Dave in Green

As of about 3 p.m., there's a nasty line of heavy thunderstorms moving into the northwest corner of Ohio. My guess is they will be hitting Akron sometime around 6 p.m., and could be a good test for the new drainage system. So it might be interesting to watch the stadium cams in a few hours.

Personally, I have no problem filtering out "infantile ire" from the thoughtful comments posted here, so I hope that no one is ever discouraged from posting because they think that reasonable thoughts might trigger inappropriate responses.I like the creativity of the concept of taking down the Mill Street bridge. The problem I think is that it creates a long stretch from Market to Exchange where University Ave. would be the only vehicle bridge over the railroad. This might tend to create more vehicular traffic over the University bridge, and I think we can probably all agree that increasing vehicular traffic through the campus on University Ave is not such a good idea.However, if the Mill Street bridge is being replaced, there might be an opportunity to configure it slightly more to the south and pick up a little extra real estate to the north of the bridge.But the Bird's eye view on Mapblast (now known as Bing Maps) already shows some activity in that area, and I'm not sure what may already be planned there. Is there a master plan for this general area, or is it every building contractor for himself?

There are lots of good stories when comparing the Zips' 12 seed to others, such as Marquette (12 seed), Xavier (11), etc. My favorite is Gonzaga with an 11 seed. Based on this extremely early estimate, the Zips are very close to being the Gonzaga of the East, for a year at least. Of course, some of that is the result of 4 of this year's Gonzaga players being projected in the top 100 of the NBA draft. But what the heck .....

While I appreciate all of the other sports, my main interest is men's basketball. Of course the cynical view is that we see on an almost daily basis that longterm contracts are torn up and coaches either leave for a better deal or are kicked out for not delivering as expected. But this announcement still has meaning in the sense that, as of today at least, UA has faith in KD for the long run and vice versa. We fans can only hope that this continues for the long run, as it will mean that KD and UA are continuing to deliver what's important to each of them, which I think is a vision of what we fans want to see.

essentially on campus is not the same as on campus. Off campus is off campus. It's prety easy to figure out unless one is trying to pull a fast one. I know if I were to build an $80,000,000 university arena, I'd make damn sure it was more than essentially on campus. And I would change your terminology from essentially on campus to pseudo campus, which means "false campus"That was only addressing the point that a facility on the outside edge of the campus would be as easy to walk to as one on the inside edge of the campus. "Off campus" ranges from a few steps over the border to many miles away. So obviously some off campus solutions would be much different from others, and lumping them all together can be misleading.In any case, if UA really wants a new facility inside the campus borders, and if they have the financing to make it happen, I have no doubt that they'll find the space to do it. If UA can't make the numbers work alone and requires a partner to build a multipurpose facility off campus, then I think the level of success will be proportional to the proximity to the campus. In that case, the ideal solution would be to build it right on the campus border so that it appears to be a part of the campus to all but those who might show up with surveying equipment.

Collegiate athletics are all about competition. So it doesn't make much sense to rubber stamp someone from within, no matter how qualified, without at least taking a look around at who else might be available. Find at least a few obvious external candidates and measure them against Yurachek. If he measures up well, promote from within.The story says: "The negative is he (Rhoades) did such a good job that bigger schools noticed, and when the right one offered, he took the job — in large part to be closer to his and his wife's families."One way to try to encourage greater longevity at UA is to put a higher priority on finding someone with local roots, family in the Akron area, etc. That narrows the search parameters to the point that the usefulness of a national search firm is greatly reduced.There are never any absolute longterm guarantees on either side. But KD is a perfect example of a quality person who is more likely to remain at UA longer due to his local roots.

Count me among those who want to see both the University of Akron and City of Akron be successful. If they can work together to be successful together, all the better. Same for all of us here who care enough about the issue to want to see the best happen. No one's honest opinion is a lie or trolling to me.I really don't have a dog in this fight. Wherever the Zips play basketball, I'll be there. I'm open to all possibilities. For example, while the concept of having a new basketball facility on campus makes more sense than having a multipurpose arena miles away, there are potential locations adjacent to the campus that would be about as easy for many resident students to walk to as some potential locations just inside the campus boundaries.Whatever turns out to be the best overall solution for all parties is just fine with me.

