While watching A/N basketball on Saturday, I was puzzled that during the game there were crowd shots of just about everybody at the game, but not the Army pep band. Naturally, I was looking forward to the Alma Maters because we won. I was stunned that a recording of the Army Alma Mater was played.
I don't ever remember an Army-Navy basketball game in which both bands were not present. And there seemed to be no cadets at the game, which also would be a first. Are budget concerns that extreme?

It's disturbing enough that the band doesn't show for a majority of the home games and cadet attendance is so abysmal, but having nobody there on Saturday really bothered me. Anyone have any info on this?

I have no inside information to answer your question, but I do believe the answer is "yes, budget concerns are that extreme."

Based on what I've seen in my corner of DOD, it's a mix of real concerns and concerns about the perception created by travel. I can easily see trip sections like these falling by the wayside.its a shame really, but that's the reality these days.

Beat 'em!

wp1994 wrote: I do believe the answer is "yes, budget concerns are that extreme."

Ditto.

Also amongst the missing:

Superintendent, Commandant and Athletic Director.

General Dempsey was there and his wife was obviously not being " joint".  She was a great Army fan.

Bill

BeatNavy wrote:

wp1994 wrote: I do believe the answer is "yes, budget concerns are that extreme."

Ditto.

With what I hearing in the news, in the near future the guys wearing white Fruit of the Loom t-shirts with electrical tape to make numbers would not surprise me. (black with tan masking tape on the road).

Billthegoat wrote: Also amongst the missing:

Superintendent, Commandant and Athletic Director.

General Dempsey was there and his wife was obviously not being " joint".  She was a great Army fan.

Bill

I guess I should be happy the teams showed up.

Given that the USMA Leadership team recently cancelled all travel for the traditional Feb-Mar Founders Day season, I doubt we'll see them at a lot of away games anytime soon unless it's close to WP. This is what I meant in the earlier post about the perception of travel.

Beat 'em!

---------------------------------------------
--- Billthegoat wrote:

Also amongst the missing:

Superintendent, Commandant and Athletic Director.

General Dempsey was there and his wife was obviously not being " joint".  She was a great Army fan.

Bill

---------------------------------------------

Maybe all our away football games will be cancelled this coming year and wind up with a 6 game schedule (5 at home and the A/N game).
The AF game in Colorado could also be canceled with all the other away games.
This is serious.

Again maybe the entire football season will be canceled because of all these budget cuts.
Somethings gotta give and first on the block is sports.

RABBLE wrote: Somethings gotta give and first on the block is sports.

No, sports is not first. If it was, there wouldn't have been basketball games at Navy on Saturday.

Perception can play as much of a role as actual shortcomings.  Consider, for example, the preliminary decision to cancel the Army Navy game in 1963 after President Kennedy was assasinated.  Until Jackie stepped in and said that Jack would have wanted the game to go on, the powers that be thought it would not be in good taste to play the game so soon after his death.  Likewise, I can recall decisions made to curtail SA participation in bowl games during the Vietnam War because of image issues. 

The public cannot be expected to differentiate between activities funded out by AAA and those funded by taxpayer money; so we may see more curtailment until the budget crisis is resolved.  I have no doubt that canceling the Black Gold game at Fort Hood was as much an image issue as it was an actual budget issue. 

I saw many of the same things in private industry whenever my company had a bad year.  They would cut off things like providing free coffee at training sessons, which meant that students had to go to the cafeteria to get coffee and ended up wasting more training time than the cost of coffee.  It was more of an image decision than it was an actual budget decision.  Travel is always one of the first things to go.

Don't Cadets pay to travel to away games?  We did as cadets.

oldgrad74 wrote: Don't Cadets pay to travel to away games?  We did as cadets.

Individual cadets, yes.  Pep band, rabble rousers, no.

oldgrad74 wrote: Don't Cadets pay to travel to away games?  We did as cadets.

Back in my day, WP covered the costs of cadets attending many of the games, particularly those played in NYC, and of course the Navy game in Philly.  The biggest single deployment of the Corps in my years was the AFA game in Chicago when the entire Corps traveled by train.  For some games, WP paid for one regiment to go.  I got to see a Pittsburgh game that way.  When Army played at Michigan, WP covered the costs of cadets from Michigan to attend as I recall. 

By the time we had uniform and incidental costs deducted from our pay, we received about $40 per month back then, and even at reduced rates, that wasn't enough to pay for the costs of attending any away games without some help from the outside.  Since we didn't get all those weekends off back then, going to football games was one of the few times we got away from WP.

Article from Poughkeepsie Journal.

Headline: Army plans $92 million in cuts at West Point

I hope I get this link correct:

www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/ar...&nclick_check=1

Beat 'em!

wp1994 wrote: Article from Poughkeepsie Journal.

Headline: Army plans $92 million in cuts at West Point

I hope I get this link correct:

www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/ar...;nclick_check=1

Beat 'em!

The bulk of that was slated for new cadet barracks.  Meanwhile, the POTUS gets to golf in FL with Tiger Woods and the wife and kids go skiing in Aspen and the cadets continue to live in s***holes.

Hey, this country gets what they voted for last November. I don't feel sorry for any of this garbage anymore.
If these numbskulls who voted for this Kenyan socialist, you get what you deserve.