That's funny Dave... all those other teams waited and managed to come up with solutions, most of which involved playing as scheduled or the next day. Only Florida wouldn't wait, and declared the game OFF. As it is... works out great for me. We get L$U 5 days later on Thanksgiving, so I hope the Gators bruise them up good. 8)
Gainesville is only 70 miles away from the coast and at one time was under hurricane warning. If that storm had shifted 20 miles the other way there would have been devastation up the Fla coastline and potential hurricane force winds in the Swamp. Only Ga-SC was rescheduled for Sun and I'm willing to bet ND fans wish they had never played their game with NC State in those bad elements
No doubt the ND/NCState game should have been delayed till Sunday or moved to South Bend. That's what UGA/SCAR did and what LSU/SCAR did a few years ago when the game was moved from Columbia to Baton Rouge. It could have easily been played Sat sometime in Baton Rouge or even Sunday in Baton Rouge.
The decision not to play came down Thrursday afternoon before the Friday storm. Doesn't seem feasible at all to suddenly organize the game for Baton Rouge that same weekend. Plus.... not an easy decision for UF to give up the one sellout at home they had this season... and also play in Tiger Stadium which is a tough place for anyone to win in a year that UF would be in serious SEC East contention if Bama beats Tenn. and in fact the Gators will be in first place tomorrow if they beat Mo. while the Vols lose.
I'm on Dave's side on this one. The logistics are massive for any program. It's easy to second-guess and criticize after the fact. All it takes is a contrarian attitude. I can't imagine that any reasonable person would not have cancelled the game given the facts available at the tme of the decision.
We're almost due south of Gainesville and the forecasts we're for us to have 35-40 mph winds Thur nite into fri and partly sunny skies on Sat.
Here is the official forecast with inland areas east of I 75 forecast for 55-75 mph winds with widespread power outages. http://ufweather.org/2016/10/06/north-florida-impacts-major-hurricane-matthew?id=20692&category=local Keep in mind that over 50 UF players had family left behind on the east coast of Florida as I did with my Dad in Jacksonville. If the storm had tracked a little further west than it did and the science of predicting is so inexact that it very well could have then the destruction would have been so violent that the game would have been cancelled anyway. Not many if any in the sports world are saying Foley was a bad weatherman for cancelling the game. :roll:
The end result of all of this is that Florida gets screwed.... in more ways than one. First and foremost in a tight division race the Gators have to play LSU on the road instead of at home in the Swamp. Secondly the UF home schedule this year is down to 5 games vs. the 7 it was supposed to be.... not good for admin coffers and terrible for local businesses plus the marquis game on the home schedule for the Gator fans is now gone to La.
Hhhhmmmm....I've come to realize that when people retire, especially guys, they still pick up expertises in life....like the weather. Over the years I witnessed my dad become an honorary meteorologist. Think I'm with Gipper on this one.
Florida didn't get screwed, and here is why... They could have played Friday, but chose not to. They could have played Sunday, but chose not to. They could have played Saturday in Baton Rouge with LSU offering to pick up the travel tab, but chose not to. LSU gave them an open check covering Friday to Sunday, and they thumbed their nose at it. They literally thumbed their nose at 3 very viable options, 2 of which kept them playing at home. They chose not to. Their proposal was the sh*t on the 2 noncon opponents (the buyout of LSU's opponent is twice as much as Florida's despite the insurance coverage). I don't really have a dog in this fight, but 2 teams got truly screwed out of a game and none of them are named Florida. Florida got what they deserved. You get your QB back, but you lost the home game. I hope your gamesmanship was worth it.
Corey, Listen to the lyrics: <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/NjM9nTd9Jnc" frameborder="0"></iframe>
Tom, I did listen to the lyrics. Point taken. I didn't want you to think I ignored that. At the same time, Dave should probably listen to the lyrics of this one. It's quite relevant. <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/-_qMagfZtv8" frameborder="0"></iframe>
Played Friday???? WTF? Played in Baton Rouge that weekend?? WTF? Seriously you will not read your ideas on this topic anywhere in the sports world. There's no reasoning with someone who doesn't acknowledge the weather threat that Matthew presented. Why in hell would Foley... A smart guy.... See some kind of gamesmanship available to his program in all of this. It's a revenue loss of significant proportions. The thought occurs to me that some of you think all Gator fans in a game attendance live within a 10 mile radius of the stadium. Fans come from all over the state including the entire east coast of Florida and with a noon kickoff some come in on Friday.... The day of the hurricane.
Terry, You are right. The Alabama defense is special. Our defensive backs didn't have to worry about the deep ball because Dobbs didn't have time to throw the long ball and they couldn't run the ball. Our defensive line is special and linebackers are special. This was a good win for Alabama.