My brother, a Tulane and ULL grad, attended the game. He guesstimated it was: 30K ULL to 24K Tulane fans in attendance.
One can squabble over a K here or there, but it was a good showing by both fanbases.
I sort of disagree with this... Tulane was the pinpoint straw the broke the camels back in the big east breakup. Further, their northeast alumni base did little to help the mediocre television deal the AAC ultimately got. They got a crappy sub 300 rpi mbb team out of cusa at least.
Let me put it this way. The AAC football schools got exactly what they wanted in Tulane. Sure, Tulane is the punchline that "killed" the Big East because Tulane is an easy target. But Tulane did not actually kill the Big East. The endless teams fleeing the conference killed the Big East as we knew it. It didn't matter which football school they added next. It was going to be the scapegoat for the basketball schools. The Big East split was inevitable. It was obvious they all knew the split was coming because East Carolina was added for football only without a conference for all their other sports. Ultimately, the basketball schools got exactly what they wanted, their own conference.
Tulane was not added for their northeast alumni or for a TV deal. Remember what the texts from UCF's president revealed. Tulane emerged as the top candidate for three primary reasons: 1) The important New Orleans market (much bigger than TV), 2) Tulane's elite academic reputation, and 3) Tulane's powerful president who shared the same positions on important issues. Not mentioned, but Tulane was committed to investing big money into their facilities. Along with a good bit of politics, those were the reasons Tulane was added. The Big East presidents thought that Tulane brought more to the conference than any of the other candidates, and they got exactly what they wanted in Tulane (except for Scott Cowen retiring). It wasn't like they picked Tulane over Louisville or something.
Last edited by Dawg06; 12-29-2013 at 04:15 AM.
Tulane is in New Orleans....'nuff said. That's why ANY conference would be interested. And by "any" I mean any conference on Tulane's perceived athletic level.
Tech is in Ruston.... same premise, only the opposite.