Why does it bother ISU fans that some Iowa fans aren't alumni?

[ryno99]

I never went to Iowa but I'm a fan. And it stems back from early childhood memories. My father took me to my first ever sporting event, Iowa football game in 1985. We use to go to Iowa BB games all the time with friends and would go to Iowa BB camps in elementary, middle school, and high school. I got to meet Chris Street the season before he passed. You know how big of deal that is for a 7th grader?! I use to watch ISU BB games as well, especially with Hoiberg. ISU and Iowa BB were always on TV and easy to watch. Was always exposed to Iowa FB on TV much more than ISU FB ever was. Think that helped stem the fanatic in me as well. I didn't choose to attend Iowa for college because I wanted smaller classrooms (coming from a smaller HS) and campus. Plus my counselor didn't do a very good job selling me on Iowa's programs anyway. I went to a college that is more difficult and more expensive to enroll anyway. But even in college my roommates and I were Hawkeye fans and would attend Iowa sporting events. There were very few ISU fans in college and if they were, family were Cyclone grads or from Ames area. Just my 2 cents.

 

[calinorthhawk]

Well, to extend this to the ultimate degree of stupidity...

Perhaps by saying look at his twittter handle, the poster assumed someone to be capable of actually looking at some of the content of that very forum. Within there just might be some comments, photos, things that substantiate Zach as a fan of the Hawks (maybe even photos of him sitting in the stands with family, friends and other Hawkeye supporters following the halftime activities of the game where he served as Honorary Team Captain.) But, no. Let's just take that sentence from a more detailed post and make it the topic du jour here.

In a fashion, your posts do question Zach as a Hawk fan. To you, because he does not specifically refer to Iowa or Hawkeyes in anyway in a twitter handle, that leads to conclude that all of these fans that you say know he is a Hawk fan to suddenly forget that knowledge when they access his twitter feed. Yeah, that makes perfect sense.

Thank you 5Fan5 for explaining this simple concept to our friends. I did not think my comment could be any more obvious for a grade schooler on up, but I guess I was wrong.

CyCity, I will amuse you here for a moment and actually respond: I gave you an example of a diehard Hawk fan who did not attend the University per this asinine thread. Rather than taking my word for it and not assuming your prior knowledge of this public figure, I pointed you to check out his Twitter handle as proof of this. I did indeed assume that you or the other readers had the capability to look it up and read through if interested. You would find pictures and tweets that 5Fan5 alluded to, such as "Black/gold in my blood. Love the Hawks. I AM @DrakeAlumni", "
I love Iowa football. Team.", etc. etc., and see that indeed this guy really does love the Hawks while having never been an alumni or attended the school. He is simply representative of a huge part of the fanbase that similarly loves and follows the Hawkeyes while never having gone to the University of Iowa. Yes, all of these "true" Hawkeye fans really do exist.

 

[Niko13]

A few things I find amusing about this thread:

- Anyone who picks a school based on how good that school is in sports (who doesn't play sports), is an idiot. So if you went to Iowa in the '80's and feel superior to someone who went to ISU in the '80's, because Iowa was better in football during that time, you have issues. Many older Iowa grads are arrogant or feel superior for that exact reason. Sad and pathetic.
- If you grow up in Iowa, and got into one school, you likely could have gotten into the other. There's 100 different reasons to pick a school, it's not like one school is ivy league or light years better than the other, so you can quit acting like it. No, Iowa is not Stanford, it's not Notre Dame, it's not even Michigan. ISU is none of those either, but they are both very good schools.
- If you didn't go to Iowa, or even go to college, but root for them, fine. But I think it's fair to get called out for that if you deserve it (e.g. if you call ISU a community college, make fun of ISU for being an Ag school (ANF anyone???), ask those that went to ISU (and actually got a degree) why would they go there, etc.). So don't be that way.
- Whoever is comparing being a Packers fan (a pro team with a national brand, that you didn't spend a good portion of your life attending, or paying tuition to, or getting a degree from, etc.), to being the same as being a fan of a college you didn't go to... that comparison makes no sense. Apples and oranges.
- Iowa may have more fans because of their football success in the '80's, and now many of those fans have had kids and grandkids, etc., so yes Iowa has more fans (congrats!), but you're obviously worried. Or threads like this wouldn't exist on your boards. And get the most views and responses. The 2nd most viewed thread was last nights ISU-KU thread. You may make fun of enrollment smack, but now that ISU is bigger than Iowa, putting out more alumni than Iowa, consistently beating Iowa often in major sports, etc., we can sense you are worried.

You can have your tavern hawk fans, your easy Big 10 schedule in every sport, your lame Carver arena, you can try to act like you help farmers on your football helmets, while at the same time making fun of the Ag school in the state that actually helps farmers, and you can try to act like you don't care about ISU, or that Iowa is a better school, or has better fans, but deep down you know it's not true. And that bothers you. Almost as much as that 20 point comeback in basketball. Which makes me happy.

Thanks for the laughs in this thread though.

you should support the ag movement too and add it to the end of your handle. You seem to already fit the bill

 

[rufus-hawk]

Who said anything about not being able to be a fan if you didn't go there? I was a Hawkeyes fan growing up in SE IA. I went to ISU and became a cyclone. It really is a simple concept.

It's a simple concept that to many a Hawkeye or Cyclone is an athletic team mascot. I did not play sports at Iowa so I call myself an alum, not a Hawkeye.

 

[yerpHAWK]

I grew up a hawkeye fan. All my life it was hawkeyes hawkeyes hawkeyes. I went to college at UNI because it was closer, and a better school for me. Does that mean I cannot like Iowa? I can't be as every bit of a diehard as anyone else. I should throw away my favorite team, in the state in which I was born cuz it's not right.