Lots of things to consider here.First and foremost, it's relevant to discuss a potential future new facility even if the JAR is not currently selling out. You can't wait for the old facility to sell out before starting to discuss a new facility, because it takes years from initial planning to opening. So you need a well thought-out plan in place to start executing as soon as you see a clear trend that the JAR will soon be obsolete for a growing Zips basketball program. Well thought-out plans benefit from the brainstorming of many people of different backgrounds. So no one should feel discouraged about tossing out wild ideas here.Second, the discussion about downtown vs. on campus is a key point. But the clear trend of recent years is that the UA campus is growing more and more into downtown. So if this trend is going to continue into the future, it may be that a location just outside of today's UA campus might be on campus in the near future. I don't have inside knowledge about UA's potential future plans, but perhaps someone posting on this forum does.A location closer to Route 8 makes for the easiest ingress-egress for those who want to just catch the game and hit the road, while a location closer to S. Main would be better for those who want to make it an evening with dinner, drinks, etc. So either location is a compromise that will leave some happier than others.The blue line UA map is a great place to go hunting (thanks, uakronkid).

If UA can make a good business case to build a first class basketball arena near the center of the campus, who would not be for it?If they can't, then the next best option is to partner up on a multipurpose facility with excellent basketball sight lines in a prime location right on the edge of the campus that maintains the look and feel of the campus. But this would require a partner that makes a good business case that a multipurpose entertainment facility can be financially successful in downtown Akron immediately adjacent to the UA campus.In either case, the facility needs to be attractive, friendly and convenient for recruits, players and fans, both students and non-students.Anything less than one of the top two options would be increasingly disappointing, depending on decreasing quality of the facility and/or increasing distance from campus.

Hey, everyone wants to be as wealthy as LeBron James, right? Because if you have as many millions as LBJ, you can live anywhere in the world you want, right?Unfortunately, I don't have a fraction of LBJ's wealth. But I do share his good taste on where to live.

According to his coach, Egner also had offers from Wright State, Eastern Michigan, Western Carolina, Wisconsin-Milwaukee and several other mid-majors. The item near the bottom of this Canton Rep story also notes that Egner could wait it out and see if his athleticism gets him into a major program. Don't know if that's just hometown optimism or if he really does have the potential to blossom into a major program talent. Canton Rep Link

A lot of it comes down to thorough benchmarking. There are hundreds of different facilities across the country to evaluate and see what works and what doesn't. There are many multipurpose facilities designed for basketball and other events. You'd want to benchmark the best of them to see if the best multipurpose facility is close enough to the best facility optimized for basketball and see if the difference is small enough that you could live with the compromises if it resulted in finding partners to help get it built if the money isn't there for UA without a partner.As far as location, most universities are not located as close to the center of a large city as UA. But there are still quite a few to benchmark, so there's no excuse for repeating the mistakes that have been made by others in building too far from the campus and not within easy walking distance.Research the best facilities and the optimum locations, and then do your best to replicate the best within whatever budget you can muster. There will never be universal agreement on what is "best," so you just have to try to get as close as you can to something that will please most of the people most of the time.

The two-year "short-term remedy" may or may not be the best for the MAC overall. But it's not bad for the Zips. While we may hope and believe the team will be strong enough to secure one of the top four seeds and be unaffected by the change, if the Zips should slip to a 5th through 8th seed, we get the advantage of an extra home game instead of an extra date at the Q. If they somehow slip to a 9th through 12th seed and end up with an extra road game, the location would be a minor point in our overall shock over how a team with so much potential could fall so far.

