I cannot imagine how the Tulane football team feels. I feel out of my element when the cable guy comes, but when you have to move your entire Division I-A football team some 500 miles out of state, well, that's almost out of this world.

Now the Green Wave is holed up in a DoubleTree Hotel in Dallas, out of touch and out of contact with what is left of New Orleans. In his story for ESPN.com, Ivan Maisel notes how the hotel has turned into the make-shift football facilities for the team with a meeting room serving as a locker room, Jesuit High's football field serving as their practice field and Southern Methodist University's weight room serving as their own.

Team meetings have to be staggered because there are only two VCRs the team can use to watch film.

Before you go pooh-poohing the fact that the team's use of technology has been cut-down, think of how you would feel if you were driving a Cadillac one day and the next you were stuck with a rickshaw.

This is not Herman Boone or Bear Bryant taking their players for a two-week stomp in the woods to get them back to the basics of the game where they live and think only football.

Nor is this the case of a coach punishing his players for their poor play by making them practice in older facilities or by locking them out of their spacious locker room.

This team will be working out of a hotel for the future; however, whether it's the near or distant future remains to be seen.

The only place that could accommodate that large of a group of people who need to stay together is a hotel. Hotels are fine for a two-day vacation or a safe haven from the rigors of a family reunion, but it is certainly not a place to run a football program.

This is a football circus and I'm sure the clowns aren't having any fun because they will soon have to squeeze into the clown car again. According to the story, the team is supposed to be on the move again, with Louisiana Tech being one of the campuses mentioned for a makeshift home.

It's hard to imagine Tulane ever feeling comfortable this year. Sure the outpouring of support will make life easier on most, but when you don't have a home and your family's living situation is still a mystery, how can anyone feel comfortable and have football as their major focus of attention?

School sabbatical, you think? Sounds like football purgatory with more than one waiting room left for the Green Wave to pile into.

This article was published in The Marquette Tribune on September 8, 2005.