Marshall University Athletics
BOGACZYK: Boilermakers-Herd Very Big in Many Ways
9/5/2015 12:00:00 AM | Football
By JACK BOGACZYK
HERDZONE.COM COLUMNIST
HUNTINGTON, W.Va. – It’s well chronicled that Purdue’s trip to Joan C. Edwards Stadium for Sunday’s season opener is the first football visit by a Big Ten Conference team to Marshall, which is coming off a nationally ranked season.
What’s less discussed is another special moment … The 2015 opener begins the 25th season for the Herd in “The Joan.”
And it’s going to begin on national TV (3 p.m., FOX Sports 1) as the only major college telecast of the afternoon with one of the largest crowds in the history of a place that opened as Marshall Stadium on Sept. 7, 1991, with a 24-23 win over New Hampshire.
“We’ve had one of the best single-week sales we’ve ever had,” said Aaron Goebbel, MU’s associate athletic director for external affairs and ticketing chief.
Goebbel said the Purdue game is another first. “This season is the first time fans can buy tickets online, print their tickets at home and then bring them to be scanned at the gate,” Goebbel said. “So, this is the first game for that. It’s another plus for our fans.”
The Herd is expecting a crowd to rank in the top four in Edwards Stadium history, with a shot at the No. 3 spot. The stadium capacity is 38,148. Here’s the top-5 attendance list as the 2015 season begins for the defending Conference USA champions:
1. 41,382 … West Virginia 24, Marshall 21 -- Sept. 10, 2010
2. 40,383 … West Virginia 48, Marshall 23 -- Sept. 8, 2007
3. 36,914 … Kansas State 21, Marshall 19 -- Sept. 10, 2005
4. 34,424 … Virginia Tech 30, Marshall 10 -- Sept. 24, 2011
5. 33,537 … Marshall 49, Kent State 33 -- Oct. 11, 2003
“If we don’t get to 35,000, I’m going to be disappointed,” Marshall AD Mike Hamrick said Thursday night during his “Inside Herd Athletics” radio show.
The Purdue-Marshall attendance also could set a standard for the 2015 Herd – unless “The Joan” sees a bigger gathering in the final five home dates against Norfolk State, Old Dominion, Southern Miss, North Texas and FIU – or a larger crowd for a bowl date.
No other facility in which Coach Doc Holliday’s team plays this regular season seats more than the 30,788 of Red Floyd Stadium at Middle Tennessee.
“It’s an opportunity to showcase our program on a national stage,” Holliday said, “and it’s important we fill this place up and have a good time.”
Meanwhile, the Herd is seeking its first win over a power conference team in a season opener since winning 13-10 at Clemson to start the perfect (13-0) 1999 season – star quarterback Chad Pennington’s senior year.
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Want another indication of the drawing power of Purdue-Marshall? Check the Edwards Stadium pressbox seat requests.
A record number of NFL personnel men will be on hand -- nine representatives from seven teams, with scouts joined by one AFC team’s general manager.
Clubs requesting credentials are the Buccaneers, Chargers, Texans, Giants, Jets, Cowboys and Steelers.
“We usually average about two NFL scouts per game,” said Jason Corriher, Marshall’s assistant AD for media relations. “The most I can remember for a previous game is four or five.”
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Purdue’s visit to “The Joan” will be the seventh for a power conference team to Huntington since the Herd returned to major college football in 1997 from Division I-AA championship success.
The Boilers’ visit will be in the first in the College Football Playoff era. The first six were by top-six conference teams from the ACC, Big East and Big 12 in the BCS years (1998-2013).
Marshall is 1-5 in those games, winning the first over Temple (Big East) – 34-0, in 1999. Since then, the Herd fell to Kansas State (Big 12) in 2005; West Virginia (Big East) in 2007 and 2010; Cincinnati (Big East) in 2008 and Virginia Tech (ACC) in 2011.
On future schedules, the Herd has Power 5 visits to Edwards Stadium by three ACC foes – Louisville in 2016, North Carolina State in ’18 and Pitt in 2020. Marshall also has future non-conference home-and-home series with Navy and East Carolina of the AAC and Appalachian State of the Sun Belt.
Holliday said he appreciates the chance to get bigger challenges at home.
“I think it’s a great tribute to our program, a great tribute to Mike Hamrick,” the Herd coach said. “We’ve got Purdue coming in here and a year down the road we’ve got Louisville coming in. We’ve got N.C. State and Pitt coming, Navy coming.
“It’s a tribute they think enough of Marshall University to come here and play in our stadium. It’s a great opportunity for our program and says a lot for where our program is going. It’s a tribute to Mike and what he’s been able to accomplish to get these guys to come in here, because scheduling is hard sometimes – especially when you’re pretty good.”
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Purdue’s trip to Marshall is the Herd’s sixth football game against a Big Ten member team. The Herd has gone 0-5 on the road, all since a 2000 date at Michigan State. Marshall lost at Ohio State in 2004 and 2010 (Holliday’s head coaching debut), at Wisconsin in 2008 and to the Boilermakers at their Ross-Ade Stadium in 2012.
Other current Big Ten members who were not in the conference when facing the Herd are Maryland and Penn State. Maryland fell in the 2013 Military Bowl to Marshall -- the Terps’ last game as an ACC member before joining the Big Ten – and PSU won at home over the Herd in 1929 and ’30. The Nittany Lions didn’t join the Big Ten until six decades later.
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Earlier this week, Marshall’s multimedia rights holder, IMG College, announced a live, on-demand audio platform with live cut-ins to Saturday college football games. The IMG College Football Blitz airs weekly from 2 p.m.-midnight, providing live cut-ins to game calls, analysis and coaches’ interviews. Marshall is one of more than 70 major colleges in the IMG college family, so Herd cut-ins are available for Football Blitz’s whip-around format, which will be available in a game-day only channel on TuneIn Radio, as well as on SiriusXM (app, webstream and on satellite channels as available), CBS Interactive’s “College Sports Live,” and on IMGCollege.com.
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Finally, here’s a pregame congratulations to my Henderson Center hallway office running mate, Steve Cotton, who begins his 20th school year as the “Voice of the Herd” when he calls Sunday’s game broadcast on the Thundering Herd/IMG Sports Network.
It’s Cotton’s 23rd year overall at Marshall, and he moved into the lead play-by-play role for the 1996 football season. In those many years, he has called more than 800 Herd football and men’s basketball games, and he’s a record 10-time West Virginia Sportscaster of the Year.
How about that … an anniversary season for “The Joan” and “The Voice” in the same season!
