Somebody get Over40 a new signature … and a 50-cent loan.
SWEET B)
can’t wait to see his carefully worded answer.
B)
I’m hanging on the edge of my seat!!!
Let me translate ahead of time…
“no comment” 
Mike, I want to thank you for what you have done for Charlotte this year. All of us should be the first to thank you for the coverage you are giving us. I would love for one of your reporters to ask each ACC coach in North Carolina why they will not play us or play us at home. Do not let them give you the pat answer. Put them on the hot seat. Make them say on the record what they have said only in private. Put their refusal to play us on the front page of the sports section. Then let some of the Observer writers respond. Kentucky refused to play Louisville until they were forced to play them. Now it is “the game” in the state of Kentucky. If the largest newspaper in NC puts the heat on and keeps it on, maybe things will change. Can you image a series with Chapel Hill like Louisville has with Kentucky?
What a joke.
Unfortunately if we did have a series with the in state ACC schools it wouldn’t be like the loserville kentucky game. The game would never get the hype that Duke or NC State Vs. UNC. What I think would be fun and would get the hype is a 4 team preseason tourney featuring in state schools. How about for the first year we get Charlotte, Duke, ECU, and Wilmington (I would have picked another ACC school but two teams from the same conference cannot play in the same tourney - I picked Duke because they would be the least afraid to play us I would think).
I think last year we discussed a Carolina’s preseason tourney. That would really open up the field. Could probably go to 8 teams then.
Either option would certainly pick up a TV spot on either C-SET or ESPN.
How about this Carolina’s Field. USC, Charlotte, Tar Heels, Wilmington, Coll of Charleston, Winthrop, ECU, and Gardner-Webb. That would make a nice tourney and bring in some good sponsors for TV time.
Very nice Q & A with Lutz in today’s paper regarding us playing the ACC. Maybe the question about playing us can be directed towards the actual ACC schools in question instead of towards Mike P or our school now.
This is my favorite quote from Lutz:
[b]"...I don't worry about the ACC schools playing us or not playing us. I worry about getting the best schedule I can..."[/b]
A shame that more people here don’t have that attitude instead of whining and worrying all the time about an ACC team playing us. Guess that’s to be expected though when you grow up in ACC country but we’ve done all we can do on our end to get games with these teams. Can’t force them to play us and I don’t blame them for not doing so. I wouldn’t want to lose to us either.
An in-state or “Carolinas” tournament is a no-brainer in my opinion. Wouldn’t that draw the crowds? There would be no team that wouldn’t bring fans. That Pepsi Tournament always pissed me off because we were the host school but never got to play in it. What tournament was it that we beat… was it a ranked Arkansas team? We had Rodney “Lockjaw” Odom and James “Trigger” Terrell that year. That might have been the Pepsi tourney but I can’t remember. That might have been the year we played the Dukies in Cameron but I can’t remember.
Anyway, I don’t see why a tournament with all NC/SC schools wouldn’t be a money-maker and an exciting event. I’ve never understood why teams go to places like Hawaii and Alaska for God’s sake. I mean WTF?
Edit: My good friend lake49er has set me staight. That tournament we beat nationally ranked Alabama and DePaul to win it. He also pointed out that a female Observer writer gave her pre-tourney prediction, and it was something to the tune of “The only way the 49ers have a chance is if all the other teams get the flu.” Back then was the hayday of the Observer not giving us an ounce of respect.
Here’s a link to the article.
http://www.charlotte.com/mld/charlotte/spo…te/10210413.htm
I have to say Bobby was very tactful in all of his answers. And its out… Be interesting to see how the ACC teams respond to this article.
Great article. Jena is doing a great job for us this season.
I think the question would have to be directed at the other schools. I think in terms of history, Duke and Carolina certainly have the right to be choosey, because anybody would play them. But as far as the other schools, esp Wake and State, I’d love to hear a response to these same types of questions.
There’s a lot more days ahead for articles like these though. 
Is it Friday yet?
Mike I am very disappointed that this article did not appear in bold letters on the front page of Sunday’s edition because we all know Sunday’s edition has a higher circulation.
I don’t think Bobby pulled any punches at all. Very frank.
Jena did a great job covering the issue thoroughly without being pushy.
I agree…Jena is really stepping it up this year for the Observer. I don’t know if she was hired to cover the Niners, but this has been great publicity and now the team has to deliver. As much as I think the coverage has been lacking in the past, this season the Observer has delivered so far. I certainly hope it continues.
This is the kind of stuff that helps promote our program and it really has a good insight of who we are and what we stand for. Keep it up Observer!
Norman,the tourney you are talking about is when we were finally invited to our hometown tournamet.Do you remember the comments from the “lady” at the observer who did the write up.“the only chance the 49ers have is if the other teams get the flu”.As you know we went out and slaped nationaly ranked Alabama and nationaly ranked Depaul to win the whole thing.Bonus points:Who were the two future NBA stars who played for that Alabama team?
To be more on topic, I just wanted to thank Mr. Persinger for this article. It is obvious that you are listening to us and it’s great that Jena is taking the lead in getting things like this done. You are winning folks over Mike. Keep it up!
@lake49er: Dude, you sent me that exact post in a PM. Did you mean to do that??
Thanks Mike P. Being out of state it’s great to be able to get some quality Niner info online from the Observer. Keep it up!
[b]Who were the two future NBA stars who played for that Alabama team?[/b]
Sprewell and Horry…James “Hollywood” Robinson I believe was also on that team. They were loaded. Also, the 4th team was State or UNC? and lost in the the 1st game to avoid a showdown with us.
Just who is this great and wise JENA JANOVY? Any pix out there? We need to be real goooood to this woman.