Mars wrote:
I actually like the Deseret Duel. I don't agree with some things about it, like women's basketball counting equal to men's, but anything that brings anything to the rivalry is a good thing. It's kind of like the Directors Cup but only for the two of us.
We lost though, in overtime.
I agree that spotlighting a good rivalry is nice. I suspect that is the reason why I have ended up following the scores and for the first time ever, I am feeling some of the "bad BYU weekend" gloom over a women's softball loss to the University of Utah.
I don't suspect that it is just me who struggles all week afer the football team falls short, is it? Have other Cougar fans always taken tumbling and softball losses so hardly while I lived in ignorant bliss? I can survive the pressure of possible letdown for a few weeks in the fall, and I survive the days after a basketball loss, but having to feel pain over a softball loss or gymnastics spanking is going to start adding up!
Part of me would say that as long as BYU beats the utes in football and basketball, I can live with the rest. However, this "duel" seems to call for an even higher realm of superiority, so I can't blindly ignore it or the "other sports" losses as I had been able to do before.
I want to know why spanking the Utes in rugby can't count; do they play lacrosse? - another sport BYU players seem to do well with. Aren't the ice cats and men's soccer teams able to pound u of u representatives regularly? Why don't they count? Sure, these aren't sanctioned as NCAA sports at BYU, but they are Cougar athletes. I want to support these less known athletic teams, just like I think women's tennis/ soccer/ gymnastics/ volleyball/ etc. deserve support - (I also enjoy any chance to see the good guys pummel the Utes.)
If you really want to stick with NCAA sports, then where are the points for golf? Even more significantly, where are all the cross country and track teams in the equation? With all of the men's and women's running teams, BYU maintains a chokehold on the Utes much stronger than their admittedly impressive tumbling team does against ours.
Who here hasn't felt like this has been a great year of dominance over the utes? They lost in football; got swept in basketball; were pummeled in rugby; don't belong on the same track or cross country course with our All Americans. Overall, this has been a great, BYU dominant year! However, the Deseret First Duel is too close to call? Aggghhh!!!
If a "Deseret First Duel" loss will push Homloe to upgrade our "olympic sports" teams to pummel the Utes in everything, I guess that I won't really complain - I do like beating rivals. However, I'd probably rather see resources poured into efforts to win a BCS championship, or a Final 4 run in the NCAA's.
Maybe this is a BYU sacrifice to get the utes to look beyond the mark and devote their resources to these "other" sports as we create a super power with the sports that most are going to see. An awesome plan indeed, but wouldn't real utes be foolish enough to convince themselves that they could be equal with "other sport" dominance anyway?
Do we have to take the chance that their delusions could be supported by a marketing stunt? I'd be happier if the Duel included everything (non-NCAA sports)/ expanded competition teams where there may not be head to head matches (ie. who places higher in CC & track or at least make the utes show up for a dual/duel meet in those sports) so we can pick up the free points we deserve.
Meanwhile, if the baseball team can't come through, I'm going to be pretty mad at the thought of having lost an "overriding" annual contest to the reds. It is already closer than the year really was. It has already proven to be a shaky personal investment for me... I'll sign off, but I sure think that I hate the Duel (at least in its current form!)
