One of the ideas for improving future state tournaments will be to overhaul the Parade of Champions. The other one is in a run-off election that is taking place in a poll near the top of the board. Let's disregard the other one in this thread and concentrate on the P of C. Tell us what you like and what you would like to see added or changed. Please don't tell us what you don't like. This forum is full of pages of "I don't like..." and very few posts about how to fix it. Let's get the positive juices flowing and come up with great ideas. We must be practical. I called Offut Air Force Base and they told me they don't think the Thunderbirds will be available for a flyover even if we can get the Qwest doors open wide enough.

I will start by saying I think we should have Leader, Grand Marshall, Top Banana, whatever you want to call it. There are many people who have been outstanding in Nebraska wrestling. Wouldn't it be nice if we had a college coach in the state who has had outstanding success in coaching, including several national championship teams. Or, wouldn't it be nice if we had a coach here who had coached a large number of the other coaches in the state. Or, wouldn't it be nice if we had a coach here who is a genuinely nice guy who cares about his team in all aspects of their lives. We not only have all 3 of those people, but they are all 3 the same person, Mike Denney, head coach at UNO. If you like the idea of a Leader please nominate someone and we will start another poll.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Frank Ryan,

Brad Vering will be an Olymbic champion by next year. I think he'd be my top pick.Good ol' Nebraska guy through and through, and he walked the POC.

Brad Vering or Chris Oliver was my initial thought when I brought this up over a month ago. NO matter what Chris has done or not done in college, he was still a GREAT Nebraska high school wrestler and I think it would be cool if he were to lead the parade out. Brad Vering is an obvious choice and a very very good one. Im sure it would be an honor for him!!!

I think the number one thing you need to do is get the crowd excited before the parade starts, great energy from the crowd is what makes the parade the parade. A couple of years ago when I attended at the Devaney it seemed they had the crowd up on their feet for a little too long and the parade suffered because no one knew when it was going to start and everyone was going crazy for 15-20 minutes before hand.

I think they need to stick to an exact time, I'm not sure if they do that or not but if they advertise that the parade will start at 4 then the parade starts at 4:00. Does the Qwest have the big screens that can show video? A great idea would be to put together highlights from the whole tournament or from last years championships. I have done our highlight video for the last couple of years...so with the right equipment, film, and personnel you can get a great 3-6 minute video that would get the crowd completely into it.....at the climax of the video...immediately start the parade, put queen on, and let the fans go nuts

Let a Freddy Mercury impersonator lead the parade, since it's his (Freddy's) song.

"I'm just a little silhouetto of man, scarramouche, scarramouche, can you do the fandango?"
-Freddy Mercury

Come on kids. Send in those ideas of how to liven up the Parade. I'm slow, but I can absorb them a little faster than they are coming. What about the music played during the parade? I'm a poor one to judge because I'm nearly deaf and don't know what the song sounds like. But I know that the UNL Tunnel Walk music always seems to get the crowd fired up. The Omaha Lancers Hockey team used to play "We Will Rock You" and "man, woman, and child that put 'em in the aisles".

Let's hear your ideas.

This is interesting. I've been reading most of the responses to the concerns about the Parade and came up with the following.

I've been to all of the last 20+ State Finals and honestly do not remember when "We Are The Champions" was played in its entirety. It seems it has always been shortened. I would have to go back and look at the tapes to be sure but I don't think it has ever been played to the conclusion of the song.

The Public Address introduction to the Parade has also been the same forever. Does it need changed? I don't know, but someone posted that it was different, it's not.

Another frequent complaint is the dimming of the lights during the Parade. As someone else posted, I believe that maybe once or twice in the last 20+ years has this actually been done. I doubt that it will ever happen again for various reasons.

The idea of having an "ambassador" or "dignitary" of the sport from Nebraska leading each string of wrestlers is a good one. Especially if they are not going to have cheerleaders from the previous year's Championship Team do it.

