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Showing content with the highest reputation on 08/11/2020 in all areas

  1. MACtion is the death nail of MAC football. It's killed off student and fan interest. We were much better off in 2001 or 2005 than we are now with a following, and that was playing in the Rubber Bowl 8 miles off campus.
    2 points
  2. Where are the buy games this year? Who says they come back? The MAC Television Deal is not separated out by sport, so ZIPS FOOTBALL is not earning anything there, the SCHOOL earns something as part of the MAC membership. Per those articles on Football Spending.. 2015 https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2015/07/20/faculty-members-urge-u-akron-decrease-football-spending 2018 https://www.crainscleveland.com/sports-business/university-akron-tries-tackle-sports-dilemma 2019 https://www.cleveland.com/datacentral/2019/03/how-university-of-akron-raised-and-spent-money-on-sports-in-2017-2018.html Revenue: $34,601,000 Football Budget: $7,500,000 Ticket revenue: $1,381,580 (All sports) Contributions: $1,757,161 (All sports) NCAA: $1,289,476 ($0 from football as it is not NCAA sponsored at FBS level) Conference: $1,827,299 (All sports) Subsidy from non-athletic department sources: $24,289,339 Expenses: $34,873,226 Scholarships: $6,976,674 was spent on 213.05 scholarships split among 362 student-athletes. Even if you give football credit for all ticket sales, all contributions and all conference distribution (includes TV deal with ESPN) that's only $5,000,000 bucks and leaves a gap of $2.5m to break even. The only person that says football breaks even at Akron is the MAC Commish. The President and AD will never state that as it's simply not accurate. "Akron's athletic department budget of $33.1 million in 2017-18 included operating expenses of $11,174,159 and a total payroll of $10,181,747. The figures were a respective $1,230,159 and $173,747 above the original projections. But the Zips' athletic revenues — a theme that is all too common throughout NCAA Division I — account for only a quarter of the department's costs. That leaves the university to pick up the tab for the rest, via student fees and other institutional support." 2020 https://www.clevescene.com/scene-and-heard/archives/2020/05/01/budget-cuts-render-university-of-akrons-football-program-increasingly-indefensible There are 65 schools that are realistically eligible for the College Football Playoff - the power 5 schools plus Notre Dame. The GROUP OF 5 will never even have a chance to be a part of the Playoff. If a power 5 school goes 13-0 they will be in the CFP, guaranteed. One could easily extend the argument that spending $300K on a head men's soccer coach is insanity. Add in his state benefits at 42% of that figure and it's easily 10x the season ticket revenue for men's soccer. One could easily make the argument that Akron should aspire to be more like Creighton or Wichita State, basketball at the forefront and no football. The very argument being made by Gary Miller & Larry Williams about keeping athletics at the D1 is the marketing value provided to the campus and additions to the campus culture. Students would disagree if polled about their over $1,000 per year in fees to provide the playing opportunities for other students. Athletics is an extracurricular activity and not a mandated part of the academic mission of the University.
    2 points
  3. Show us the documentation on Akron Football actually being the one program that brings in more than it spends? Akron Football, even at 14-0, will never ever play for a national championship. The program is irrelevant and no one attends games, even with the dumping of copious amounts of free tickets into the area. Students do not attend with free tickets. Less than 1000 season tickets sold per season over the last 4 years. But hey, people really care about Akron Football. What a fraud.
    2 points
  4. I'm not surprised by the cancellation of the season. The people who run the league get 24 hours to decompress. Hopefully they will feel reenergized and on Monday get down to the business of figuring out what they want the league to be. The upcoming week is going to be informative. What will the other G5 conferences do? Is the MAC the first dominoe to fall? Does the cancellation of the MAC season take pressure off of the other G5 schools and make it easier for them to cancel? What are the phone calls between G5 commissioners? Maybe in 10 years, we will all look back on the cancellation as our day of freedom from what has become complete insanity.
