Gov. Elect Spitzer - Football Stadium

[danefan]

UA_MA_2000,

Thanks for your comments. Its great to have a spirited and well thought-out discussion on this board. I agree with a lot of the points you make, with the exception of those I have already voiced an opinion on (Ie: going to Bowl Subdivision (formerly IA).

 

Its also nice to have another member of the bar on this site. Interesting how many attorneys are on this board and the AGS board as well. I guess its yet another forum for argument....I mean discussion. :-)

 

I don't mean to pick on you personally about the next thing. No one really gets its right...so this if for everyone.

 

What used to be called IAA is now FCS (Football Championship Subdivision)

What used to be called IA is now FBS (Football Bowl Subdivision)

 

Appalachian State beat UMass in December and was crowned the Division Football Champion. Florida was crowned the Division Bowl Champion. The NCAA legislation was passed in because people used to refer to other sports at IA schools as DI and would refer to other sports at IAA schools as IAA also. In reality all Division IA and IAA schools were Division I. Now they have made that clear.

 

OK, now that we have that clear, I was wondering if anyone read the Brian Etkin column in the TU today?

Here is the link:

http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp...sdate=1/23/2007

 

I don't always agree with him, but I do here. UAlbany can be the team that brings the community together. The Athletic Dept has been making this effort and should continue to do so.

[haggyland]

I read somewhere last year that we are the 7th most educated city in America (defined by the percentage of the population with post-graduate education).

 

I love the enthusiasm. As for educational attainment, a good web-site to visit is:

 

http://www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/educ-attn.html

 

One of the PDF files that I am familiar with shows the cities with the highest percentage of Ph.D.'s, but I will keep looking for the post-graduate figures, as I love studying percentages and facts.

[UAalum72]

Too long of a post for my attention span, but:

 

1. We ARE Division I; Michigan was in the I-A subdivision, we were I-AA; the reason they changed the name to BCS and FCS is recruiting in other sports, as people would ask if we were I-AA in basketball, when subdivisions only apply to football. Check the I-AA forum for many discussions about people thinking that I-AA is the same as D-II.

 

2. Many rating services rank all Division I teams together - click the Sagarin ratings at the top of this page, he does all 241 Division I footballl teams. Ken Massey rates all 706 college teams from I-A, I-AA, II, III and the NAIA, from Florida to Principia.

 

3. Albany averaged 3,100 last year, not 4K, and that was the best attendance in years, if not ever. We may draw 6,000 for homecoming, or with a good opponent in the opener, but may not get 1,000 if it's raining or freezing.

 

4. The number of pro teams within a 4-hour drive, plus Syracuse, UConn, BC, Army and now Rutgers will make it really tough to build a major college program. Plus that New York has never had a flagship university - Cornell is the land-grant school. It's my theory that when they finally did start creating the SUNY system, the private colleges used all their influence to keep public system divided among smaller campuses that wouldn't compete with the privates for donations. I think it worked.

[UA_MA_2000]

Thanks for the corrections! I'll try to get back to my post and make the edits so as to not confuse anyone (or myself as I try to figure it out). Also, I think brevity is something I still need to work on.

 

Very interesting and timely T.U. article given my previous post. I think there is some truth to it, but I also think there are more UA Alumni (especially those in this area) out there than any other local college, and I would hope that this gives us an edge going into the next 10 years.

 

UAalum72: Very interesting point about the private schools extending their influence to keep SUNY broken up into smaller schools. I couldn't agree with you more! I always thought we had four major university centers because they would have been too large if we combined them into one or two. I suspect otherwise now. I'd like to think that someday, because NYS is so large in size and population, that we can have at least two out of the four major campuses (Albany, Binghamton, Buffalo, and Stonybrook) pushing at least 30,000-40,000 students. That will be difficult to accomplish --- independent from the rise in student enrollment associated with the normal growth in population over the years --- unless we can get non-resident students to increase in number and/or foreign students.