A couple of points from pick125's post above. The Finals are advertised to start at 2:00 and the broadcast starts at 2:00. There is a short introduction then the Parade starts. Been the same for years and years. I like the idea of a highlight video either from the current tournament or the previous year's tournament.

UHHHHHHHHH, I think we might want to pass on the Freddy Murcury impersonator leading the Parade dswitz!!!

Don't try messing with the music. Does anybody remember the year they played one of the Rocky themes instead of "We Are The Champions"? It was icky to say the least.

IMHO, volume would enhance things. Course I'm just a couple of shades behind Frank in the deafness category but music that you can "feel" always makes a bigger impact.

I think the thing we all need to remember is that the NSAA will be resistant to any change whether proposed by the fine folks on this message board or by a District Representative. Do any of these ideas need to go to the vote of the Board of Control or are they things that can be implemented by the Director of the Tournament Mr. Boysen? If it has to go through the Board of Control, it will likely take multiple layers of votes and lobbying to get any idea to a vote of the Districts, let alone the Board of Control.

While all this discussion is great for our sport in general and the Parade in particular, I wouldn't expect a lot of changes real fast unless they are decisions that are solely up to the Tournament Director.

Just my 48 2/3 cents worth.

This post is mostly to bump it up the line. Throw out those ideas so we can go to NSAA sounding like we know what we are doing.

One ship sails East and one sails West by the very same wind that blows.
It’s not the direction of the gale, but the set of the sail,
That determines which way each one goes.

Have you set your sail or are you drifting in the wind?

The parade needs more energy, I can remember one year at Devaney when they played some Motley Crue then right into Enter Sandman by Metallica. The cheerleaders got the crowd going and it was electric. We need a big build up to the finals. I saw on youtube a Highlight video of the Minnesota State tourney here a couple of years ago and something like it would get the crowd pumped. Having the 4 different classes enter from 4 different corners of the arena would help as well. I love Nebraska football as much as the next guy, but they got lazy with the tunnel walk and the NSAA has done the same thing with the parade. The Huskers need to enter the stadium with the same crowd energy as Virginia Techs entrance another one you can check out on youtube and the wrestlers deserve a parade that is equal to yesteryear.

Maybe past champions that are in attendance could lead/join the parade?

I watched the Iowa State Finals. One thing that I liked is that they parade all of the placers out like the NCAA Nationals. I thought that it created a great atmosphere. Also a few more people would stick around to see their kid walk.

quote:

Originally posted by BLASCHKO:
I watched the Iowa State Finals. One thing that I liked is that they parade all of the placers out like the NCAA Nationals. I thought that it created a great atmosphere. Also a few more people would stick around to see their kid walk.

This is a no-brainer. This needs to be done.

What I think would be neat would be something along those lines, with one change: -- march out all the 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th place medalists by weight class...THEN do the Walk of Champions, and get the cheerleaders leading the parade to march slow enough that it will take the ENTIRE playing of "We Are The Champions" to get the wrestlers out on the floor.

The Parade of Champions needs a "pre-show" to get the crowd into their seats & jacked up. That would be the place to use different music & videos of Tournament highlights. Someone needs to brainstorm with the HuskerVision folks to put it together. The NCAA's will be there in a couple of years & there has to be someone in Omaha or Lincoln involved to bounce ideas off & make the needed changes.

I like the idea of the placers marching. Many of the suggestions could be implemented by the "Tournament Director" if that person had the will to proceed.

If we continue to accept what we've been getting then we will get what we've been accepting.

The change has to begin with finding a District Director sympathetic to the idea of improving the Tournament experiance. The downward trend of the attendance at Qwest has given all of us an opportunity to be heard.

quote:

Originally posted by Alexander_Delarge_655321:

quote:

Originally posted by BLASCHKO:
I watched the Iowa State Finals. One thing that I liked is that they parade all of the placers out like the NCAA Nationals. I thought that it created a great atmosphere. Also a few more people would stick around to see their kid walk.

