GP1

The professors are making a badly informed argument, or they are Nihilists and just want to blow athletics up without out any idea of what comes next. We are living in very Nihilistic times. Akron isn't changing conferences, it isn't changing divisions and the football team isn't dropping down unilaterally. None of these actions are necessary and any one will negatively impact the athletic department. This is what Akron needs to do, FIX THE FREAKING FOOTBALL PROGRAM!!!!!!! Everything else will work itself out.

Good post and thanks. People love a winner, but they can stay home and watch OSU play in what is nearly a guaranteed win every week. My experience with college football in the past 15 years has been very different, almost unexpected. We made a decision to follow a historically bad program in Wake Forest in a city extremely similar to Akron. The product wasn't always great on the field, but the gameday experience is almost always good. Even in the bad years, they were still pulling in 15-20,000 per game in their 30,000 seat stadium. I've said it before, I'll say it a thousand times. There is nothing Wake does that Akron can't do. Akron needs to stop being this terrible on the field and the game day experience. From what I read here, the gameday experience can only be described as a joke. It doesn't have to be. It isn't that hard to create a good experience for someone at a game. My experience tells me if a group of fans can at least be given a nice day regardless of the game outcome, they will come back, and when the team gets good they are excited come back. That's where Akron needs to get to.

Maybe not great, but very good.

Good post. If I was hiring an AD at Akron's level I would look for someone could changed a program for the better for the athletes students alumni fans and general community. Are we seeing progress in those categories at Akron?

The relevant budget comparison is to primarily MAC and secondarily G5 schools. Id also like to know taxpayer support of programs with budget shortfalls. I'd also like to know what these schools are doing to add value to the taxpayers who are supporting their programs. The ultimate question to me centers around what G5 schools are doing to benefit the athletes, students, alumni, fans and general community around their schools. I don't think it takes massive budgets to do this smartly and well. In fact I believe the P5 schools are largely spending money on nonsense at this point and have lost sight of the mission.

The ending was interesting. The game was not.

Alignment between President, Athletic Director ang coaches is important.

I watched Wake Forest beat Pitt with their #3 QB. It was a joke of a game. Boring beyond belief. Wake Forest has gone from Wolford, Newman and Hartman to Larry, Moe and Curly in one season.

Direction?.... Yes. I would say we are in a good place. The football program is poor but the athletic department is doing well.

When I watch high school football, I wonder how a D1 program gets enough players to field a team. Heck, half the kickers can barely get the ball over the line in HS Most high school starters aren't D3 material, let alone D1. A kid can look like a superstar because everyone else is so bad. Fans have been duped into believing the star rating system means something. I think at the highest level it does, but the rest appears to be throwing darts blindfolded. Coaches are still heavily reliant on word of mouth from trusted high school coaches in regions. How bad of a job do coaches do at recruiting and how bad are decisions HS kids making? The massive numbers in the TP are a good indicator. Half of those will never play again. In reality, D1 programs could get away with around 65 scholarships and the average fan would never see a difference in the quality of play. https://www.axios.com/2023/05/11/ncaa-football-transfer-portal-record

A lot more games. Akron doesn't need "secondary" (I get your meaning) players. They need primary players and players about to be primary. The juniors and seniors who can play should be retained. The juniors and seniors who cannot should be shown the URL for the transfer portal in order to make room for players who may become primary players now or in the future.

This is the sort of thing someone says when they know there is no way to be proven wrong.....or right for that matter, but it sounds great. His last five full years have been solid. He is averaging over six wins a year and two seasons with 8 and 7 wins respectively. 75% of the MAC would love to be able to say that. He recruits Ohio, but the main focus isn't NW Ohio. The point I'm making is fans from NE Ohio believe there is more/better D1 talent around NE Ohio than reality. There isn't a place in the country that doesn't overestimate the quality of high school football in their part of the country. It's natural for fans to feel a sense of pride about history and where they live. The main point is a coach can't fill his roster up with future transfer portal players just because he thinks fans will be happy if he recruits his local region. There is little evidence this works as a strategy for schools outside Florida, Texas and California. 3 of last 6 MAC Championships have been won by Miami or Toledo. I've already the point about Miami. I could make almost the exact point about Toledo and Toledo has won almost 80 games over the past 10 years.

It's awesome for recruiting. It lets a player know you think so much of him you will open a spot for him. It also is appealing to a hyper competitive kid, which we need to turn around the culture. Coach Prime has done a great job of this.

Ya!!!!! Why should people publicly voice their criticism of an organization their tax dollars support. It seems unAmerican to do so.

Is this what the QBs at Miami and Toledo make?

A scholarship is a series of one year contracts that aren't guaranteed to be renewed. Players can absolutely be fired. Many should be fired.

I'm really like Lingard, but we don't have the line to do this. Zips need everyone to contribute.

He's already a head coach! Former late 80s Zips grad assistant was Chris Ball. He's now the head coach at Northern Arizona.

You may be right. I think a couple of things come into play. First, if the kid plays well there is a lot of confidence and he stays. The key is what to do if he doesn't play well. If he's the coach's "guy", the coach needs to publicly support him as the future of the program and live and die with him. Dave Clawson did this with John Wolford. No matter what, he was going to live or die with him. Yesterday he benched a Senior starter at halftime who was badly underperforming. This year will be Clawsons first losing season in a long time. As good as he is, he can't win with a bum at QB. I predict a new face in the program at QB next year. Wake will absorb a couple of losing season for the next Wolford, Newman or Hartman. Akron doesn't have more years of losing.

A team is more than one person and the failures this season are widespread. I don't blame nil or tp for our failures either.

If you are in the woods and be chased by a bear, do you have to be faster than the bear or just faster than your camping partner? Bullock just has to be better than the 4th QB.

Take away one 27 yard run and it's less than 50 yards running. I'd love to know what their average yards per play on each down was, especially first down. Too often they are in second and long. There is just so much wrong with the offense. I think it has to do with an inability to complete passes down field for a number of reasons. Defenses can focus on stopping the running game and shorter passes. The running game would be better with an offense stretching the defense. At a minimum, the defense couldn't be so aggressive against Akron at the line.

The coach and administration didn't overthrow wide open receivers and miss game winning field goals. It's 2023 and players get to be on TV every game, cut NIL deals and transfer at will. With all of that comes a heightened level of criticism. The public face of failure is the coach. Behind closed doors, everyone knows why and who lost those three games.

Based on what NIU did to them, can you blame them.

There isn't enough high level local talent anywhere to produce a high quality G5 program. Everywhere in the country, people from that part of the country overestimate the quality of high school athletes of all types. The same thing happens here in South Carolina where I live. Everyone thinks Clemson and SC can live on local players alone and that simply isn't the case. This is a small population state incapable of making 2 P5 schools elite programs.