University of Virginia Library

From The Sidelines

Sept. 12—
Too Early
For Turkey

By Hugh Antrim

ON SEPTEMBER 12, 1970, the Wahoo gridders will ride over
to Blacksburg to open the football season in Lane Stadium. This
item was a big news story a few weeks ago, but now that the
excitement of the big, extra game with Tech has dissipated, let's
take one more look at the thing before we dismiss it until
September.

The reasons for which the game was scheduled and approved,
more or less, by the community should be clear. Virginia Tech
has been, and hopefully still is, Virginia's one true football
rivalry. After all, from 1923 to 1966, Tech played Virginia
annually and the crowds were impressive, even when the quality
of the teams were not. Also, there has always been the amusing,
subtle verbal struggle about the coats and ties vs. the red tractor.

BUT THE OVERRIDING REASON this game was scheduled
has to do with money. The NCAA gave the schools the option of
an eleventh game to bail them out, financially. College football is
big business, and the investment that goes into a single season is
sizable. An extra game with the resulting extra receipts would
obviously make that investment more worthwhile and financially
feasible. And the local cynic would further argue that the extra
game allows athletic departments to get a little more mileage out
of their players, so to speak.

We don't condemn the extra game, necessarily, we just feel
that a certain amount of reflection is proper. The Registrar's
Office tells us that classes do not begin until September 18. In
Blacksburg, Tech students don't even register until September 21.
Keeping in mind that the Virginia-VPI game is set for September
12, the logical question follows why schedule a game between
two schools when they are not even is session? Evidently both
Steve Sebo and Frank Mosely are of the opinion that the game
with attract a good crowd, regardless of the student attendance.
Whether or not such confidence is merited, we are beginning to
question the motive behind the situation. An Athletic Director
has to find funds from some place with which to run an
intercollegiate athletic program: we accept that premise and can
live with it. But when such a quest for funds for that program
seems to gain priority over all else, we question its validity.

BY SCHEDULING A FOOTBALL game before the students,
many of whom live outside the state, return from vacation, it
would indicate that the football team (further severed from the
community of which they are presumably a part) would become
a semi-professional unit representing themselves and not the
institution whose name they use.

The line between professional and truly amateur conduct in
college athletics is all too often blurred, and perhaps that's a
prerequisite for success. We assert that Virginia is about as
amateurish as anyone can be in the ACC and still survive the
competition. But that eleventh game has connotations of creeping
professionalization that we don't care for; and yet, come
September 12 we hope the Wahoos put a deep, dark hole in those
VPI tractors. Besides, we prefer turkey in November.