Very interesting but also very sad. LINK

The athletic department reported $19.8 million in revenues in 2009. Of that amount, $14.9 million came from direct institutional support and $1.6 million came from student fees.

Boy. That's some creative accounting! Any moron can see they actually made only $3.3M, and gave themselves $16.5M to make it appear (or make themselves think, even if it's transparent to any moron) they are less pathetic than they actually are. The saddest part is, EMU is far from the only school in this plight. I imagine most MAC schools are very near this position. And I can't imagine how California public universities can keep playing the Big Time Athletic game. It could be finances that bring down the house of cards faster than cheating, turning college students into pro athletes, or any of the myriad of fundamental problems with collegiate athletics in America.

Eastern uses $150,00 from a contract with Pepsi to purchase tickets from itself to meet NCAA attendance standards.

At 3 bucks apiece. I was surprised to see that the highest priced seat in the house was $9.

I see their athletic director used the "B" word. Whenever the "B" word is used in reference to a MAC school, you know the program is in trouble. Unfortunately, all we ever read about in the MAC is the "B" word.

What in the heck can they possibly be "building" towards? Only 75% of their funding coming from taxpayers? It's laughable to think about. EMU would be better off if they discontinued all sports.

The description of the situation at EMU sounds uncomfortably familiar.

In some ways, it does. In most ways, it doesn't. We have a top notch basketball program and a national champion in soccer. We have had pretty good track teams over the years. Other programs have performed well also. We have good facilities. There are positives.

Our problem is we built White Elephant Stadium, which I like to refer to as The Big Dialer, and it sits empty because of poor performance on the field. The footbal team casts such a negative light on the rest of the Athletic Department because the games happen at the beginning of the school year, it makes it hard to get marketing traction for a good team like basketball. The University badly needs to get the team winning and people in the seats.

The distance between where we are and where we would need to be is like the distance from the Earth to the Moon. While it isn't that far compared to other space bodies, it isn't exactly the easiest place to get to. We are much less like the Beverly Hillbillies Captain Kangaroo described and more like a guy who "built" a rocket and thinks he can fly it to the moon. A sample conversation might be like this:

Skeptic: "That's a really nice rocket ship you've got there."
UofA: "Thanks. We built it."
Skeptic: "Do you know how to fly it?"
UofA: "We built it didn't we."
Skeptic: "I know you built it, but do you actually know how to fly it?"
UofA: "Sure we do. We've seen other people do it before."
Skeptic: "I understand that, but have you actually piloted one before?"
UofA: "No, but we have a plan to fly it."
Skeptic: "Where are you going to fly it to?"
UofA: "Where else would we go? The moon."
Skeptic: "How are you going to guide the craft to the moon?"
UofA: "That's a silly question. Look how big the moon is. We'll just point it in the general direction and light a match."
Skeptic: "You mean you don't have a guidance computer? They had guidance computers even in the 1960s when we were exploring space."
UofA: "They were fools back then. Look up. If the three kings found Jesus by the light of the north star, we can find the moon by following the moon."
Skeptic: "Ya, but the three kings were riding camels and not sitting on top of tons of explosive liquid."
UofA: "There is little difference between driving a camel and driving a space craft."
Skeptic: "Let's get back to the trip to the moon. Does the pilot have any experience piloting a spacecraft?"
UofA: "Of course not, but he has an action plan."
Skeptic: "Do you think the plan will work?"
UofA: "The plan doesn't really matter, we built the rocket. The rocket alone will do all the work."
Skeptic: "So nobody has any experience leading a group of people who could guide a craft to the moon? What about the ground crew?"
UofA: "The ground crew is equally inexperienced. That doesn't matter though. We have this rocket and it will do all the work. Light a match and off you go."
Skeptic: "Do me a favor. Don't light the match while I am within 100 miles of the rocket."
UofA: "Don't worry. Everything will be OK. The rocket will do all the work."

You would have to sit in the seat, turn the key, put it in gear, and press on the accelerator to find out what kind of traction you have. UA Marketing has yet to sit in the seat. Marketing the basketball team should be like falling off a log this season. You should see Zeke's face everywhere you look around town. Quick prediction, you won't.

PS Nice conversation. Sad, but amusing all in one.

I have no doubt you are right. Keep in mind, NE Ohio fans will find any reason, no matter how silly it is, to not support even a good sport like UofA basketball. For whatever reason, a bad football team will give them the reason to no attend basketball games.

Maybe if they used a little more personal touch, they might do better. Billboards are necessary, but they lack the personal touch people respond to. A face to face meeting at a public forum like the Camber of Commerce with a good speaker like KD might just be the personal touch they need to sell extra tickets to small and mid sized business owners. Like you said though, that takes initiative.

The Zips need to go off during their OOC schedule. If they fall flat, it doesn't matter where Zeke's head is plastered.

49'ers are building

Thanks for the link. I'm impressed with what uncc is doing. They aren't going to start a team and then start the building process like we did. They are going to get everything in place and THEN have a team. We were doomed from the beginning. I don't know how UNCC will do, but they at least seem to be thinking clearly and planning properly.

Notice they aren't even going to try D-1A. They know they don't belong there.

The biggest kick I got out of the article was they will be competing against the nfl and nba teams. For what? A group of fans who don't really care about the Bobcats and Panthers. The Bobcats averaged around 13,000 per game last year. They averaged less per game in television viewers. I live one mile from the city of Charlotte in South Carolina so I have a different cable provider than Time Warner...we don't get the games at my house. I couldn't even name a player on the team. I've been to one Bobcats game. I've been to more Charlotte Checkers (AHL) games. I don't even know when their games are taking place. They could move that team tomorrow and nobody would notice. Panthers fans are front runners.

If in two years, Wake Forest is as bad as they were last year, I'll give up my tickets and buy UNCC tickets. I might just buy some UNCC tickets and give them to customers.

I have Judy Rose and the architect for the football stadium speaking at an organization I belong to the third Monday in August. I'll ask her for a copy of the presentation when she is finished so I can post it on a web page for the organization. If she gives it to me, I'll put a link on this board.

You know...if someone said GP1 talks to himself I would not have been surprised. So this post is not surprising at all. My guess is these convesations lead to him having a bad day as he feels insulted by the lack of respect given in the conversation.

I was saying this very same thing to myself the other day.

Looks like you have a tight handle on MAC athletics...

I am ashamed to say you are 100% correct.

The grate one's comment, "In most ways it doesn't" reminds me of the old couple visiting their local tavern. The old guy looks and sees an elderly couple at the end of the bar, nudges his wife and says, "look at them, that's what we will look like in 15 years." She responds, "you do realize that's a mirror, don't you?"

BRING BACK THE HURONS.

FYI, they do that all the time .. whenever and wherever it's possible. I'm not aware of any such requests being declined. Caleb & KD are out and about more than anyone knows.

That's good news. Your last sentence is concerning. Why doesn't anyone know where they are going to be speaking? These speaking engagements should be regular updates on gozips.com. It's good publicity for both UofA and the organization hosting the event.