Arkstfan

25,000 sold at $20 per = $500,000 x 6 home games = $3 million. Even if you drop the average price of tickets sold to $15 that is $2.25 million. You can get an average ticket price of $15 by selling 18,750 tickets at $20 and admitting 6,250 students or others for free and average 25,000 attendance.

Being I-A and being worth a crap as member costs. There is the cost of buying things and paying salaries (which is why you see money games). But there is the cost of building a program that is more than a whore. Schools should strive to play as many at home as they do away as an interim goal while playing more at home than away should be a long-term goal. Fans have to become educated as well. UNT could play very regional schedule in the Southland, I don't recall 30,000 seat stadiums being something that was needed. The pool of I-A schools willing to travel to a North Texas is limited. When you start matching up available dates, that pool gets even smaller. You have 15 weeks to squeeze in 12 games. The last week of the season is automatically not available for 63 teams (SEC, Big XII, ACC, C-USA, MAC, Army, Navy). 117 of 120 schools have to set aside 7 to 9 dates for conference play. It gets more challenging in the Sun Belt because the conference schedule isn't made until the members turn in their non-conference dates. That squirrels it up even more, leagues like the Big XII and SEC set their conference dates and then tell the members what days they have available for playing non-conference. Would a MAC team or WAC team be my first choice? No. But if the choice is a road trip for a check or MAC school at home, the better long-term interest of the program says you take the I-A opponent.

The presidents don't want a playoff and until that changes you can accept it or bang your head against the wall until you slip into blissful unconsciousness. We have the system we have until the presidents change their mind. With the system we have today where the bowls are contracted up we didn't have enough bowls last year when a team like Troy stayed home. I would gladly go back to the old system where only conference champions were locked into bowls and 6 game winners weren't getting a serious look and the bowls scrambled every year for the best match-ups they could get, but I'm not going to get that either.

They sell a ton of those, Ducks Unlimted sells really well also.

Something different from this? http://rts.texasonline.state.tx.us/NASApp/...20&pltid=24 I like our new plate

The Big West wanted to go to Reno but the good folks there weren't interested in installing the needed lighting (official reason). Real reason was that the AD at Reno didn't want a bowl sucking sponsorship money out of the community.

I bet soda machine, cafeteria, bookstore, parking fees, parking fines, and dormitory profits can be used for athletics because its not a state appropriation and its not tuition.

Here's the deal. Why would the MWC want to add Boise to get the bowl? The Humanitarian had CUSA in, CUSA didn't take anyone and got out of the deal as quickly as possible. The MAC has said no to going there. The ACC has been working like crazy to get out and wants to release the contract early to move the 8th pick to the new game in DC. The MWC doesn't need Boise State's help to get in the game because no one else wants to be there. Do you think the Sun Belt would lock into a deal requiring expensive travel and selling thousands of tickets to that game when UTEP and La.Tech for their trips sold a combined total to their fans of maybe 2,000 for their trips? The Pac-10 just barely made its contracts last year and has consistently struggled with what it has. The Big 10 has shorted Motor City three out of five seasons. The Big East has an extra deal this year that would have filled every spot last year but would have shorted St.Pete if Louisville had lost one more game or the Big East placed two in the BCS. There isn't anyone else to take. The game is going to be WAC/MWC no matter what happens with Boise State's membership. You don't use a bowl arrangement to add the #118 TV market when you are going to get the bowl anyway. Boise's pursuit has to stand on its own merit absent the bowl because Boise State's membership is no more critical to getting that bowl game than Washington State's membership is to the Pac-10 being in the Rose. Do they have fan support that is consistent with what the MWC wants? Yes. Do they play the caliber of football and basketball the MWC wants? I think so. Do they bring the TV interest? Their market is very small but they do have some brand value nationally. Is adding them worth giving up a game against one of the current members? Tough call. Everyone wants to play BYU and the league basically started because BYU, Utah, Colorado State, Air Force, Wyoming were fed up with the WAC and one of their grievances was not playing each other every year in football.

#1. It's about how you say it. #2. How people perceive the person saying it influences how people hear it.

Well one thing to remember. Mike Tranghese will likely be retired by the time that happens so a lot will depend on the new commissioner. Tranghese saved the conference after the ACC raid like George Bailey when there was a run on the bank. Do they have another George Bailey? If the Big East holds together? If Notre Dame is being squeezed don't be shocked if their place of choice is the Big East. They already have the other sport relationship, they already have the bowl relationship. The Big East unlike the Big 10 might very well entertain a deal where Notre Dame still controls the tv rights to its home games because that would mean three to four Notre Dame road games would be under their television contract. Barring Notre Dame, the logical play is UCF. Allows football to go to Florida every year allows for pairing a trip to Orlando with Tampa in other sports. Now if basketball and football part ways? Notre Dame would have to choose sides. The football Big East would probably kick Notre Dame out of their football bowl relationship making it hard for the domers to get in a good paying bowl game if they don't qualify for the BCS but they might still cut them slack on the TV deal. Temple could come into the picture because the Big East would lose its basketball presence in Philly (#4 TV market). UCF could still be in the mix. If they go to 12 Memphis could get in the mix, maybe UAB.

