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47 Days: Rice stadium needs to fill its 47,000 seats

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Rice football stadium has the capacity for 47 thousand fans, but the Owls have struggled to fill it up over the last several years.

Old Rice Stadium held less than 37,000 people. While it served its purpose at the time, the defending Southwest Conference Champions needed something grander. The Owls historic 1949 season included an undefeated conference record, a Cotton Bowl win and a No. 5 ranking in the final AP Poll. The banner year led to the proposal and construction of a brand new stadium which was ready for the season opener next September — the Owls won.

That new stadium was built to seat 70,000 people. At the time, it was the second-largest stadium in the SWC, trailing only the Cotton Bowl in size. Since it’s creation it hosted Super Bowl VII (1974), the Bluebonnet Bowl (1959-67, 85-56) and the Houston Oilers (1965-67). In 2006 tarps were brought in, reducing the normal seating capacity to 47,000.

Even the reduced seating has been more than enough since it was installed. According to the NCAA’s latest figures, Rice brought in 96,770 in total attendance last season. When averaged across the Owls’ five home games that comes out to 19,354 attendees per game. Filling all 70,000 seats is a long way off, but the new direction of the program and the home game against Houston should get the Owls headed in the right direction on the attendance front.

As recently as 2016 the Owls’ student section was setting attendance records. The 1,830 students that came to the Owls opener against Baylor that year were the most at a single home game since 2008. Many of those same students are still around. They, along with some new classmates, can help jumpstart a new era of full stadiums for Rice football. It’s not going to happen overnight, but there’s plenty of room in the future.

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48 Days: Peter Godber on to CFL after 48 appearances with Owls

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Former Rice football offensive lineman Peter Godber is now playing in the CFL, following 48 appearances with the Owls over his four-year career.

The last few seasons were littered with low points for Rice football, but it wasn’t all bad. One of the bright spots was offensive lineman Peter Godber. After appearing in 48 games with Rice, Godber was the No. 3 overall selection in the 2018 CFL Draft. He’ll trade out the Rice blue for the orange and black of the BC Lions.

Appearing primarily at right guard for the Owls during his four-year career, Godber also saw some time at left guard. He would end his career with 19 consecutive starts. When his collegiate career was done, Godber made the trek back north to Canada. He grew up in Toronto, modeling his game after Chis Van Zeyl, an offensive lineman for the Toronto Argonauts. He’ll be facing the Argonauts several times this season.

The Lions were in desperate need of help along the offensive line, making Godber’s arrival all the more uplifting. The passing game, under quarterback Jonathan Jennings, was sporadic – at best.

Jeremiah Johnson was the bellcow on the ground. When he could get into space he made some terrific plays, leading the team in explosive runs (10+ yards). Both of those players will be better off with Godber in front of them this season — and they have been. BC won their opening game over the Montreal Alouettes 22-10, thanks to a career high in rushing yards from Jennings.

Rice will miss Godber in the lineup next season. It’s been a long time since the Owls had to pencil anyone in at his position. Coach Mike Bloomgren has a variety of options, but none are as proven as Godber was. He will be missed.

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49 Days: Remembering the legendary ’49 team

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Rice football has one finish in program history inside the AP Top 5, the 1949 season in which the Owls won the Southwestern Conference and the Cotton Bowl on their way to a 10-1 finish.

The 1949 Rice football team will forever be known as the greatest team in school history. They plowed through the Southwestern Conference, going undefeated in conference play. That earned them and a trip to the Cotton Bowl where they drubbed North Carolina 27-13 after jumping out to a 27-0 lead.

The 1o-1 season culminated in a No. 5 ranking in the AP Poll. That is still the highest finish in school history and one of four top-10 finishes. Coach Jess Neely, the head man in 1949, is responsible for all four of those top-10 results. Not only have the Owls not sniffed the top 10 since he departed following the 1966 season, they haven’t been ranked inside the Top 25 at all.

