I wanna be a Pirate again

I must admit that it's been a long time since I've lived and died with every ECU football game. It's time to get back on the beam.

I attended ECU '87 through '92 (yeah, the extra year was necessary to make up for my first couple semesters. I spent more time at Sub Station II, may it rest in piece, than I did in the Biology lab....go figure). I was an ardent fan even as we were consistently loosing our homecoming games to SW Louisiana. Ah, the Art Baker years....up the middle, up the middle, up the middle, punt. Those were the halcyon days when watching the 100 foot "cup snake" materialize in the home stands was exponentially more exciting than the game.

Enter Bill Lewis. It took him a couple seasons to get it right....and did he ever. Man what an exciting season '91 was. But for a bogus excessive celebration penalty against ECU during the season opener with Illinois, we might have won all 11 regular season games that year. But that aside, going 10-1, beating State in arguably the greatest comeback bowl victory in NCAA history (I know, our choke against Marshall a few years ago ironically now gives the Thundering Herd that title), and finishing ranked 9th in the country was pretty damn sweet. Hell, I'm a NY Yankee fan, and I'll tell you, even the '96 World Series did not excite my inner fan the way the '91 ECU football season did. I've been searching for that high ever since.

The Logan years were bitter sweet. We went to some bowl games....won some, lost some, had some great upsets, built a larger stadium, were a constant fixture on ESPN2, joined a conference, et al. But, bottom line......we never, NEVER, truly turned the corner. Think about how many times we lost to a UAB after beating a Miami....how many times we started out ranked 26th in which a season opening win would have catapulted us into the national poll rankings and into the spotlight, how many asinine plays (He's a riverboat gambler you know) resulted in a bitter loss.... I believe it was those things...., that reputation, that got into our collective psyche, and that affected our recruiting and kept us out of a major conference. I have to give the Logan years negative marks considering where we are a decade and a half later.

Never the less, here we are. A new coach. A new AD. A new attitude maybe? We don't know yet. But, I'm ready to believe again. Ready to pour my heart into my beloved Pirates. I want to believe again. I want to feel every loss and every win deep into my purple and gold soul. God help me, I love this team.

Here we go Pirates, here we go.....