From Mark Green at GoMiddle.com:

On Thursday night Middle Tennessee had to opportunity to show Minnesota and the nation that it had arrived. The team fought hard and showed Minnesota that it deserved to be on the same field, but an opportunity to beat Minnesota slipped away. If you are angry, good - it’s a sign of an advancing program. If you’re feeling good about the effort - then you got a ways to go walking away from that “small school mentality.”

If that’s true, I don’t want to ever walk away from that “small school mentality.” As a fan I don’t want to walk away from a game angry about how the game went down. A large amount of emotion goes hand in hand with being a fan of any sport, but sports fans far too often let that emotion get the better of them. It seems the modern sports fan cares for little else other than winning.

If you walked away from last night’s game between MTSU and Minnesota angry then I feel sorry for you. I understand the point Green’s trying to make. Later on in the article he says:

Expectations have grown and fans have come to expect more than just a good showing - they expect a victory - and that’s a sign that your program is on the rise. 

Fair enough, but there’s a difference between being disappointed in a loss and being angry about it. I was disappointed we didn’t win last night, but I was also mightily impressed by the way the Blue Raiders played. I had a blast watching our guys, particularly in the second and third quarters.

First MTSU had to overcome the adversity of losing senior quarterback Dwight Dasher to an indefinite suspension for off-the-field behavior. Dasher is a special player, perhaps the single most talented player that has ever played for Middle Tennessee State University. Last season he became the fourth quarterback ever to throw for 2500 yards and run for 1000 in the same season. That’s not at MTSU, that’s of all NCAA players ever. Stepping in to replace him, Logan Kilgore made his first start in a Division 1 football game and did a mighty fine job for the most part. During the second quarter in particular MTSU’s offense was just shredding Minnesota’s defense.

For almost the entirety of the third quarter MTSU led Minnesota 17-14, but ultimately Minnesota’s size led to their victory. It was plain as day that MTSU was undersized compared to their opponents, and ultimately that gave Minnesota the edge they needed to get the victory.

But what last night showed is that MTSU, a team at the bottom of the premier level of college football was able to hang with a team from a BCS conference and look respectable doing it. That to me is the sign of an advancing program we should be looking for, not angry fans.