly Olympic Stadium. It's weird since the Sydney Swans closed the 2016 home-and-away season 11 miles away at the SCG with a 164-51 home win over Richmond in a match that started maybe an hour after the Cal/UH game ended.
I just find it interesting that the Swans gave up a home game for the college event. However it seems logical that some sort of agreement was reached to balance the books, since Sydney played to a house of 36,000 vs. 61,000+ at ANZ.
Elsewhere...
The 2017 AFL fixture is out. Something I found interesting is that Gold Coast and Port Adelaide play their round 8 tilt at Jiangwan Stadium in Shanghai, China on May 14.
Showing posts with label Hawthorn. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hawthorn. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 8, 2016
Saturday, July 9, 2016
Holiday
This week is causing me to be more creative, as I'm visiting family in Texas this week.
Typically I spend the weekend and first part of the week watching the footy and sharing my thoughts later on in the week. But the wife and I flew out on Independence Day (no traffic and no lines at the airport!), so I didn't get a chance to watch the matches in their entirety.
What I wound up doing was checking out the first part of the game, a little through the middle, and then the last five minutes or so. The score bug is in the corner of the screen, so I could stop at a place where it looked good.
I recorded three games in round 14 two weeks ago (playing a little catch up here)-- I was a little bummed that I recorded only the last quarter and a half of Adelaide/North Melbourne, which the Crows won by 33 points. I got over it pretty quickly, since I still got St. Kilda/Geelong and Hawthorn/Gold Coast.
St. Kilda vs. the Geelong Cats was likely the best match of round 14, with the Saints getting a big first-half lead and then having to rally from nine down late to win by three points. Their rally got help because of Geelong's substitution patterns, as two of the guys the Cats really needed out there were waiting to re-enter after taking one last breather. However St. K kept the pressure on and Geelong couldn't get their studs back in. The Saints move to 6-7 after the big win.
I expected the Hawthorn and Gold Coast game to be a bit of a blowout, as the Hawks seemingly are rounding into premiership form, but GC made them work in a 26-point Hawthorn win. This was a home match for the Hawks, played in Launceston, Tasmania. I like the wide camera shots during the games that are played there, as they really show off the countryside in the distance. Hawthorn also wore guernseys with brown and pink vertical stripes instead of their standard brown and gold, to help raise breast cancer awareness.
The Hawks moved to the top of the AFL ladder with the win. It was also fun to see the Suns' Gary Ablett back and playing well after spending most of the last two seasons battling shoulder trouble.
A few other things...
Fremantle's winning streak stopped at three in Round 14 after a beating from a Collingwood side that really needed a win, and Richmond got well against a struggling Brisbane Lions side.
Now the trick has been to stay out of the Twitterverse, as the games I've recorded have already been played, and I saw the AFL feed on my timeline, so I have to shut my eyes or distract myself as I scroll further down as round 16's results come across. There's a two-hour time difference from when I'm at home, so I'm being extra careful.
Round 15's report is still to come.
Typically I spend the weekend and first part of the week watching the footy and sharing my thoughts later on in the week. But the wife and I flew out on Independence Day (no traffic and no lines at the airport!), so I didn't get a chance to watch the matches in their entirety.
What I wound up doing was checking out the first part of the game, a little through the middle, and then the last five minutes or so. The score bug is in the corner of the screen, so I could stop at a place where it looked good.
I recorded three games in round 14 two weeks ago (playing a little catch up here)-- I was a little bummed that I recorded only the last quarter and a half of Adelaide/North Melbourne, which the Crows won by 33 points. I got over it pretty quickly, since I still got St. Kilda/Geelong and Hawthorn/Gold Coast.
St. Kilda vs. the Geelong Cats was likely the best match of round 14, with the Saints getting a big first-half lead and then having to rally from nine down late to win by three points. Their rally got help because of Geelong's substitution patterns, as two of the guys the Cats really needed out there were waiting to re-enter after taking one last breather. However St. K kept the pressure on and Geelong couldn't get their studs back in. The Saints move to 6-7 after the big win.
I expected the Hawthorn and Gold Coast game to be a bit of a blowout, as the Hawks seemingly are rounding into premiership form, but GC made them work in a 26-point Hawthorn win. This was a home match for the Hawks, played in Launceston, Tasmania. I like the wide camera shots during the games that are played there, as they really show off the countryside in the distance. Hawthorn also wore guernseys with brown and pink vertical stripes instead of their standard brown and gold, to help raise breast cancer awareness.
The Hawks moved to the top of the AFL ladder with the win. It was also fun to see the Suns' Gary Ablett back and playing well after spending most of the last two seasons battling shoulder trouble.
A few other things...
Fremantle's winning streak stopped at three in Round 14 after a beating from a Collingwood side that really needed a win, and Richmond got well against a struggling Brisbane Lions side.
Now the trick has been to stay out of the Twitterverse, as the games I've recorded have already been played, and I saw the AFL feed on my timeline, so I have to shut my eyes or distract myself as I scroll further down as round 16's results come across. There's a two-hour time difference from when I'm at home, so I'm being extra careful.
Round 15's report is still to come.
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