Recent shortcomings aside, what the Owls accomplished in ’49 is nothing short of extraordinary. They beat Heisman Trophy winner Doak Walker and SMU and topped Texas on a last-second field goal, faltering only to LSU early on in the season 14-7. If that result ended in the Owls’ favor they could have been in the mix along with undefeated Notre Dame, Oklahoma, Cal and Army for the school’s first and only national championship.

Even without the title, the accomplishments of the 1949 team were plentiful. Led by Froggy Williams, Tobin Rote and Billy Burkhalter the Owls combined a lethal offense with a stingy defense. Williams, who doubled as the team’s kicking specialist, ended his impressive career with 75 career PATs and 156 total points, both records that stood for more than three decades. He earned All-American honors as a senior following the 1949 season.

The 1949 season was so successful that it galvanized interest in the completion of Rice Stadium. The 70,000 full capacity structure was opened for the beginning of the 1950 season.

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50 Days: Owls look to flip the script of recent history

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Rice football is 50 days from the kickoff of the 2018 season against Prairie View A&M. The Owls have lost 50 games over the last seven seasons.

Rice football is not where they want to be, at least, not right now. The Owls lost 50 games over the last seven seasons, an average of just more than seven losses per season. In that period the Owls won 34 games, 43.5 percent of their contests. That’s not awful, but it’s a notch below where the administration wants the Owls to be.

A .500 winning percentage should be the floor of any successful program. That necessitates a decent showing in conference play and a few more wins on the way to a postseason appearance. Although they’ve had their years, the erratic nature of the last seven finishes has been concerning, particularly the negative trend since winning 10 games in 2013:

2011: 4-8
2012: 7-6
2013: 10-4
2014: 8-5
2015: 5-7
2016: 3-9
2017: 1-11

The administration had a choice. They could have made the easy, comfortable decision to retain head coach David Bailiff after falling to 1-11 in 2017. They didn’t. Coach Bailiff did a lot of good for the Owls, taking Rice to four bowl games, winning three of them. He produced two of the Owls three 10-win seasons in program history. But it was time for a change.

Under Bailiff, the Owls were a somewhat average Group of 5 program. In the good year’s they’d challenge for a conference title. In the bad year’s the product on the field was hard to watch. The Owls have been a lower-tier program because of that, but things are finally changing for the better.

Athletic Director Joe Karlgaard has pioneered a new vision and a new hope for Rice football. If this works, the Owls aren’t going to be a 7-loss team every season. Rice football is capable of producing bowl-quality teams every year and keeping themselves in the conference championship conversation through October. At a minimum that means reversing the 34-50 record of the last seven seasons to at least 50-34.

That’s why head coach Mike Bloomgren was hired. To flip the script.

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Conference USA West title wide open entering 2018

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Rice football hopes to soon contend for Conference USA titles. Although it might be a tough ask in 2018, the Owls chances are better than most might expect.

Rice football isn’t far removed from contending for championships. The Owls won the Conference USA West Division in 2013, triumphing over the Marshall Thundering Herd by a score of 41-24. The Owls ended that season with a lopsided loss to Mississippi State in the Liberty Bowl, but by and large, the year was considered a tremendous success.

Not many are looking to the Owls to compete for a conference title in the first year of the Mike Bloomgren-era at Rice. Yet, the West Division is more wide open than it might seem.

North Texas won the West Division in 2017. The Mean Green will be in the mix to win it again in 2018, but there hasn’t been a back-to-back winner in the west since Tulsa won the division in 2007 and 2008, the only back-t0-back winner in the history of the West Division.

Per the latest Oddshark release, Louisiana Tech, not North Texas, is the favorite to win the West in 2018. Rice is a long shot (+10,000), but the West Division isn’t nearly as deep as the East. Outside of Lousiana Tech, there isn’t another team in the West with better than +1,000 odds to win the conference. In fact, only one of the top five favorites to win the conference comes out of the West. The top three, FAU, FIU and Marshall all play in the East.

That doesn’t make Rice’s road easy, but it proves oddsmakers believe the Owls have an easier path to the championship game than half the teams in CUSA. With only one clear favorite in the West, the Owls work is a little bit easier. They still have to win the games, but it Rice up more favorably than they could have hoped entering 2018.

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