    1 point
  5. MAC Football By The Numbers: — The average MAC school spends $8.7 million on football. — 39 Power 5 programs were slated to pay $65 million for 49 guarantee games, including 18 against the 12 MAC programs. — $850,000 to each MAC school from ESPN, or around 10% of the overall football budget
    1 point
  6. Hopefully we are not making decisions regarding Zips Athletics to placate the faculty union / senate.
    1 point
  7. Pretty much all of the MAC-CUSA-SB schools are in the same situation with big student fee subsidies but as far as I know we are the only one with a task force pending and our severity of budget and faculty cuts. The bubble has been expanding for a while now and we may be the ones to burst it. Everyone is clinging to their conference status quo, waiting and watching for some type of reset. I think if a few schools start dropping out of G5 by choice or necessity it will trigger some changes at the conference level. P.S. - some or most of the FCS conferences (e.g. Ivy League) have auto bids to the hoops and soccer tourneys, no? P.P.S. - Even though we know it wouldn't save much if any money returning to FCS, I think it would placate the faculty union / senate ... right now they just want to see a downgrade occur.
    1 point
  8. Is it systemic? No, that's not what the word "systemic" means. If it was systemic, ALL universities would be experiencing it. It is a "problem" for the bottom half. There is a need for systemic change. What system though? The Athletic Department or the overall university or G5 universities or just G5 athletic departments? The systemic issues at G5 schools have created problems for G5 athletic departments. G5 schools are having trouble coping with the financial pinches in recent years and are making already financially strapped athletic departments the target of poor administrative decisions including crippling cuts to athletic departments and student fees. Systemically, G5 universities are in a cycle of disastrous public relations. When is the last time you went six months without a report of the financial problems at UofA or similar schools. There is no reason to get upset with the media about this as they are public schools for the most part and taxpayers deserve to know what is going on at their public institutions. Are these schools making a concerted effort to highlight what they are doing positively within their communities? I doubt it. I don't see it and I live close to two decently sized public universities. The public is left with a feeling these schools are failing at every level and since they are funded by the public the "outrage response" is to demand cuts. Five years of cutting did not make General Electric a great company. Today, it is a shell of the company it was five years ago when the Six Sigma Black Belts took an hatchet to everything in sight (actually, it was much more than five years ago). During that period, you almost never heard good news about the company and investors lost confidence. The same is happening with G5 schools. How about the clowns who run them and work at them (yes, I'm talking to the professors who endlessly call for cuts to athletics) highlight some of the great things the kids are doing throughout the school to offset the negative financial press? What if these positive stories gave confidence to potential students and the enrollment/revenue increased? Isn't that a solution as well? G5 schools are not going to cut their way to success or a new future. That is a downward cycle that will cause the entire system to fail. If you want systemic failure, this is what it will look like. It's time to turn these schools into the beacons of light they are and not the black holes they appear to be. College athletics can be part of that endeavor.
    1 point
  9. Akron can't be the only G5 school in the same situation. It seems like it would be systemic throughout the bottom half of Division I football. Maybe not as dire, not everyone has our marketing "effort", spending spree, and recent W/L records. But the rest of the Outside (how many?) universities, how many other programs are in dire straits? Is there a need for systemic changes? Does a football team really NEED 63 scholarships? Is it worth maintaining FBS football so men's hoops and men's soccer can be eligible for an auto bid in the tourneys?
    1 point
  10. https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/2020/04/21/university-kentucky-do-furloughs-layoffs-over-budget-deficit/2996062001/
    1 point
  11. The NCAA has nothing to do with Title IX or Gender Equity. That's the United States Government. Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 (20 U.S.C. . 1681 et seq.) prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in education programs receiving Federal financial assistance. Athletics are considered an integral part of an institution's education program and are therefore covered by this law. The only way Akron gets relief from Title IX is if they give up 100% of their Federal financial assistance, aka all Financial Aid.
    1 point
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