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Articles on UB athletics


alum73

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Interesting articles. Big time D1 is serious commitment.

 

Makes you appreciate the work that McEloy has done in getting so many teams at a level to compete for conference championships. Hard to believe that Buffalo doesn't have any.

 

Also interesting that Ivy league schools spend more on athletics than UB - not including financial aid. That is absolutely amazing.

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Also interesting that Ivy league schools spend more on athletics than UB - not including financial aid. That is absolutely amazing.

The Ivy League schools sponsor a great many more sports - I think Harvard has 41, twice as many as Buffalo - and their football stadiums are huge, even if their crowds aren't any more. (If facilities upkeep is part of their budget)

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That report stated some of the same things I said about UA: cut down on sports and concentrate the money on the sports where you can be really competitive and win championships. They have 20 sports, UA has 19. Especially for those people who want to move to I-AA Scholarship level football, that is something that really needs to be considered. The economy in NY isn't such that the government is going to shell out money to help all four research universities upgrade their sports budgets ... and if UB is going to go after some of that money (as it sounds like they will or have to), then it's going to be a battle between the four schools and a battle for private funding.

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I thought you were advocating cutting sports to help other minor sports, where I don't see a lot of benefit to the program as a whole.

 

This report not only says

 

"Consider reducing the number of sports and focus on sports with the best opportunities for success."

 

but also

 

"Consider adding sports that have potential for success due to UB's location, facilities or expertise, such as ice hockey and lacrosse."

 

and their main focus is

 

Support a few key sports at the championship level,

including football and men's and women's basketball.

 

where success brings a much greater visibility to the program at large.

 

I'm don't like the idea of cutting sports in general, but if you do we've got more room than UB - while the article says "The NCAA requires that institutions participating in Division I athletics field a minimum of 16 teams." I think I-AA only needs 14; newspapers are notoriously lax in recognizing that a school with D-I-AA is Division I, and only I-A requires 16.

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We have already cut sports(and some very successful ones) to go to Division I and meet Title IX requirements. Let's forget about cutting sports and concentrate on financing the ones we have and if anything reinstating some we lost. The alumnae and community has to pushed a little harder. Maybe the Ivy league has the right idea-- NO athletic scholarships BUT scholarships to athletes---it gives you a broader base for financial support.

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72

 

Cutting sports would help all sports. The report offered that UB should think about adding sports where it could succeed, like hockey and lacrosse, but the report meant at the expense of cutting sports where they cannot excel. (i.e. add lacrosse, cut a sport to fund lacrosse instead, then cut more sports out of the 20 total to help football and basketballs).

 

I don't think that would be a bad idea for UA. I think that cutting 1-2 sports (or more) while leaving the athletics budget the same would help both the majors and the minor sports.

 

The people on this board who advocate for I-AA Scholarship football have to realize this is a real possibility under the current funding model. I don't see how they can propose added dozens of scholarships to football (and the corresponding number of scholarships to non-revenue women's sports) without some cuts in the non-revenue sports.

 

I've always wondered why schools bite off more than they can chew in terms of having more sports than necessary. I think that is the case at UA right now, unfortuantely. That would change if some huge donors came forth to endow certain sports, but it hasn't happened in the five years of D-I so far, and I don't see it happening anytime soon (based on recent history).

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Cutting sports would help all sports.

 

Except of course the sports you cut

 

Two separate issues:

1. If you want to cut minor men's sports to help scholarship football, Title IX means you probably can't cut women's, you'll have to ADD women's sports at the same time as cutting 1-2 men's. So there's no net gain to each sport's budget anyway. When scholarship football becomes a reality, that's the time to make decisions like this.

 

2. If you want to cut minor sports now to help other minor sports, tell me this: of the dozens of colleges that have cut wrestling, swimming, baseball, gymnastics and even football over the last twenty years, name me five who have gained national recognition because of a resulting success in another minor sport (and not because the ENTIRE athletic budget increased).

 

I've always wondered why schools bite off more than they can chew in terms of having more sports than necessary.  I think that is the case at UA right now, unfortuantely.

 

We didn't bite it off. We had many more sports when we were Division III than we do now. I don't see that the remaining sports are any more successful now after cutting the others.

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I like the post of UAalum72!! The more opportunites for participation the better!!!

I think DF2ks is out of wack. NO ONE would like to drop teams with the HOPE that would provide a winning football or basketballl team. I llike Bob Ford and I have financially supported the basketball program annually for over 40 years but if I was ever told that my support resulted in the elimination of the wrestling, or swimming programs, I would drop my support immediately!! Teams support teams---we would not have won the American East Comissioners Cup without a wide and varied sports program. The Comissioners Cup would be a lock if we added a few more low scholarship sports.

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I didn't realize that you were millionaires who were going to personally fund the "low scholarship sports" that you propose to ADD. Not to mention the full-time coach's 35k per year salary (plus another 10-15k in benefit costs to the university), plus all the recruiting money, plus the upgrades to facilities to house the offices for these new "low scholarship sports".

 

Here is a newsflash for all the "uberfans": outside of the America East, no one knows that UA won the Commissioner's Cup. In fact, I venture to say that outside of the people on this board, less than half the students at UA know that UA won the Commissioner's Cup. If winning the Cup annually is your goal, that is fine.

 

All the "big time" schools are competitive in the sports that bring in the money: men's hoops, football, and (supposedly) women's basketball (I say supposedly because it's debatable whether it brings in revenue at well over half the schools who put it in that category).

 

That is the crux of the study done at UB: to gain national notoriety you're going to have to compete fairly regularly in the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament and stop getting your pathetic I-A football team listed on ESPN.com's list of the 10 worst programs in America every week (which, they pretty much are).

