The PR move of the day belongs to Knoxville, and legendary head coach Pat Summitt's (and women's sports marketing director Jimmy Delaney's) efforts to get more students to attend University of Tennessee women's hoops games…giving away FREE TUITION…the story ran on AP this morning and I found it on lohud.com…pretty unique idea if you can afford it…
And on to college football. It has always intrigued that college football, much like soccer, are Madison Avenue darlings when it comes to exposure and dollars spent. Every Saturday you will find bars around Manhattan filled with loyal alumni following their teams…yet try and find a New Yorker who has been to a game in the tri-state area, an.attendance is non-existant. The Garden State Bowl and the Kickoff Classic have both gone the way of the buffalo, and Rutgers lack of onfield success this year has sent media to other parts of th.country on Saturday afternoons…the niche stories will always surface, like the great one by Pete Thaniel in today's Times on the Harvard-Yale game and the Harvard playe.Noah Van Niel who will be an opera star after today's game ends, but the feel of going to a “big” college game is lost in the canyons of the Apple.?
And the same holds true for professional soccer. I LOVED taking my kids to see the Red Bulls at Giants Stadium twice this year, LOVE coaching girls soccer, LOVED the movie on the Cosmos tha.came out last year, LOVED the movie running on cable now called GOAL: The Dream Begins, yet still don’t see the transfer over in New York despite the millions companies spend on the sport, the adulation of Beckham Don Garber has a wide ranging interview also online in today's Times that answers some questions, but still doesnt explain the lack of passionate following of the Red Bulls, or the interest in the new MISL team (does anyone kno.) that will play in the Prudential Center (the Ironmen) starting on December 1, and will have PELE as a guest.
Lastly, another plus to the Nets, the first NBA team (other than the Celtics of course, and some NBA teams on St. Patrick's Day) to go green…another great move by Barry Baum, listed in yesterday's Bergen Record and attached here…I got the chance yesterday to speak to a few hundred kids at Manhattanville College's open house for sports management yesterday, and it was great to see young people there taking notes and asking questions…I also got to meet one of the hardest working reporters face to face for the first time, Barry Wilner of AP. Barry went from speaking to signing two of his books, just out, including one on the Harvard-Yale game (which of course will be for the Ivy title today)..?
