The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. (non-admin closure) GSS ( talk| c| em) 06:12, 27 February 2018 (UTC) reply

1974 Boston University Terriers football team

1974 Boston University Terriers football team (  | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – ( View log · Stats)

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NN season for long-defunct NCAA Division II program. Fails WP:NSEASONS, as a national championship season might be notable at this level per the guideline, but this was a year the team barely cleared .500 and finished fifth in its conference. Further, per WP:NOTDIR, a team season article "should consist mainly of well-sourced prose, not just statistics and lists of players." (emphasis in the original) It does not. Ravenswing 09:04, 20 February 2018 (UTC) reply

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of American football-related deletion discussions. MT Train ^Discuss 09:48, 20 February 2018 (UTC) reply

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Massachusetts-related deletion discussions. MT Train ^Discuss 09:48, 20 February 2018 (UTC) reply

• Keep. The fact that Boston University later discontinued its football program is utterly irrelevant to the notability of the 1974 team. If the 1974 team was notable at the time, its notability is not lost by such later events. In this case, the article easily passes WP:GNG as the team received significant coverage in multiple, reliable, independent sources. (I am in the process of adding some such sources to the article.) Cbl62 ( talk) 16:24, 20 February 2018 (UTC) reply

• Comment: I'm not disputing the notability of the team -- the team page isn't up for AfD. This is discussing whether this season is notable, and per WP:NSEASONS and WP:NOTDIR, it is not. Nor, per WP:NOTINHERITED, does the season gain notoriety because some of its players achieved conference honors (very few seasons for any team at any level of sport, from high school competition on up, can't make similar claims), the principal addition you made to the article. I also note that you spent work sourcing that the games were played, but that's routine sports coverage explicitly debarred by WP:ROUTINE from contributing to notability. Ravenswing 18:58, 20 February 2018 (UTC) reply

The article has been substantially rewritten and sources added with coverage from newspapers across the country including San Antonio, Louisville, and Philadelphia. The assertion that even in-depth coverage of a team's games cannot be used to establish notability of a season is simply wrong. That is the coverage used in almost every case. Compare: Single season notability discussion library. ( The Boston Globe and Boston Herald would likely provide the most in-depth coverage, but its archives are not available on-line for 1974, at least not to the best of my knowledge.) Cbl62 ( talk) 19:29, 20 February 2018 (UTC) reply

• Keep. College football seasons are commonly accepted on Wikipedia, and while that argument violates WP:OSE, the article is also now well-sourced, and all other teams in the conference that year have a season article. Whether they should probably requires a broader policy change. SportingFlyer ( talk) 00:49, 21 February 2018 (UTC) reply

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Schools-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k ( talk) 01:53, 21 February 2018 (UTC) reply

• Keep per Cbl62. Jweiss11 ( talk) 10:03, 21 February 2018 (UTC) reply
• Keep Consensus is that individual college football seasons are notable and notability is not temporary. Smartyllama ( talk) 14:07, 24 February 2018 (UTC) reply
• Keep College football seasons, including seasons at the level at which Boston University competed in 1974 (roughly equivalent to the current FCS), receive extensive coverage, both in the media at the time and in almanacs and histories and the like later on. (Note the extensive list of sources now in the article.) Even at a lower level, college football is popular enough in America that these teams will receive extensive coverage. TheCatalyst31 ^{Reaction• Creation} 22:45, 24 February 2018 (UTC) reply
• Keep per Cbl62's sourcing and improvements to the article. As to the ridiculous idea that game coverage cannot count towards notability of a sports season, that is a clear misunderstanding of WP:ROUTINE, please see What is and is not routine coverage. Ejgreen77 ( talk) 14:06, 25 February 2018 (UTC) reply
• Keep Notability is not temporary, the mere fact that the BU FB program has become defunct is not a valid deletion criteria. Article is extensively sourced to WP:RS. Chetsford ( talk) 19:02, 25 February 2018 (UTC) reply

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.