Park | Time for Penn football to shine

I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not a huge football fan.

I’m big enough of a sports fan to know the general happenings of the gridiron world and come winter, I’ll most likely join the many Philly natives as they hope for a long-awaited Eagles Championship — that is, of course, if we even have a season — but for the most part, my sporting interests haven’t always been with football.

So when the Quakers won their second straight Ivy League Championship last fall, I have to say that I wasn’t particularly excited.

After the team went an underwhelming 5-2 my freshman year — good enough for third in the Ancient Eight — I had been left with the impression that the team was decent, but nothing to call home about. Not much more than an average team in the Ivies.

But I think that may be starting to change.

A couple weeks ago, the ever-growing cable sports network Versus announced a deal with the Ivy League to nationally broadcast five Ancient Eight football games, three of which will be Quakers games.

While this is pretty exciting news, it’s not something entirely new. The Ivy League has had its games shown on Versus before and has partnered with the sports network for the last three years. However, to show three games in a single season seems, to me, to indicate a shift in how the program is viewed by the rest of the sporting world.

To avid college football fans, this may not seem like a significant step and admittedly, it’s a very small one. Compared to the University of Floridas and USCs — to which nationally broadcasted games are as much of the game as Gatorade is — watching Penn football is probably a lot like watching a minor league team — without glitz and not all too exciting. But from the point of view of someone who has come to appreciate Penn sports for what it is — we did all knowingly make the decision to come here — this looks like it could be a move towards gaining some recognition.

I mean, it’s not like the Quakers have nothing to offer.

The Red and Blue are the two-time defending Ivy League Champions and have had two straight undefeated Ivy seasons. On top of that, last season’s squad steamrolled through conference play, defeating its Ancient Eight opponents by an average of 19 points. This stellar play resulted in the highest Football Championship Subdivision ranking (No. 14) of any Ivy Team since the 2003 Quakers.

Although the Quakers have not been able to showcase their dominance outside of the Ivies due to the League’s reluctance to participate in the FCS postseason — a topic that has been under much scrutiny especially in recent years — the team has still earned the respect of several nonconference programs.

This TV deal obviously doesn’t guarantee anything. However, it does open up the possibility of millions of football fans across the nation catching a glimpse of this historic program.

Who knows. Maybe some day, the program will really be worth calling about.

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