not sure how they're overrated. They've beaten two top twenty teams to start the season. Not that they're better than everyone else above them, but I'm not sure what else they could really do to help their case.

9/8/2008 1:53:52 PM

cop beatdown in the lower right corner

9/8/2008 2:15:22 PM

ECU will lose to Tulane

9/8/2008 2:35:53 PM

i hate ECU but i have to give them their due...despite getting lucky on a couple early calls, they pretty much dominated WVU...hopefully they'll think their toughest games are behind them, and slip up and lose against some team they take lightly...maybe the Wolfpack

9/8/2008 2:43:16 PM

not even so much that, but it's not always easy to play great every week. people get injured, have bad games, etc. everyone who is already certain that they're going to go undefeated is really jumping the gun. I think they'll win a lot of games, but it's pretty tough to run the table no matter who you are. Look at App, they beat michigan but they still lost games to "lesser" teams throughout the same year

[Edited on September 8, 2008 at 3:04 PM. Reason : .]

9/8/2008 3:03:48 PM

Quote :

"pat hill?"

he won the conference once in '99 and has finished ranked once, at #22, and has played in zero bcs bowls. yeah if that's all holtz does at ecu then he'll probably be there for a while.

9/8/2008 3:06:39 PM

I'm pretty sure they've been ranked way higher than #22 at one point in time or another though, which I believe was the argument

they reached #8 at one point in 2001

[Edited on September 8, 2008 at 3:15 PM. Reason : .]

9/8/2008 3:13:07 PM

As his contract is right now, he's in the top 30 highest paid in the nation...which i know is not bank, but he's not doing bad, especially with the cost of living in Greenville as it is.

I think he might stick around a couple more seasons unless Notre Dame offers & then there is no doubt he'd be gone in a second.

If he can get ecu in to a bcs conference then he might last even longer...but no one wants ecu in there conference right now since their bball is non existent.

9/8/2008 5:25:36 PM

^lol. Where does that put State? You could make a NCSU madlib:

Our sport team is non existent.

9/8/2008 5:29:53 PM

Quote :

"I'm pretty sure they've been ranked way higher than #22 at one point in time or another though, which I believe was the argument they reached #8 at one point in 2001"

If you wanna reach back into antiquity, ECU finished 1991 season @ #9

Last season most folks thought ECU would have no problem in greenville but they came out overconfident, unprepared, and spotted the wolfpack 21 straight points before playing catchup in a losing effort. The Pirates play better when they "have nothing to lose". Watching the Olympics this summer i couldn't get over how many athletes busted their asses day in day out training, working out, conditioning, practicing, dieting, putting their bodies to the test... they do this for several years just to go to Beijing and lay an egg. Just like that it's all over. Skip will have to have the team focused (and i think he's done a good job of that so far) or it'll be the Marshall game from last season all over again & that could very well be in Raleigh.

9/8/2008 8:08:47 PM

Quote :

"ECU will lose to Tulane"

and it probably won't be close either

9/8/2008 8:15:40 PM

^^That's one way to look at it. If I were in their shoes I'd force myself to look at it as getting all my life expenses picked up by sponsors, a free two week trip to China where I only had a few hours of obligations to tend to. Bonus if my event was somewhere in the first half of the first week.

You can always look back on the time you played football as a fond memory (unless everyone boos you every time you hit the field) and you get a free education to boot - regardless of whether or not your team loses.

9/8/2008 8:24:27 PM

yeah, I think tulane will definitely blow out ecu

9/8/2008 8:51:37 PM

lol well considering they held the Alabama Offense to about 6 points.

lol I'll assume Alabama's Defense is better than ECU's.

9/8/2008 9:18:06 PM

and ECU's defense held WV to 3 points. So if we go off the last game defensive performance, ECU still win's.

9/8/2008 9:23:38 PM

Am I the only person that wants them to come in here ranked top 12? I mean damn talk about TV exposure and everything else. Hello.

9/8/2008 10:54:38 PM

^i don't give a damn what they're ranked.

I just want to win so the ass pirate fans will STFU

9/9/2008 12:11:53 AM

^^Yeah no kidding...they beat Tulane rise a few spots in the poll and we play a top 10 team possibly.

Would do wonders for us, TOB recruiting, players' psyche, etc. to beat that kind of team.

9/9/2008 12:26:52 AM

I'm not even saying ECU won't lose to Tulane, I'm just saying they won't get blown out.

If Tulane can air it out, it might be a long day

9/9/2008 9:38:19 AM

yeah, I think they can score alot on ECU's secondary, They ran Alabama up and down the field, but Bama kept them out of the endzone everytime and that basically won the game for them. Same with Tulane basically, I think the only scoring from bama came from Special teams and a couple of field goals.

