Quote:
Originally Posted by Logan
How does the city not being devoted to one team specifically = "New York doesn't give a shit about college football"? Seriously, have you ever been there on Saturdays? Go and find any decent sized bar that isn't dedicated as the alumni spot or the gamewatch party for any large school. I can probably go down the top 25 and name you two bars for each school off the top of my head.
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The New York Nielsen market includes North Jersey, Long Island, Rockland/Westchester, Fairfield County CT, the PA county next to Sussex, and the Upstate NY counties south of Ulster. The low ratings for college football aren't surprising. There is only one BCS school in the market, which traditionally (until the past decade) hasn't been a part of the bowl season, and is mostly relevant in only 1/3 of the market. Corollaries to this include: state schools in the Northeast generally don't play at the BCS level, NY has a very decentralized state school system; and with the concentration of private schools in the region, northeasterners tend to view their state schools as safety schools (for better or worse) rather than their dream destination. These all play a role in a northeastern apathy towards State U football.
Sure, you have a lot of fans who root for teams other than Rutgers, either transplanted alums or locals with other developed rooting interests (as a former NJ resident, Penn State and Notre Dame come to mind). I don't think there are enough of these groups to sway viewership. The transplanted alums in Manhattan won't help their case by watching their games in bars or going home for the holidays (if they are Nielsen households), as those views won't be counted in the ratings...