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Tradition - stanfan95118 - 03-18-2014

Perhaps this has already been discussed recently, but I am wondering about the consensus here concerning the more successful tradition (overall): men's basketball or football?

I would perhaps instinctively side with football (14 conference titles; 2 claimed national championships; a Voldemort; successful coaches; etc.), but basketball has a strong tradition also (13 conference championships; 1 outright national championship; 17 tournament appearances; etc.)

Thoughts?

Re: Tradition - Nan3cy - 03-18-2014

I'd say football, but that may be colored by my undergrad days. When I was in school in the late 60s, everyone went to the football games. (Girls all wearing white blouses and red skirts.) I didn't know anyone who went to the basketball games on any sort of routine basis. Of course, if all of the undergrads had wanted to go to the basketball games, it would have been impossible because the Old Pavilion seated what, 2,000 people? But the football stadium was pretty much full up for most home games.

Re: Tradition - JeffInCorvallis - 03-18-2014

Strong tradition for men's basketball during the Monty years: students lining up and camping out for the best seats, memorable games with UCLA and Arizona, good times.  However, outside of those peak years of Mad Dog, Brevin, Chris Hernandez, Josh Childress, pretty much nothing remarkable.

I vote for football.

Note that we do not approach the tradition of U$C, Alabama, or Florida State and even with continued success likely will not due to small (but nerdy) fan base.


Based upon historic records - Mick - 03-18-2014

(03-18-2014, 04:02 PM)Nan3cy link Wrote:I'd say football, but that may be colored by my undergrad days. When I was in school in the late 60s, everyone went to the football games. (Girls all wearing white blouses and red skirts.) I didn't know anyone who went to the basketball games on any sort of routine basis. Of course, if all of the undergrads had wanted to go to the basketball games, it would have been impossible because the Old Pavilion seated what, 2,000 people? But the football stadium was pretty much full up for most home games.

The win/loss percentage for each program is virtually identical.  Stanford has won 605 football games, lost 440 and tied 49.  If we assume each tie is worth exactly half a win and half a loss, then the winning percentage for the football program throughout its history is 57.54%. 

The Stanford men's basketball team has won 1,519 games and lost 1,137.  That means they won 57.19% of their games.  To put it in perspective, if the football team had lost just four more games in its history, it would have a lower winning record that Stanford basketball.  So consider it virtually identical.

The postseason is a different story.  Stanford is 11-13-1 in football games, a 46% winning percentage (I counted the conference championship games as part of the regular season, same with the basketball conference championships).  In basketball, however, Stanford's record was 63.16%, with 36 wins and 21 losses.

Stanford has played football for 106 seasons (from 1892 to 2013, less four years for WWI and WWII and 12 years where they played rugby and not football -- which I didn't count for these purposes) and basketball for 99 seasons (101 years since 1913/1914, less two years for WWII).  Stanford went to the football postseason in 22.6% of those seasons.  Stanford went to the basketball postseason in 24.2% of those seasons.

So is it a basketball school or a football school?  Well, it should be both.  But football has the slightly upper hand, as it has played in what would be the equivalent of the NCAA Basketball's "Elite Eight" four years running now.



Re: Tradition - 76lsjumb - 03-18-2014

(03-18-2014, 05:11 PM)JeffInCorvallis link Wrote:However, outside of those peak years of Mad Dog, Brevin, Chris Hernandez, Josh Childress, pretty much nothing remarkable.

So..., I guess Hank Luisetti is, what..., chopped liver...?  ???

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hank_Luisetti

Re: Tradition - 81alum - 03-18-2014

Our basketball program was reasonably successful prior to WWII.  From 1913-1941 we had 20 winning seasons, 2 even seasons, and 9 losing seasons.  Those last few years before the war were the Hank Luisetti years.  Luisetti did not invent the jump shot, but since he was one of the first to use it in a highly publicized game in Madison Square Garden--a game in which we broke Long Island University's 43 game winning streak--he became known as the man who changed the game of basketball.  Basically, before Luisetti a tiny number of players were using the jump shot, but after Luisetti it became the norm.

