Rutgers new stadium expansion is nice and team was bad

When we pulled up to Rutgers’ stadium on Sunday afternoon for the team walk through, we saw a completely different look to the place that we visited in 2007. Rutgers has added about 12,500 seats in their endzone, which became a sea of red clad students yesterday.

Rutgers students packed their new endzone seats yesterday. They left disappointed

The whole stadium looked very nice, and very red. It seemed to me that most everything had been painted, and just as I noticed the fresh red paint, I turned to see a man painting the sideline camera box, where the team video is shot from.

It's tough to see here, but the very left side of the booth isn't painted yet

I don’t remember seeing “banner” scoreboards on either side of the stadium either, but they were there this year, and they added to the “big game” feel at Rutgers stadium.

The banner type scoreboards proclaim "Rutgers: The Birthplace of college football" before each game

Overall, I’d have to say the fans were loud and excited, providing a heck of an atmosphere for about a quarter and a half…and then UC pulled away. The game got boring as the Bearcats hung 47 points on the Scarlet Knights, the most UC has scored against any Big East opponent in Brian Kelly’s reign as head coach in the Queen City.

Even though I said it yesterday to many folks, including my counterparts at Rutgers—Steve and Alex—Brian Bennett, the ESPN.com Big East blogger (who, by the way, we met before the game) might have said it best when he wrote, “I’m not sure even the most optimistic Cincinnati fan could have predicted this kind of performance in the season opener.”

And he is right. Even the video guys couldn’t have predicted that kind of game. In fact, as we talked with Bennett before the game, I answered a text message from Elder High School head stats guy Greg Metz. He asked me simply, “Score prediction?”

I responded, “UC-at least one more point than Rutgers…You know I don’t predict scores that well.”

All in all, the road trip turned out well. No video glitches, the highlight video fired the team up and the flight was smooth. Nothing could be better. Well, winning a few more games in the fashion we did yesterday would be.
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Check back in later for more Rutgers photos and on Thursday for a recap of the 2007 game between UC and this week’s opponent Southeast Missouri State—aka SEMO. Thanks for reading and make sure you enjoy today.