This is a no-brainer. This needs to be done.

Kansas also does a similar parade with all the placers, but they present medals after each match (I am not suggesting that). But a parade of all placers would be nice. Kansas also starts their tourney off with a parade of every team and all participants around the arena, they have a banner which has the schools name on it in alphabetical order. We had a tradition that all qualifiers would sign the banner. We had like 50-75 other qualifier signatures on it and it was replaced once full and given to the school.

quote:

Originally posted by C. Gocke:
. Kansas also starts their tourney off with a parade of every team and all participants around the arena, they have a banner which has the schools name on it in alphabetical order. We had a tradition that all qualifiers would sign the banner. We had like 50-75 other qualifier signatures on it and it was replaced once full and given to the school.

I like the banner idea in the parade. Did it hang in the arena or hallway during the tournament so people could get close enough to read the signatures?

Someone posted that they missed being able to walk around in the Devanney and see the pictures of previous Husker teams because they knew a lot of those people in the pictures.

When my son coached football at Louisville he had a coaching clinic each spring. One year one of the speakers was Jim Duggan, the highly successful coach at Council Bluffs, St. Albert. At the first meeting at the start of the season Jim had all of the FB trophies that the school had ever won on a table in the gym. He picked them up, one by one, and commented, this is the district championship trophy from 19XX. The letterwinners on that team were Joe _, Tom_, etc. He said he could see the reaction in kids faces and he read the names of their dads, uncles, cousins, etc. and could see them vowing to have their names read for their kids someday.

One ship sails East and one sails West by the very same wind that blows.
It’s not the direction of the gale, but the set of the sail,
That determines which way each one goes.

Have you set your sail or are you drifting in the wind?

quote:

Originally posted by Frank Ryan:

quote:

Originally posted by C. Gocke:
. Kansas also starts their tourney off with a parade of every team and all participants around the arena, they have a banner which has the schools name on it in alphabetical order. We had a tradition that all qualifiers would sign the banner. We had like 50-75 other qualifier signatures on it and it was replaced once full and given to the school.

I like the banner idea in the parade. Did it hang in the arena or hallway during the tournament so people could get close enough to read the signatures?

Someone posted that they missed being able to walk around in the Devanney and see the pictures of previous Husker teams because they knew a lot of those people in the pictures.

When my son coached football at Louisville he had a coaching clinic each spring. One year one of the speakers was Jim Duggan, the highly successful coach at Council Bluffs, St. Albert. At the first meeting at the start of the season Jim had all of the FB trophies that the school had ever won on a table in the gym. He picked them up, one by one, and commented, this is the district championship trophy from 19XX. The letterwinners on that team were Joe _, Tom_, etc. He said he could see the reaction in kids faces and he read the names of their dads, uncles, cousins, etc. and could see them vowing to have their names read for their kids someday.

One ship sails East and one sails West by the very same wind that blows.
It’s not the direction of the gale, but the set of the sail,
That determines which way each one goes.

Have you set your sail or are you drifting in the wind?

It did not hang up in the arena during the tourney. The cool thing about the signatures is like you said about your sons clinics, the athletes started to see other names that they recognized but didn't know they wrestled or qualified.
I don't know where you would hang them at in the arena

quote:

Originally posted by C. Gocke:

quote:

Originally posted by Frank Ryan:

quote:

Originally posted by C. Gocke:
. Kansas also starts their tourney off with a parade of every team and all participants around the arena, they have a banner which has the schools name on it in alphabetical order. We had a tradition that all qualifiers would sign the banner. We had like 50-75 other qualifier signatures on it and it was replaced once full and given to the school.

It did not hang up in the arena during the tourney. The cool thing about the signatures is like you said about your sons clinics, the athletes started to see other names that they recognized but didn't know they wrestled or qualified.
I don't know where you would hang them at in the arena

I think there may be room on the walls of the hallway, like where the brackets are hung.