 

[NorthCentralHawk]

I became a Hawkeye fan FAR before I ever thought about which university I wanted to attend. When I decided to go to ISU for ChemE, it had nothing to do with sports and more to do with quality of the education I wanted to pursue - at least in the early 90's, ISU had a well-regarded engineering college.

Figure my Hawkeye "fandom" is more battle tested than the average alum; I endured 4 years in Ames without changing sides...in fact, in many ways, I believe it made me even more of a Hawk fan.

 

[Ronman]

Who said anything about not being able to be a fan if you didn't go there? I was a Hawkeyes fan growing up in SE IA. I went to ISU and became a cyclone. It really is a simple concept.

You were an Iowa fan and you converted to a Clown? Ouch! Bad choice!

 

[rufus-hawk]

A few things I find amusing about this thread:

- Anyone who picks a school based on how good that school is in sports (who doesn't play sports), is an idiot. So if you went to Iowa in the '80's and feel superior to someone who went to ISU in the '80's, because Iowa was better in football during that time, you have issues. Many older Iowa grads are arrogant or feel superior for that exact reason. Sad and pathetic.
- If you grow up in Iowa, and got into one school, you likely could have gotten into the other. There's 100 different reasons to pick a school, it's not like one school is ivy league or light years better than the other, so you can quit acting like it. No, Iowa is not Stanford, it's not Notre Dame, it's not even Michigan. ISU is none of those either, but they are both very good schools.
- If you didn't go to Iowa, or even go to college, but root for them, fine. But I think it's fair to get called out for that if you deserve it (e.g. if you call ISU a community college, make fun of ISU for being an Ag school (ANF anyone???), ask those that went to ISU (and actually got a degree) why would they go there, etc.). So don't be that way.
- Whoever is comparing being a Packers fan (a pro team with a national brand, that you didn't spend a good portion of your life attending, or paying tuition to, or getting a degree from, etc.), to being the same as being a fan of a college you didn't go to... that comparison makes no sense. Apples and oranges.
- Iowa may have more fans because of their football success in the '80's, and now many of those fans have had kids and grandkids, etc., so yes Iowa has more fans (congrats!), but you're obviously worried. Or threads like this wouldn't exist on your boards. And get the most views and responses. The 2nd most viewed thread was last nights ISU-KU thread. You may make fun of enrollment smack, but now that ISU is bigger than Iowa, putting out more alumni than Iowa, consistently beating Iowa often in major sports, etc., we can sense you are worried.

You can have your tavern hawk fans, your easy Big 10 schedule in every sport, your lame Carver arena, you can try to act like you help farmers on your football helmets, while at the same time making fun of the Ag school in the state that actually helps farmers, and you can try to act like you don't care about ISU, or that Iowa is a better school, or has better fans, but deep down you know it's not true. And that bothers you. Almost as much as that 20 point comeback in basketball. Which makes me happy.

Thanks for the laughs in this thread though.

There, there, little brother...

 

[HerkyFan]

There, there, little brother...

So much fun in this thread.

 

[Phenomenally Frantastic]

I hate starting an ISU thread but have always been curious about this.

As a Hawkeye fan I don't feel any superior or care if the guy cheering next to me went to school here or not. It really seems to annoy Clown fans though. Any insight into this?

Jealousy

 

[JStandefer]

I never understood this either. I went to college for 4 years and couldn't tell you one thing about any of their athletic teams, or if they even still have all the same sports as when I graduated. I grew up close to the U of I campus and attended football and basketball games growing up, and watched road games on TV. More people can tell you I'm an Iowa fan than can tell you where I went to college.

I do not apologize.

I know many ISU and UNI students and grads that were Hawkeye fans. But, as have never met an Iowa student or grad that was a fan of ISU

 

[MepoDawg#]

Dumb thread is dumb. I get why ISU fans (alums) bash Iowa fans who didn't attend Iowa as they are jealous of shear number of Iowa fans compared to ISU fans. They need something to keep in their back pocket to badger big brother with. As for Iowa fans, why does it bother you (us) what ISU fans think?

 

[leiserom]

To me almost all Iowa fans either went to school there or are from Iowa originally. I never meet any "bandwagon fans"of Iowa from out of state All the bandwagon fans jump on the OSU or Alabama bandwagons as an example. Easy to do as they win a lot.

 

[Hawk40forever]

First time poster, long time reader...Feels right that my first post is on an Iowa/ISU thread. I have chuckled many a times while reading the fun banter throughout these threads. As an alum of the U of Iowa it thrills me that we have exponentially more non alumni fans than the Cyclowns do. It illuminates the overall popularity and success that the Hawkeyes have had over the years. I don't cheer for the Clowns in any situation, just the way it is for me. But I certainly welcome any and all non alumni Hawk fans. They call it the Hawkeye State for a reason.

 

[Psyclone]

I hate starting an ISU thread but have always been curious about this.

As a Hawkeye fan I don't feel any superior or care if the guy cheering next to me went to school here or not. It really seems to annoy Clown fans though. Any insight into this?

It's an Internet myth that all ISU fans are alumni. It gets repeated so often people start to believe it's true.

 

[Psyclone]

I have 3 or 4 buddies who are sophomores at ISU for engineering who still consider themselves Hawk fans and will get into it with their fellow classmates for fun. The hate for big bro on that campus is real

Chances are pretty good if they stick with their education, that they will flip. It won't be because of their friends harassing them. In fact that may just delay the process.