Sorry, but I’ll be indulging in sports – specifically SU – talk this morning, because today the Syracuse football team will try to do something they haven’t done since 2003: win their season opener. It’s been an ungodly horrible four seasons here in the ‘cuse – the worst stretch in our history, which, for football, dates back to 1889. That’s, what, 120 years or something. But, having disposed of the previous coach (and I use the term “coach” loosely), and hiring an SU alum who feels our pain (and shame), we’re hopeful that things are back on the right track (though we’re painfully aware of how bad things have gotten, and we know it’ll take some time to turn things around).

For one thing, 19 scholarship players have quit the team since the new coach took over. I think a lot of them were in shock over the change. Our new coaching staff apparently forces them to bust their asses every day, and some of these kids just weren’t up for it. Of course, since they pretty much sucked, it’s hard to call it a “loss.” Still, we’re very thin in a lot of areas (most notably linebacker), and our offensive line has nearly gotten our parade of quarterbacks killed. This season, a local kid who played basketball for Duke for four years decided to go to grad school here and got a waiver to play one year of football. He subsequently won the starting job after one week of practice, which perhaps tells you about our QB situation (though, to be fair, as a senior in high school, he was a football Parade All-American, and he won the Gatorade National High School Player of the Year Award). So, we’ll see.

There’s been a big push to fill up the stadium with Orange-clad fans, and I shall be doing my part by taking my stepson to the game (me in my #44 Ernie Davis replica jersey- by the way, if you haven’t seen “The Express,” they’ve been playing the hell out of it on HBO this month, and even my wife, who would rather have teeth pulled than watch sports, thinks it’s a great movie – which I purchased for myself as a gift for my 44th birthday, and the kid – who aint really a kid anymore – wearing his other birthday present – a newly purchased orange polo shirt). Last I looked, there were only about 3,600 tickets left despite the holiday weekend, gorgeous weather, competition from the NY State Fair and the fact that the game is on national TV (noon Eastern; on ESPN2 in HD if you got it). With a decent walk-up crowd, it may even sell out, which hasn’t happened in a looooong time. Seems we’ve all drunk the Kool-Aid here (or at least the Orange Juice).

It’s also the 50th anniversary of our only football National Championship (did I mention “The Express”), which I missed by being born 11 months too late. Still, as a kid, we had teams with people like Floyd Little, Larry Csonka, Jim Nance, and John Mackey. Sadly, as time went on, college football changed, and our “three yards and a cloud of dust” coach didn’t. The cheapskate Chancellor didn’t put enough money into our facilities, our stadium, which was state of the art when it opened in 1907 was small and crumbling. Recruiting suffered (with a few exceptions, like Art Monk), a new coach had little success (though compared to what we just went through, he was a savior), but he was successful in getting the university to build a new stadium – the Carrier Dome (which is also getting a little long in the tooth as it opens for its 30th season) before being shown the door.

With a new coach came the renaissance of SU football, with players like Joe Morris, Marvin Graves, Don McPherson, and, of course, Donovan McNabb. I never thought they’d let the team get so shitty again, but, as with so many things in my life, boy was I wrong.

Last season, we won 3 games, and, out of 119 teams in whatever it is they call Division I football these days, we ranked 114th in total offense, and 101st in total defense.

For those of you non-sports fans, let me explain: no offense + no defense = 1 big steaming pile of shit.

So, while we have high hopes as the season begins today against the Minnesota Golden Gophers (7-6 last year – they started out 7-1 and lost five straight, but they still went to a bowl game), we’re trying to temper our expectations. Mostly, we just hope to see something that resembles a football team out on the field. If they don’t really, really suck, it’ll be an improvement.

Anyhow, if you tune in to the game today, look for me. I’ll be the guy wearing orange.

Time to kill some gophers.