From 1954 to 1975 we were coached by Howie Dallmar.  Howie had led us to the 1942 national championship, then played professionally before coming back to coach us.  During the first half of his coaching career we usually had winning seasons.    Though 1966 we had 9 winning seasons to 4 losing ones, but we won the Pac 8 only 1 year.  But after that his teams began to flounder a bit, and he had only 1 winning season until he retired in 1975.

After 1975 we went through the Dick DiBiaso and Tom Davis eras, during which we never had a winning season in 11 years.  Considering the last decade of Dallmar, followed by DiBiaso and Davis, any sort of basketball tradition at Stanford passed into dim memory and faded.  Basically, we went nearly an entire generation without any significant basketball success before Mont gomery showed up.

Now, contrast this with football.  Stanford football started some twenty years earlier than Stanford basketball, and most of those years were winning seasons. 

From 1924-1935 we had the glory years.  We had winning seasons--usually overwhelmingly so--every single year.  Pop Warner was a genuine innovator of the game and took us to three Rose Bowls.  Claude Thornhill followed and we won the conference 3 years straight.  Sadly, we only won 2 of the 6 Rose Bowls, but six in an 11 year period! 

Thornhill seems to have lost his touch in the late 1930s, but Chuck Shaughnessy replaced him and immediately led us to a glorious Rose Bowl victory in 1941, where we beat Nebraska in their first ever bowl game 21-13.  In the third quarter Nebraska put up a brilliant goal line stand and stopped us from scoring on four tries from the 1 yard line.  They chose to punt the ball on 1st down to get it out of the end zone, but Pete Kmetovic caught on, caught the punt, and returned it 39 yards for a touchdown.  That sealed the game for us.  That play apparently was thought to be the greatest play in the history of the Rose Bowl at the time it was made.

After Shaughnessy, we went through a decade of medicrity until Chuck Taylor took over in 1951 and took us immediately to another Rose Bowl.  It was, unfortunately, the first nationally televised college football game.  I say unfortunately because after we jumped out to a 7-6 lead over Illinois, they scored 27 unanswered points to crush us.

The rest of Taylor's coaching career with us was mediocre, although we had decent seasons in 1953 and 1955.  Then came Jack Curtis for five years without a single winning season.  And finally John Ralston, who did not really get off to a fast start.  For his first 5 years Ralston had only one winning season--although he had three 5-5 seasons.  Beginning in 1968 things improved, with a 6 win season, then a 7 win season, then two 9 win seasons capped by winning Rose Bowl performances.  Ralston really marks the beginning of the modern Stanford football tradition, after two decades of mediocrity.

Jack Christianson had five winning seasons in a row, although most people remember him as a failure since he was unable to continue Ralston's Rose Bowl success.  Then Walsh for two innovative, successful years in which he changed the nature of American football.  Sadly, he was followed by 12 years with only two winning seasons.  Finally Denny Green got us to a bowl in his final of three years,  and everyone here knows the rest of the story.

IN SUM

I think it is pretty clear that football has the more illustrious tradition at Stanford.  Both football and men's basketball had their glory years earlier in the 20th century, both had their innovators, but men's basketball got to the national stage exactly once and our football program did so half a dozen times.  Football has had its ups and downs since 1968, as has basketball, but the Ralston-Walsh-Harbaugh-Shaw era seems on balance more impressive than the Mont gomery-um-who-else era. 

Perhaps most important, I do not think football has ever been without hope for an entire generation of time the way basketball has.


Re: Based upon historic records - yvonne - 03-18-2014

(03-18-2014, 05:19 PM)Mick link Wrote:The postseason is a different story.  Stanford is 11-13-1 in football games, a 46% winning percentage (I counted the conference championship games as part of the regular season, same with the basketball conference championships).  In basketball, however, Stanford's record was 63.16%, with 36 wins and 21 losses.