9/9/2008 9:42:20 AM

I don't think too many teams are going to run all over ECU. The air attack is what scares me

9/9/2008 9:55:10 AM

It will all depend on the defensive line play of ECU. If they do the kind of job they did last week then Tulane will have a tough time getting good passes off.

wish the game was on TV

9/9/2008 9:55:56 AM

^ Its on WITN-TV in eastern nc

9/9/2008 11:46:36 AM

I'm not driving to greenville to watch the game.

9/9/2008 12:14:13 PM

^ I was wrong - it's on cstv.

9/9/2008 5:07:51 PM

Quote :

"The air attack is what scares me"

Ahah EZU must be terrified of us then.

9/9/2008 5:10:37 PM

i can't remember a conference team in recent history as futile vs. ECU as Tulane. Even when we suck, we still beat em (like Army when we used to play). They're the team you pencil in for a W when you first look at the schedule. We can't lose to them... UAB will have that honor

9/9/2008 9:33:18 PM

As bad as I don't like EZU (the biggest community college in NC), they have to be heavily favored.

9/9/2008 9:45:56 PM

I didn't know ECU was a community college. Well now I'm even more impressed!

[Edited on September 9, 2008 at 10:22 PM. Reason : .]

9/9/2008 10:21:46 PM

State/ECU game will be on ESPN at 12 in 2 weeks.

9/10/2008 1:10:49 AM

The following is from The Daily Tar Heel in todays edition...has hell frozen over?

Quote :

"Aboard the good ship Greenville Sam Rosenthal, Sports Columnist Published: Wednesday, September 10, 2008 (The Daily Tar Heel) Updated: Wednesday, September 10, 2008 In the wake of East Carolina football’s consecutive upsets of then-No. 17 Virginia Tech and then-No. 8 West Virginia, everyone wants to play Prince Charming to the Pirates’ Cinderella. The Associated Press slotted the Pirates at No. 14 in its national poll, and ECU moved to No. 20 in the ESPN/USA Today Coaches’ poll. And (almost) every columnist in America analyzed ECU’s successes and made predictions — some anointed the Pirates as Bowl Championship Series contenders, while others belittled their accomplishments and warned of flash-in-the-pan syndrome. Yours truly hopped on the ECU bandwagon ages ago — as in last September, after covering North Carolina’s road contest in Greenville. Not because the Pirate players put on a show (which they did, in a tilt-a-whirl of a game that ended 34-31 on a last-second ECU field goal). No, my boarding the Pirates’ ship occurred because Greenville’s fans kick (and plunder) some serious booty. The atmosphere there infects you as soon as you step outside on game day — heck, even the night before, when some students build makeshift beaches in their backyards and party until they drop. In the morning, they rise and party some more. Hardly anyone’s kitchen table stays inside Saturday — not when there’s tailgating to do. Young and old alike join in. Walking to Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium, you see car-upon-car flying an ECU flag on its window, surrounded by drunken scalawags. Then you step inside and lose yourself in a vast purple ocean, like an ant on Barney the Dinosaur. Once the game starts, so does the announcer, who leads the crowd on every first down in chants of “First Down, Pirates … Argh!” UNC junior Ryan Graepel grew up in Greenville and attended most of the ECU home games during his middle school and high school years. Now, for big games such as the West Virginia affair, he drives to where the heart is. Graepel said that, on Saturday “the whole town was buzzing.” At Cubbie’s, a local joint, “there wasn’t a single person in the whole restaurant not wearing a purple T-shirt.” Graepel tailgated with friends from high school, then arrived at the stadium early. “It was just an incredible atmosphere. Really, nothing like we have here (at UNC),” Graepel said. “Here, it’s more of a social event for the students, and there, every single student is paying attention to the game. They know when to cheer, when not to cheer. They just have a better understanding of the game of football.” See, football in Greenville equates to basketball in Chapel Hill. Graepel called it “the face of ECU athletics.” Compared to the Chapel Hill football experience, he said, “ECU’s a lot louder … I think it really gave ECU an advantage, and I think we probably could give our own football team an advantage, but a lot of the time we just don’t.” See, East Carolina’s fans become coach Skip Holtz’s 12th man on the field, something which UNC coach Butch Davis only sees at night while counting sheep. This Pirate team might fulfill the BCS prophecies, or it might lose the rest of its games. That should not affect whether you climb into Cinderella’s carriage. If you join the bandwagon, do so because the people of Greenville deserve a great college football team. They’ve earned it by providing a great college football environment. And if you ever find yourself at Kenan Stadium watching the football game take a backseat to a meet-and-greet, stand up and yell, “First Down, Tar Heels … Argh!” Because Chapel Hill could use a healthy dose of piracy. Contact Sam Rosenthal at samrose@email.unc.edu. "

9/11/2008 11:18:11 AM

^Fuck UNC with a bag of dicks.

9/11/2008 11:29:27 AM

The UNC atmosphere does blow.

9/11/2008 12:26:31 PM

^I agree with this post.

9/11/2008 12:37:36 PM

^,^^ I concur as well.

Hell, I have a friend from UNC that spends a lot of Saturdays at NC State games just b/c its a funner (yeah, its a word. fuck off) environment.

