Spring Break
Editorial: Support Panther football
Editorial Board
Issue date: 9/5/08 Section: Opinions
Forty-five minutes is not a long drive.
At 11 a.m. on Saturday, Eastern plays Illinois at Memorial Stadium in Champaign, and although, Eastern will most assuredly lose students should go and support their team.
And if somehow Eastern pulls off a miracle, you as a student have a right to shove it in an Illini fan's face.
But for the meantime, the Panthers will need all the support they can get this weekend. The No. 20 Illini are coming off a tough loss to No. 6 Missouri, and its offense will look to explode against the Panthers in its newly, renovated Memorial Stadium.
The Panthers not only play these teams to make themselves better, but, in part, football is one of the best revenues - generating sports on this campus. The Panthers received $300,000 for this game alone, which goes into a general athletic fund pool.
This is the second time Eastern and Illinois have played one another in three years. The Panthers also received $300,000 the last time they played the team in 2006. Illinois defeated Eastern 42-17 during the 2006 season.
Eastern received $450,000 to play Penn State in the 2009 season which is the largest amount Eastern has received to play a Football Bowl Subdivision team.
Another reason to attend Saturday's game is the Panthers are coming off their third straight Football College Subdivision playoff appearance.
Eastern's last win against a FBS team was in 2004 when the Panthers defeated Eastern Michigan 31-28.
This is first time Eastern will play two FBS schools since the 2006 season when they played Illinois and Hawaii.
"First and foremost, we play these (games) to win," said Eastern Offensive Line Coach Jeff Hoover in January. "A win (at Illinois) could really catapult us on a national scale."
Hopefully, the Panthers will not walk away from this game with too many injuries.
Injuries in any college football game are inevitable, but Clint Sellers suffered about one of the worst in the opening kickoff against Illinois in the 2006 season. Sellers, an All-American in 2005, lost his senior season when he connected against Illinois' E.B. Halsey and separated the brachial plexus bundle in his right shoulder, which connects the nerves in his arm to the spinal cord. The injury left his arm paralyzed.
Eastern red-shirt junior guard Kevin Mahoney was taken to the hospital with what appeared at the time to be neck pain after being injured in the fourth quarter. He was diagnosed with a concussion and will miss 4-6 weeks.
Drive to Champaign and show some support for your athletes who take enormous risks to represent Eastern.
Bleed Blue.
At 11 a.m. on Saturday, Eastern plays Illinois at Memorial Stadium in Champaign, and although, Eastern will most assuredly lose students should go and support their team.
And if somehow Eastern pulls off a miracle, you as a student have a right to shove it in an Illini fan's face.
But for the meantime, the Panthers will need all the support they can get this weekend. The No. 20 Illini are coming off a tough loss to No. 6 Missouri, and its offense will look to explode against the Panthers in its newly, renovated Memorial Stadium.
The Panthers not only play these teams to make themselves better, but, in part, football is one of the best revenues - generating sports on this campus. The Panthers received $300,000 for this game alone, which goes into a general athletic fund pool.
This is the second time Eastern and Illinois have played one another in three years. The Panthers also received $300,000 the last time they played the team in 2006. Illinois defeated Eastern 42-17 during the 2006 season.
Eastern received $450,000 to play Penn State in the 2009 season which is the largest amount Eastern has received to play a Football Bowl Subdivision team.
Another reason to attend Saturday's game is the Panthers are coming off their third straight Football College Subdivision playoff appearance.
Eastern's last win against a FBS team was in 2004 when the Panthers defeated Eastern Michigan 31-28.
This is first time Eastern will play two FBS schools since the 2006 season when they played Illinois and Hawaii.
"First and foremost, we play these (games) to win," said Eastern Offensive Line Coach Jeff Hoover in January. "A win (at Illinois) could really catapult us on a national scale."
Hopefully, the Panthers will not walk away from this game with too many injuries.
Injuries in any college football game are inevitable, but Clint Sellers suffered about one of the worst in the opening kickoff against Illinois in the 2006 season. Sellers, an All-American in 2005, lost his senior season when he connected against Illinois' E.B. Halsey and separated the brachial plexus bundle in his right shoulder, which connects the nerves in his arm to the spinal cord. The injury left his arm paralyzed.
Eastern red-shirt junior guard Kevin Mahoney was taken to the hospital with what appeared at the time to be neck pain after being injured in the fourth quarter. He was diagnosed with a concussion and will miss 4-6 weeks.
Drive to Champaign and show some support for your athletes who take enormous risks to represent Eastern.
Bleed Blue.
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