Buffalo is closing in on 25,000-30,000, I believe, but I continue to think that Albany has the most potential in terms of a city that is going in the right direction (and not just because it's the state capital). I will note, however, that I know nothing of Stonybrook, and I have never been there, nor even know where it is on Long Island, so anything I claim probably shouldn't be attributed to S.B. simply because I don't know much about the campus and surrounding area. If nothing else, I think times are exciting for UAlbany and the greater Albany area. Thanks for the info and perspective-

[ATL_DANE]

Thanks for the corrections! I'll try to get back to my post and make the edits so as to not confuse anyone (or myself as I try to figure it out). Also, I think brevity is something I still need to work on.

 

Very interesting and timely T.U. article given my previous post. I think there is some truth to it, but I also think there are more UA Alumni (especially those in this area) out there than any other local college, and I would hope that this gives us an edge going into the next 10 years.

 

 

Hey UA_MA_2000,

 

We're all feeling ya man. When I was at Albany in the early to mid 1990's, I used to walk around the campus and try to imagine a good location for a stadium. How bad is that? Back in my days, SUNY didn't offer a school with D1-A football. As a working class New Yorker, I couldn't afford to go out of state to an ACC, SEC, Big Ten school... or any other school for that matter. The out-of-state tuition would have killed me. As a New Yorker I was just SOL. I guess I feel pretty lucky with how far we've come. Let's just hope all this talk about full scholarships and a new stadium comes through in the next few years. I don't live in New York anymore but it's nice to see young New Yorkers are begining to have a choice in their college experience. Not everyone wants to go to a small school named after a local farming town. Here's a thanks for all the work to get us to this point and some encouragement to keep on pushing.

[ralph]

Not to be a stickler but the official NCAA classifications are:

Division III (tournament titles in all sports)

Division II (tournament titles in all sports)

Division I (tournament titles in all sports, exception in football)

 

D-I football exception:

Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) has the NCAA D-I football tournament title

Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) does not have an NCAA tournament title (the FBS plays bowl games and participates in the Bowl Championship Series, one game championship)

 

So, NCAA titles in football are won in D-III, D-II, and D-I (FCS). The BCS is not a recognized national championship by the NCAA though all teams competing for the chance to play in it are NCAA schools.

[danefan]

Pretty clear from the TU article today that no public announcements are going to be made concerning the stadium until after the environmental impact study is done. Also says that we only need to raise $5-8 million privately, which is smaller than the previously announced $20 mil or half. We should be able to get a couple million from a naming opportunity no? It will be the Capital District's premier outdoor (or in my opinion indoor or outdoor) sporting facility. I have to imagine some corporation would jump on that opportunity.

[danefan]

Interview on this morning's news with Dr. McElroy about the stadium. He said that it hasn't been aggressive or public yet because he was unsure about his own contract. Now that he has a long-term extension he said he can focus all of his energy on the stadium project. NBC 13 also did interviews with students at the CU for the Growl. The students were very excited about the stadium project, saying that it is what the school is missing and that they think we can get a lot more student support if we had a stadium.

 

A couple of factually incorrect statements in the report though:

1. The current stadium seats 10,000. It doesn't, we all know that. The media guide has actually been updated to say 5,000.

2. The new stadium will cost $8-10mil. McElroy said the other night that it will cost 5-8 million private money, but $40-50 million total.

 

The report said that the new stadium will seat 15,000 or more.

[UAlbany09]

Pretty clear from the TU article today that no public announcements are going to be made concerning the stadium until after the environmental impact study is done. Also says that we only need to raise $5-8 million privately, which is smaller than the previously announced $20 mil or half. We should be able to get a couple million from a naming opportunity no? It will be the Capital District's premier outdoor (or in my opinion indoor or outdoor) sporting facility. I have to imagine some corporation would jump on that opportunity.

 

SEFCU Stadium

[purplehaze]

Pretty clear from the TU article today that no public announcements are going to be made concerning the stadium until after the environmental impact study is done. Also says that we only need to raise $5-8 million privately, which is smaller than the previously announced $20 mil or half. We should be able to get a couple million from a naming opportunity no? It will be the Capital District's premier outdoor (or in my opinion indoor or outdoor) sporting facility. I have to imagine some corporation would jump on that opportunity.

 

SEFCU Stadium

 

Bob Ford Field at SEFCU Stadium

[danefan]

Definitely has to be Bob Ford Field. I don't SEFCU will have enough money to get the naming rights though. I would expect the naming rights for this stadium to get at least $4mil.