What comes next for Orange and us?

With Syracuse University’s football season done with a record of 5-7 after Saturday’s 31-14 loss to the Pittsburgh Panthers, it’s the time for the higher-ups to answer questions. Yes, they brought back coach Dino Babers even though he has just that one 10-win season on his plus-side, and five losing seasons now to go with…

Ready for that final contest

Yes, the new lighting inside the Carrier Dome sure flashes things up for the pregame ceremonies, I thought just before the start of the season finale between the Syracuse Orange and Pittsburgh Panthers on Saturday night. Then as I looked around minutes before game time and noted all those empty seats, I noted that some…

The walk’s still pretty

My dear wife Karen and I walked up the hill toward Saturday night’s football game in the Carrier Dome, and I thought about how pretty a late November night game can be on the Syracuse University campus. I admired the way the dome’s new roof structure peeked out at me to the right of the…

So this is a night game tailgate in late November

My dear wife Karen and I sat in my car in the full dark shortly after 5 p.m. Saturday and watched the tailgate activity around us in our designated Syracuse University football parking lot. We agreed this was the first 7:30 p.m. game start for the final contest of the regular season we’d experienced during…

Another Orange 44

This tailgating crowd in our usual lot decided that its skinny orange balloon guy had to wear the famous Syracuse uniform No. 44 as well as the name of famous Ernie Davis, the first African American to win the Heisman Trophy and a source of so much pride at Syracuse University that the green turn…

Back to Syracuse game day already

My great, big insult following the Syracuse-Clemson football game and all those students parading past and over us as we tried to watch the action on the field lasted, well, 15 days. A little less, actually, because I made up my mind that yes, we’d give our season tickets a chance for Saturday’s Carrier Dome…

We’re hoping the Dome will light up with a win

Syracuse has been oh-so-close the last two weeks on the college football field. And tonight Clemson comes to the Carrier Dome. The last time the traditional power of the Atlantic Coast Conference visiting our humble town for a Friday night contest, the Orange pulled off the huge upset. Can they turn that corner that fell…

There seems to be a Carrier Dome banner missing

Looking around the Carrier Dome this past Saturday as my dear wife Karen and I waited for the Syracuse Orange’s game with Wake Forest to kick off, I took note of the new placement for bowl game banners. Syracuse has been to half a dome’s worth, yes, some long ago, some not as far in…

Back to our usual college football normal

After our big adventure in State College, Pa., and Beaver Stadium last week for the Penn State-Indiana Game, I wondered how I’d feel going back to the half-as-large Carrier Dome as my dear wife Karen and I returned to our usual she-drives-back routine. I felt right at home is how I felt. Something about a…

A week makes a difference on the SU hill

Everything went much smoother for the second Syracuse University home college football game on Saturday. My dear wife Karen and I decided to forego any tailgating in our designated parking lot before the noon kickoff between the Syracuse Orange and Albany Great Danes, instead walking right to the quad to get in line to secure…