Students at UT Still Manage to Enjoy College Football even Without a Team

Ever since the University of Tampa dropped their football program in 1974, students have had to look further than their own campus to get their fix of college football. Not many students fully understand the history of the UT football program, or even that one existed but it was actually successful program which was the home to many great players and coaches. Two years after the University of Tampa was founded in 1931, the school started their football program and played 38 seasons until dropping the program in 1974. The university started off playing other small college teams until the early 50’s when the Spartans started to have winning records and began competing against nationally ranked teams such as University of Miami and Florida University. The UT football program had its ups and downs, having the program dropped for years at a time due to World War II and budget problems. In 1967 alumni and UT athletics fans started up the Sword and Shield organization which raised around $140,000 to build a new football stadium. The University of Tampa went on to play in this stadium for the next 7 years and even won the Orange Bowl in 1970, before finishing their final season in 1974.


So with no football program at the University of Tampa how do students get their fix of college football? Another college located in Tampa, the University of Southern Florida, is home to a division one football program and plays all of their home games in the Tampa Bay Bucs stadium located only a few miles from UT’s campus, giving students the option to go to any one of those games to enjoy a college football game and get that feeling to be surrounded by other students all cheering for their schools team. There’s also the option of following any number of college football teams on TV. Numerous NCAA football games are played on ESPN, CBS, NBC and FOX all the time, giving students the ability to easily follow a college football program. Or if a fan wants to go even further than just watching a game, all college football teams have their own websites linked to their schools site, with summaries of games from the night before and interviews with player and news for the future of that team. To find out more of which of these things students on campus chose to do I randomly asked a few students on campus. When sophomore Chris Mitchell was asked how he gets his fix of college football he responded, “I don’t really watch that much college football. When I was choosing which college it didn’t really matter to me whether or not the school had a big football team or anything. So for me, yea I don’t really care about college football.” To some students football isn’t a big deal, so it really doesn’t affect them at all. When sophomore Eric Zeltner was asked how he got his fix of college football he responded, “I watch a lot of ESPN and follow a few college teams I grew up liking. I know USF has a team, but it’s really not the same at all if UT had a team. Even though the stadium is so close it’s kind of like it could be our team, but it’s different.” When asked the same question on how he gets his college football fix, Junior Brent Colbourn said, “I’ve been to a USF game before with a few friends which was cool, but I mostly watch NFL games. On Sundays I’ll go out with a few kids I met on campus that like the same team as me (New York Giants) and watch it at a bar or something.” Among the students I asked there wasn’t a huge concern that the University of Tampa doesn’t have a football team, which was probably why they ended up at the school. Attending any college should be for more than its sports teams, which is obvious among the students questioned.

For students that come to Tampa after playing high school football and still have the need to play, the athletics department has intramural flag football. Although intramural football does not come close to replacing a varsity football program, it still offers the same basic experience of playing structured football on a team. Through all these different options for students to get their fill of college football whether it’s through watching it on TV, following it online, attending another universities football game, or just playing in an intramural league with your friends, getting the college football experience can still be attained even with the absence of a UT varsity football program.

Sources: http://www.tampabayfootball.net/, http://www.ut.edu/