Last week, the University of Hawaii (UH) football ended the regular season with an undefeated record!
This has been an amazing turnaround for Hawaii football.
Back in 1998, the UH football team was 0-12! It was the boiling point of 6 straight years of loosing seasons. The coach, Fred von Appen, was fired after 3 loosing seasons
This was how bleak the situation was during the von Appen years
!1) many of the top local high school football players chose to play for mainland colleges instead of being humilated as a UH player. Those local high school players who wanted to play for UH were even embarrassed to admit to others, knowing they'll be asked "why would you want to play for a sh----y team?"
2) when one of the college counselors came to my 11th grade English class (1997-1998 school year), and talk about the standards required to attend UH, one girl said out loud "why would I want to attend UH? They have such a junk football team!" This girl didn't play any sports, yet didn't want to attend UH "because UH had a junk football team"
3) Rumors went around that at a local high school reunion, when one of the prizes announced was free UH football tickets, people booed!
4) People joked about top high school football teams beating UH football.
That was how embarrassing it was to be associated with UH football.
However, in 1999, UH had a new football coach June Jones. (Coincidentally, it was my 1st year as a UH student). The situation changed.
After the 2nd game of the 1999 season, people asked "did you see the football game", the common reply was "WE FINALLY WON!" UH also won it's 1st road game in years, had a 1st winning season since 1992, won a WAC championship, and even won a bowl game.
PRIDE WAS RESTORED!
Because of the great 1999 season, most of the all-state high school players graduating in 2000 chose to play college football for UH!
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Fast-forward to this year -- 2007. Sales of UH athletic merchandise went up. The Aloha Stadium had more fans at the games. Even attendance at sports bars went up this year!
It's common to see people wearing UH football jerseys, and UH WAC champions T-shirts! People who usually don't care about football are talking about the UH Warriors!
Now, as the UH football team is going to play Georgia in the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans, tickets sold out fast! Demand exceeded supply BIG TIME!
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And that girl in my high school class who said she didn't want to attend UH because of it's "junk football team"?
I wouldn't be surprised if she gathers with friends to watch UH games while wearing a black UH football jersey with Colt Brennan's #15.