9/11/2008 4:43:22 PM

no parking on campus = sucks

9/11/2008 4:47:20 PM

I grew up near Greenville and a ECU fan. Atmosphere there is generally amazing, I was at the WVU game and it didn't disappoint. But gotta stay with wherever you went to school. I hope they finish the regular season 11-1

and

Quote :

"The UNC atmosphere does blow."

9/11/2008 5:54:19 PM

every time I've ever read the daily tarheel, they are almost always trashing their sports teams or coaches.

9/11/2008 5:56:02 PM

they were trashing the fans pretty much this time....


so yea, this guy got tickets to the UVA/ECU game!!!


anyone been to a game in charlottesville?

9/11/2008 9:12:28 PM

Don't take a sign

9/11/2008 9:22:03 PM

traffic sucks here enough on non-gamedays

i stayed home on home-saturdays last season, beware of roads sir

^^

[Edited on September 11, 2008 at 9:41 PM. Reason : ]

9/11/2008 9:41:32 PM

I need that rap song they had in the one chris johnson highlight reel on youtube.

I got tha purple and gold down to my soul! lol.

[Edited on September 11, 2008 at 10:14 PM. Reason : .]

9/11/2008 10:14:10 PM

during the State @ ECU game last year, the atmosphere didn't really impress me that much.

still light years ahead of UNC, and it was still pretty good, but i wasn't blown away by the amount of noise throughout the game

9/11/2008 10:16:22 PM

^^

http://www.myspace.com/purpleandgoldpiraterap

9/11/2008 10:24:03 PM

probably because we dug ourselves a quick 21 point hole

9/11/2008 10:27:53 PM

even when it got close..

9/11/2008 10:47:17 PM

Quote :

"during the State @ ECU game last year, the atmosphere didn't really impress me that much. still light years ahead of UNC, and it was still pretty good, but i wasn't blown away by the amount of noise throughout the game "

The WVU game was 100 times louder than the state game last year. That game atmosphere wasn't the greatest imo.

9/12/2008 12:33:04 PM

i thought state/ecu was the biggest game evar.

9/12/2008 12:46:55 PM

http://www.wral.com/sports/story/3535816/

this is horseshit

Quote :

"Greenville, N.C. — The State Bureau of Investigation said Friday that agents would look into reports that law enforcement officers used excessive force on East Carolina University fans after last weekend's football game. Separately, Conference USA fined ECU $10,000 for violating the league's sportsmanship policies. During the post-game celebration of ECU's 24-3 victory over then-No. 8 West Virginia, fans stormed the field of Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium. Fans said some officers used excessive force to halt the rush to the field, and some videos have shown an unidentified officer throwing a fan to the ground and another unidentified officer repeatedly punching a fan while on the ground. ECU Police Chief Scott Shelton said that, because of the various law enforcement agencies that provided security at the game, it was appropriate for an independent office to conduct the investigation. ECU police were assisted at the game by officers from the Greenville, Winterville and Kinston police departments and Pitt County and Lenoir County deputies. Shelton said his department had identified police officers and deputies shown in video clips of incidents after the game. ECU has forwarded that information to the appropriate agencies, which will determine possible discipline, he said. Shelton didn't identify the officers, citing personnel laws and regulations. After the SBI completes its investigation, Pitt County District Attorney Clark Everett will decide whether to bring charges against any officers, Shelton said. Conference USA's sportsmanship policies prohibit public access to competition areas. In addition to the fine, the league said ECU could face a suspension of future hosting privileges. The action of the fans was “clearly in violation” of the league's sportsmanship standards, according to a letter sent Thursday by league Commissioner Britton Banowsky to ECU Athletic Director Terry Holland. In addition to an increased fine, any repetition of such an incident in football or any sport could also result in the suspension of hosting privileges for conference championship competition. “In June 2008, the conference adopted a post-game policy to ensure the safety of visiting players and officials is maintained,” Banowsky said in a statement. “That cannot be achieved when fans are celebrating on the field in the presence of the visiting team. “As is the case in every conference, we expect all 12 of our members to take the steps necessary to create a safe environment at their events. It is both a reasonable expectation and an important one.” Both Holland and ECU chancellor Steve Ballard issues statements in support of the policy. “Our first concern at any of our athletics events is the safety of the fans and the participants,” Ballard said. “We are committed to making any changes necessary to enhance safety at these events and to follow Conference USA mandates.” Conference USA policy states that “institutions are responsible for the conduct of spectators at events that they are hosting and that spectators should not be permitted on the field of play until the visiting team and officials have made safe transition to the locker room.” Shelton said ECU would no longer use officers from law enforcement agencies outside Pitt County to provide security at games."

on another note, I figured it was law enforcement outside greenville that caused most of the excessive force problems.

9/12/2008 3:59:39 PM

anybody see ECU on PTI?

9/12/2008 4:19:38 PM