Rivalry trophy a... cannon?

As you can see on the left here, the CMU/WMU rivalry trophy was finally created, thanks in part to the student government associations from both schools that collaborated on the project.

Now, creating a rivalry trophy is something that really should've been done a long time ago. But I'm curious as to why on Earth there is a cannon on top of the trophy. Not a football, not a player model, not even a pair of helmets - a cannon.

The associations reason that both stadiums use a cannon, most notably after every touchdown the home team scores. Fair enough. But it doesn't symbolize the rivalry at all. CMU fires off the cannon as per the Army ROTC on campus. Many schools around the country fire a cannon for similar reasons. If the government associations knew this, then why did they take this universal symbol and try to token it as the rivalry trophy? This cannon has no historical connection to CMU/WMU, therefore it creates a new history for itself. A history that began in 2008.

Was it a disaster move? Not by any means. But there are so many better options than a cannon for your trophy. At least use something that relates to football and not just some mere coincidence between how the two stadiums celebrate their touchdowns.


On another note, here's something else I find interesting. With Western Michigan obviously prepping for a trip to Mount Pleasant this weekend, the Sports Information department chooses to advertise its Nov. 8 game against Illinois at Ford Field. Go to WMUBroncos.com and you'll see the splash page above before actually entering the site. What? You would think that the Broncos would want as much fan support as possible to create a blackout section at Kelly/Shorts and to cheer them on to a win after a heartbreak loss at home last season ...

But instead, they advertise a virtually meaningless Big Ten game three weeks from now? I guess I'm just not sure of the logic behind this one. They easily could've waited until Sunday to put up this splash page and instead concentrated on getting as many fans up to rival CMU as possible.