[Farm93]

[quote author=Farm93 link=topic=4568.msg32385#msg32385 date=1317660340]
Stanford fans are not exactly tough. 

Some are. This from Rule of Tree....on the days following the '89 Earthquake:

"On October 17, 1989, a 6.9 earthquake rattled the Bay Area, resulting in several deaths and almost a billion dollars in damage to property.  Most people remember the earthquake for delaying the Battle of the Bay World Series by almost two weeks.  When baseball returned, though, it wasn't the first sporting event held in the Bay Area since the earthquake.  Four days after the tremor, Stanford was scheduled to play Utah in a home game at Stanford Stadium.  Nervous about the potential for aftershocks as well as the ability to actually hold the game in a shell-shocked region, university administrators from both Stanford and Utah as well as conference officials met hastily to determine whether or not the game would be canceled, moved to Salt Lake, or postponed until a later date.  After an inspection of Stanford Stadium revealed no structural damage, all parties agreed to keep the game at Stanford Stadium and use it as a sign that life was moving on for Bay Area residents.

When the game kicked off that bright Saturday afternoon, jittery residents were reluctant to attend.  It supposedly took until halftime for the attendance figure to reach five digits.  While much of the university was concerned with damage to other buildings around campus (notably Old Chem and Memorial Church), the football game did serve its purpose, at least on campus, of helping students and staff forget the events of only four days earlier.  Even though the game was a 24-27 loss for the Cardinal, the Utah-Stanford football game was unofficially the first football game and arguably the first major sporting event to take place after the earthquake."
[/quote]

My point EXACTLY.  I was there as a Frosh, the small crowd had nothing to do with the earthquake.  The 49ers played in the stadium during that same month in front of a crowd of 70,000+.  Why then were there only ~13,000 people in the stadium for a planned home game?  It was raining!!  :'(

I was literally one of a handful of students in the student section.  I would guestimate there might have been 200 students, certainly less than 1,000, at the game.  Of course, the attendance figure tells you all you need to know.  ~13,000 meant students were not in the venue.  In the old stadium you sat just above dirt until row 65.  Even if you were scared to death of aftershocks, the stadium was super safe as no one needed to sit above row 65 that day.  So that quake stuff was not the real deal.  And the game was played not because of tough fans, but because of a stadium structurally safe due to its simplicity.

A lot of people that were enjoying their time on the old wooden planks (most of the aluminum was installed for the 1992 World Cup) left a long time before the Utes pulled it out.  Were they afraid of a mythical weather related after shock?  No, the rain really picked up after halftime and with no one there many realized it was just a bad time to be watching a game, for many reasons.  I remember that game well, and it was on that weekend as a Frosh that I learned that Stanford fans were not exactly your hardy bad weather bunch.  And that Stanford students would rather miss a game than risk stressing their immune system.

[Farm93]

[quote author=Farm93 link=topic=4568.msg32385#msg32385 date=1317660340]
Stanford fans are not exactly tough. 

Some are. This from Rule of Tree....on the days following the '89 Earthquake:

"On October 17, 1989, a 6.9 earthquake rattled the Bay Area, resulting in several deaths and almost a billion dollars in damage to property.  Most people remember the earthquake for delaying the Battle of the Bay World Series by almost two weeks.  When baseball returned, though, it wasn't the first sporting event held in the Bay Area since the earthquake.  Four days after the tremor, Stanford was scheduled to play Utah in a home game at Stanford Stadium.  Nervous about the potential for aftershocks as well as the ability to actually hold the game in a shell-shocked region, university administrators from both Stanford and Utah as well as conference officials met hastily to determine whether or not the game would be canceled, moved to Salt Lake, or postponed until a later date.  After an inspection of Stanford Stadium revealed no structural damage, all parties agreed to keep the game at Stanford Stadium and use it as a sign that life was moving on for Bay Area residents.

When the game kicked off that bright Saturday afternoon, jittery residents were reluctant to attend.  It supposedly took until halftime for the attendance figure to reach five digits.  While much of the university was concerned with damage to other buildings around campus (notably Old Chem and Memorial Church), the football game did serve its purpose, at least on campus, of helping students and staff forget the events of only four days earlier.  Even though the game was a 24-27 loss for the Cardinal, the Utah-Stanford football game was unofficially the first football game and arguably the first major sporting event to take place after the earthquake."
[/quote]

My point EXACTLY.  I was there as a Frosh, the small crowd had nothing to do with the earthquake.  The 49ers played in the stadium during that same month in front of a crowd of 70,000+.  Why then were there only ~13,000 people in the stadium for a planned home game?  It was raining!!  :'(

I was literally one of a handful of students in the student section.  I would guestimate there might have been 200 students, certainly less than 1,000, at the game.  Of course, the attendance figure tells you all you need to know.  ~13,000 meant students were not in the venue.  In the old stadium you sat just above dirt until row 65.  Even if you were scared to death of aftershocks, the stadium was super safe as no one needed to sit above row 65 that day.  So that quake stuff was not the real deal.  And the game was played not because of tough fans, but because of a stadium structurally safe due to its simplicity.

A lot of people that were enjoying their time on the old wooden planks (most of the aluminum was installed for the 1992 World Cup) left a long time before the Utes pulled it out.  Were they afraid of a mythical weather related after shock?  No, the rain really picked up after halftime and with no one there many realized it was just a bad time to be watching a game, for many reasons.  I remember that game well, and it was on that weekend as a Frosh that I learned that Stanford fans were not exactly your hardy bad weather bunch.  And that Stanford students would rather miss a game than risk stressing their immune system.