Given a choice, I don't know why you wouldn't want to pratice on the field where you're going to be playing. Familiarity with the sight lines, footing, and total environment can enhance the home field advantage. Wear and tear on the field surface might mean it has to be replaced more frequently. But that shouldn't be more costly than maintaining two outdoor fields instead of one. Much of the wear and tear on outdoor fields comes from weathering. So it makes sense to me to get more use out of the primary surface before it ages from weathering, and pay for more frequent replacement with money saved from not having to maintain and replace an outdoor practice field surface.

Off campus is a pretty broad term. A few steps away from the edge of the campus is essentially the same as on campus.

The assistant coach in charge of recruiting reports to the head coach. It's up to the head coach to ensure that the assistant does not establish the type of close personal relationship with recruits that would cause them to be more likely to follow the assistant if he should leave rather than stick with the program for which the players have been recruited. Easy to say, but no way to guarantee. So I would not put all the blame on KD if all of JB's recruits followed JB. But what happens in these situations is one of many factors that the best head coaches are likely to have a better handle on more often than the less successful head coaches. Who would a player recruited by an assistant to John Calipari be likely to follow if the assistant left Calipari's program and tried to recruit the player to follow the assistant to a different program?

I would agree that it's not productive to emote and obsess over the slightest questionable officiating. But neither should fans simply give all refs a free pass. Calling out questionable officiating when it is witnessed can be a constructive element in encouraging improvement. Personally, I'm more selective than I used to be, and no longer come home hoarse after every game. But an integral part of being a sports fan is to always feel free to express yourself after witnessing what you perceive to be poor performance by paid professionals.

An imaginary arc for imaginary fouls. NCAA logic at its best.

Regardless of whether or not the win-loss record rapidly improves, I give UA credit for trying to do the right thing in football just as they have done with the basketball program. UA is investing resources and making changes that appear to be generally going in the right direction. Not everyone will agree with every change, and many will be quick to say "I told you so" if the changes don't produce quick results. But as long as UA is putting a credible effort into trying to improve the program, I'm not going to give up on them.

The Mob? The Mafia is taking over UA? That might require more explanation than The Pouch.The Mob would be more fitting for our neighbors a few miles to the northeast.

The best nicknames usually evolve from many suggestions, so discussions like this one are good. But unless someone comes up with something really simple and clever that rings everyone's bell, it will be hard to stop the natural inclination for people to simply abbreviate full names, and Info is just a natural abbreviation for the new stadium.Likewise, Roo is a logical and accepted abbreviation for kangaroo, and Roo Zoo is a clever and natural extension of that.I'm not sure how "The House That Roo Built" would play.

It all depends on how much the head coach manages the way the assistant coach in charge of recruiting operates. Ideally, you'd want the assistant selling recruits more on the program rather than trying to establish too personal of a relationship. That way, if the assistant coach leaves the program, the recruits are not so inclined to follow the Pied Piper, but to stick with the program on which they were sold.The only way the UA program significantly changes is if the head coach moves on. But no one can blame a recruiter for trying to move his carefully cultivated recruits over to a new program he might move to. If UA should happen to get a new assistant coach in charge of recruiting, we would all expect him to try to switch those he'd been recruiting elsewhere over to UA.Bottom line is that sometimes you win in these situations and sometimes you lose.

I suspect the formula is more heavily weighted toward monetary contributions than to number of years of being a season ticket holder, i.e. multiple thousands in donations trumps multiple decades of season ticket purchases.

I think it would be more realistic to try to promote UA (or any other college) basketball and football to high school basketball and football fans rather than NBA and NFL fans.

There are many degrees of success. Any improvement over the previous year could be considered at least modest success. How high do we want to set our personal expectations?It wasn't that many years ago that the football team set the bar high for the men's basketball team by winning the MAC Championship. No matter how successful the Zips basketball team has been over the past few years, they didn't match the 2005 football team's level of success until last season. So now it's back on the football team to rise to the challenge.I watched that UA team win at Ford Field when they were not universally expected to win the MAC Championship, much like last season's basketball team. I want to go back to Ford Field and leave with the same feeling I had in 2005.