Help this tired, mathematically-challenged woman out. Does a single elimination tournament structure make it more likely, less likely, or as likely that a team will be at .500?

Re: Tradition - washingtonismoney - 03-18-2014

Football postseason strikes me as slightly different as bowls attempt (generally) to match nearly even teams. OTOH March Madness -- if you're a good program -- allows you the chance to blow out some ritual sacrifices on the way to a championship. The other thing is that for a dominant team, the single elimination structure means that Sweet Sixteen (i.e. 2-1 postseason record) is a realistic minimum. The basketball equivalent of, say, the 2010 Stanford football team therefore runs up postseason wins whereas the football team could only win the one bowl.

Re: Based upon historic records - stupac2 - 03-18-2014

(03-18-2014, 08:09 PM)Yvonne link Wrote:Help this tired, mathematically-challenged woman out. Does a single elimination tournament structure make it more likely, less likely, or as likely that a team will be at .500?

I think that depends on your assumptions. If you think that the true odds in the tournament are 50-50, then it should be 64:63, since there are 64 wins but only 63 losses.

(I edited out some stupid math where I came to a different conclusion, in case anyone caught it... I'm tired right now.)

Re: Tradition - yvonne - 03-18-2014

Never mind. I just figured it out. I just had to visualize the brackets.

Re: Based upon historic records - JeffInCorvallis - 03-18-2014

(03-18-2014, 08:09 PM)Yvonne link Wrote:[quote author=Mick link=topic=9695.msg85779#msg85779 date=1395188357]
The postseason is a different story.  Stanford is 11-13-1 in football games, a 46% winning percentage (I counted the conference championship games as part of the regular season, same with the basketball conference championships).  In basketball, however, Stanford's record was 63.16%, with 36 wins and 21 losses.

Help this tired, mathematically-challenged woman out. Does a single elimination tournament structure make it more likely, less likely, or as likely that a team will be at .500?
[/quote]

If you typically go into the tournament as a high seed, you win the first game.  Then, if you inexplicably choke in the second round, you end up .500...

Never mind.


Re: Based upon historic records - Roberton3 - 03-19-2014

(03-18-2014, 08:38 PM)stupac2 link Wrote:I think that depends on your assumptions. If you think that the true odds in the tournament are 50-50, then it should be 64:63, since there are 64 wins but only 63 losses.

A 64-team single-elimination tournament has 63 wins, not 64.  Any time one team wins, another team has to lose, so there's no way for the total number of wins to be different from the total number of losses.

Re: Based upon historic records - stupac2 - 03-19-2014

(03-19-2014, 04:35 AM)Roberton3 link Wrote:[quote author=stupac2 link=topic=9695.msg85790#msg85790 date=1395200324]
I think that depends on your assumptions. If you think that the true odds in the tournament are 50-50, then it should be 64:63, since there are 64 wins but only 63 losses.

A 64-team single-elimination tournament has 63 wins, not 64.  Any time one team wins, another team has to lose, so there's no way for the total number of wins to be different from the total number of losses.
[/quote]

Yeah, I know, I realized that after I got some sleep. This is why you don't math while tired.

Re: Tradition - 81alum - 03-19-2014

Fascinating how this thread exposes our different personalities.  When I saw "tradition" I immediately thought "history" and "culture" while others thought more mathematically.

I supposed there are two quite different questions we could ask:
1) To what extent are football and men's basketball at Stanford today influenced by their own long traditions of success?
2) Has football or men's basketball had a deeper influence on Stanford's reputation for athletic success?  (I.e., which figures more prominently in hearts of alums, fans, and the general public.)