 

What is the goal of the people on this board? You want to go to I-AA Scholarship football to run with the big dogs (medium dogs)? And you think you can do that by just adding a few women's sports but not cutting anything in the process? Where are those millions going to come from? (Yes, it will be over a million).

 

If you want to cut minor men's sports to help scholarship football, Title IX means you probably can't cut women's, you'll have to ADD women's sports at the same time as cutting 1-2 men's. So there's no net gain to each sport's budget anyway.

 

I personally don't want to see scholarship football. I-AA is I-AA. The community is not going to get excited by moving up to another level of I-AA. Some people will, the true die-hards. But if you're not playing big-time names that Average Joe knows, then it's going to do very little, in comparison to the number of scholarships you're giving out. Playing Montana is not going to get the community at-large to fill a 10,000 seat stadium. Montana is not Miami.

 

But, in deference to those who do want scholarship football, you're crazy to think you can do it without a multi-million dollar donation to endow a few sports, or without cutting non-revenue sports. Or both.

 

Men's lacrosse has achieved at minimum Regional recognition, and some would say national recognition (though most people who don't follow lacrosse don't know the top lacrosse teams, whereas most people can name the top hoops and football schools without knowing the specifics or following those sports).

 

Track is growing at the Regional level, but will not achieve National status without sending people to the NCAA Championships on a regular basis.

 

Ditto for volleyball and softball.

 

My philosophy continues to be, why not get truly excellent in a few sports, rather than being conference-tournament worthy ("good") in a bunch (but not Regionally or Nationally recognizable)? You can (better) accomplish this goal by cutting a few sports and diverting the money to the remaining non-revenue sports.

 

It's my contention that 19 sports (counting track's + cross country's separately) is too many for a budget of UA's size

 

(notice I didn't say for a school UA's size, because it's also my opinion that UA's size and budget aren't reflective of one another, relative to other schools UA's size).

 

Also, for those of you who dream of moving to a bigger conference with the (supposed) arrival of scholarship football: they are not going to be impressed with Commissioner's Cups. Today's conference atmosphere is based almost solely around men's basketball and football. Appearances in the NCAA Tournament bring in millions for conferences, and the more bids you get, the more money you make.

 

Conferences do not care if you make the NCAA Tournament in five non-revenue sports if you have no hope of making it in men's basketball.

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2. If you want to cut minor sports now to help other minor sports, tell me this: of the dozens of colleges that have cut wrestling, swimming, baseball, gymnastics and even football over the last twenty years, name me five who have gained national recognition because of a resulting success in another minor sport (and not because the ENTIRE athletic budget increased).

 

Loaded Question: I'm not going to be able to find the specifics about schools cutting sports and how that money was diverted to other minor sports. So it's impossible to answer. But if you think that cutting 2-3 sports, and diverting their money to other non-revenue sports, is not going to help the sports whose funding is increased ... there is no point in continuing the conversation. I think it's pretty clear that it would.

 

I think that all coaches in all sports would tell you, increased funding means more scholarship dollars for student-athletes, better opportunities to travel to see top recruits, better equipment, better facilities, better chances to hire more-qualified assistant coaches, etc. etc. down the line.

 

It's a money game, sad as that may be.

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2. If you want to cut minor sports now to help other minor sports, tell me this: of the dozens of colleges that have cut wrestling, swimming, baseball, gymnastics and even football over the last twenty years, name me five who have gained national recognition because of a resulting success in another minor sport (and not because the ENTIRE athletic budget increased).

 

Loaded Question: I'm not going to be able to find the specifics about schools cutting sports and how that money was diverted to other minor sports. So it's impossible to answer. But if you think that cutting 2-3 sports, and diverting their money to other non-revenue sports, is not going to help the sports whose funding is increased ... there is no point in continuing the conversation. I think it's pretty clear that it would.

 

I think that all coaches in all sports would tell you, increased funding means more scholarship dollars for student-athletes, better opportunities to travel to see top recruits, better equipment, better facilities, better chances to hire more-qualified assistant coaches, etc. etc. down the line.

 

It's a money game, sad as that may be.

I don't think it's a loaded question (it shouldn't be too hard to look up, and wasn't really a question anyway) but I'll rephrase: As a casual sports fan, can you, without doing any research, name five non-BCS, non-IVY Division I universities that have national recognition because they are 'truly excellent' in a minor sport? If you can't, then it's my contention that what difference does it make? What's the payoff in cutting baseball to become a nearly-national power in field hockey?

 

If you can't afford a sport, you have to cut it.

 

If you want to cut a minor sport to boost a headline sport, I wouldn't like it, but I could understand it.

 

Cutting one minor sport to boost another minor, I don't see the benefit to the program overall.

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1. Hopkins (Lacrosse)

2. Hawai'i (Men's Volleyball)

3. North Dakota (Men's Ice Hockey)

4. Minnesota-Duluth (Women's Field Hockey)

5. Cal-State Fullerton (Baseball)

6. Portland (Men's and Women's Soccer)

 

 

1. Hopkins - Division III playing Div. I lacrosse, reputation from when only about 20 schools played lacrosse, grandfathered in, can't do that any more

2. Hawaii - does the public know them as a volleyball school?

3. N. Dakota - Division II playing Div. I ice hockey, a major sport, grandfathered in

4. Minnesota- Duluth - kind of proves my point - they don't play field hockey, they're Division II playing Div. I ice hockey, a major sport. Don't know if you can still do that in women's sports.

5. Cal State-Fullerton,baseball - maybe.

6. Portland - how many people really know they're soccer powers?

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