Re: Tradition - yvonne - 03-19-2014

Here's what I thought of:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRdfX7ut8gw

Re: Tradition - CrazedZooChimp - 03-19-2014

My reasoning for thinking football is largely that I can only name one Stanford basketball player/coach who played before I started following the team (Luisetti).  I can name lots of football players/coaches from before my time (going back to Nevers and Pop, up through guys like Elway and Plunkett).  And that's despite me going to school when the basketball team was good and the football team terrible.  To me that speaks to the strength of the football tradition over basketball, and how much more it's talked about.

Of course there's also the fact that we've played in the 3rd most Rose Bowls of all time (well, tied with tOSU), second most in the Pac-8/10/12.  That's really damn impressive (although maybe our bball team has more conference championships than I thought?)

But maybe it's just because I like football more than basketball, and follow the NFL infinitely more than the NBA, that I hear more about Stanford football.

Re: Tradition - Spiny_Norman - 03-19-2014

The following 23 players and coaches with Stanford affiliation have been enshrined in the College Football Hall of Fame:

Frankie Albert
John Brodie
Chris Burford
Walter Camp
Bill Corbus
John Elway
Hugh Gallarneau
Bobby Grayson
Bob "Bones" Hamilton
Andy Kerr
Ken Margerum
Bill McColl
James "Monk" Moscrip
Ernie Nevers
Jim Plunkett
John Ralston
Bob "Horse" Reynolds
Clark Shaughnessy
Jeff Siemon
Chuck Taylor
Glenn "Pop" Warner
Paul Wiggin
Fielding "Hurry Up" Yost

The following basketball players/coaches with Stanford affiliation are in the Basketball Hall of Fame:
Hank Luisetti
Jim Pollard
George Yardley
Everett Dean
John Bunn
Tara VanDerveer


Advantage - Football



Re: Tradition - stupac2 - 03-19-2014

(03-19-2014, 11:48 AM)Spiny_Norman link Wrote:The following 23 players and coaches with Stanford affiliation have been enshrined in the College Football Hall of Fame:

Frankie Albert
John Brodie
Chris Burford
Walter Camp
Bill Corbus
John Elway
Hugh Gallarneau
Bobby Grayson
Bob "Bones" Hamilton
Andy Kerr
Ken Margerum
Bill McColl
James "Monk" Moscrip
Ernie Nevers
Jim Plunkett
John Ralston
Bob "Horse" Reynolds
Clark Shaughnessy
Jeff Siemon
Chuck Taylor
Glenn "Pop" Warner
Paul Wiggin
Fielding "Hurry Up" Yost

The following basketball players/coaches with Stanford affiliation are in the Basketball Hall of Fame:
Hank Luisetti
Jim Pollard
George Yardley
Everett Dean
John Bunn
Tara VanDerveer


Advantage - Football

Well, sure, but how many more total players/coaches has Stanford had in each sport? A football team is like 10x as big, so it's not too surprising that there would be 10x as many elite players if the programs are about the same in "tradition".

Football, definitely - Redrum - 03-19-2014

And it's not just another example of my sport preference.  I think I went to one bball game in the old Encina gym.  Saw bigger crowds when they used it for picking up your class registration packet.  All I remember is Howie Dalmar ... and people wondering whether Larry Rosenzweig's (sp?) fragile knees would allow him to actually give Stanford the tall center they craved.  Man that guy was stiff, as were the two braces he wore.  Poor guy.

Much bigger support for football in those Plunkett/Bunce years.  What was odd (well, to me at least) was how my fraternity just didn't make a big deal about the games.  Sometimes I would go alone because the bros were staying back at the house,  probably smoking pot.  Could not understand it.  But I'm the guy who sat through an Oregon State game in a game-long downpour while the Great Pumpkin's running tandem of Billy Main and "Earthquake" Enyart  just clubbed Ralston's team senseless.

Re: Tradition - FarmBoy - 03-19-2014

Rhetorical question: Which sport did John Arrillaga play and which does he spend the majority of resources supporting? Even a guy who played for the bball squad seems focus his efforts on the football program.