It might be easier to succeed but it isn't the only way. The single biggest problem that faces college athletics is money. When an athletic department makes so much money that it isn't dependent on general university funding the presidents have little control. When an athletic department has access to people of great wealth and power a popular coach or athletic director can get away with anything because those friends can send a president packing. When alumni withhold money because athletics are unsuccessful but not because tolerated ill behavior and tolerated academic lapses for athletics diminishes the perceived quality of a degree, universities get the message loud and clear that anyone with great athletic ability should be given wide-latitude for embarrassing behavior but there should be zero tolerance for not achieving the perceived level of athletic success the institution is entitled to.

It wouldn't be an exempt game. Everyone would have to play an 11 game schedule so they could have a date available to play in the championship. See the SWAC.

Those rumors have been around forever but they ignore four very basic problems. #1. The Big 10 can't get the ring on the finger of the one gal they want to marry to get to 12 (ie. Notre Dame). The Big 10 commands huge television numbers. #2. The Pac-10 has two problems. One there ain't no one in or around their neighborhood they want to add. Their bylaws require a unanimous expansion vote. While it doesn't command the TV numbers of the Big 10, if you have a BCS that doesn't include the Pac-10 you lose major interest in the little ol TV markets of Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco/Oakland, Sacramento, Portland, Seattle, and Phoenix. You also lose interest in communities that host two of the four BCS games. #3. The Big East doesn't have four schools of the caliber of the top half of the league to pick from. They don't have four of the level of the top 75% to pick from. While they don't throw the TV numbers of the other five BCS leagues they are the primary source of TV interest in little ol TV markets like New York, Boston, Hartford, and Pittsburgh. One of the strongest influences in college athletics (ESPN) has historically held a tight relationship with the Big East and UConn. #4. With six big table members it would be very hard to get half of them to vote for a rule they don't want.

There is your answer.

It will not be a new bowl game. You don't announce the creation of a new game unless you have at least back-channel knowledge that the NCAA will certify it. The NCAA won't do that because there is so much concern over what happens with the two extra games this year. You can't even think seriously about a new bowl being created until December when we see how many eligible teams this season produces and you really can't expect the NCAA to give even informal approval before January when they see if the existing games get filled and whether the existing games can make their budgets and pay out what is owed. It won't be replacing an existing conference in an existing bowl. No bowl that has a contract expiring will agree to announce they are kicking someone out until that conference has showed up and bought their tickets.

The economy was fine when Utah couldn't draw interest in a BCS game and was still OK when Boise was in. The economy didn't cause people to turn to another channel when Boise, Hawaii, and Utah were in BCS games.

No. People do not like underdogs. They may like the idea of them but they don't really like them. The ratings for the BCS games with the unheralded teams have been among the very worst for the BCS. Ticket sales have been the weakest with virtually no "secondary" market for tickets. The TV ratings for Cinderella teams in the NCAA tournament have been bad as well. People hate the idea of schools moving to Division I or I-A because they need to stay "where they belong." Underdogs being successful upsets the order people are comfortable with. Look at politics (sorry) but people love candidates who say they are for change but have positions that really aren't very different from what has been around for years. The true change candidates are usually out of the presidential races shortly after the New Hampshire primary.

Lonnie cut you a deal. I'll take Rick's job at UNT when he leaves you take Dean's job at ASU. We'll have ironclad pact to swap jobs while collecting checks from the other schools.

Simple rule. Most lawyers hate lawyering Many of them devote every free minute to something not lawyering and develop expertise in something else. A lucky few get to change careers. If I'd been paying attention and seen that the Notre Dame job was open I might have applied.

I know, I know. But those of us on the fringes are usually talking about the hot rising schools before the media ever notices they are any good.

It takes years to become an overnight success. As some or most of you may know a good friend of mine is on the Independence Bowl committee. The Independence Bowl was last pick of the SEC last year (thanks to Birmingham they pick next to last this year). The SEC teams are obligated to buy nearly 15,000 tickets for the game and its pretty common for them to sell their full allotment without having to run any bulk deals. When you have enough fans that you can sell 15,000 tickets a few hundred miles from campus with ease... you are a force. You have value to the bowls and to television that the rest of us dream of and make more off the sale of home football tickets than most non-BCS schools spend on their entire athletic department. No one other than BYU is consistently in that range in fan support and yet they are roundly hated by bowl communities because their fans don't get drunk and open their wallets. It is about dollars when dealing with the media. They can attract the attention of more readers/viewers with a piece on Penn State or UCLA than by covering every MAC school or WAC school in the same time or space. But what if you are a Penn State or UCLA fan? I-AA Coastal Carolina is an annoyance tune-up game. Oregon State is relevant to BCS hopes as is Syracuse. If Temple weren't in-state, just another annoyance tune-up game. There aren't many knowledge football fans out in the world. Most sort of know about what concerns them, which is their favorite team. I've got a friend who is supposedly a big Razorback fan but he literally will not attend a non-conference game that isn't televised because... "it must not be an important game". That's what we are up against. There are people who simply are not and will not be interested in our schools because so few others are. If there aren't 50,000+ in the stands and multiple television broadcasts they conclude it is small-time and unimportant. The funny thing is the very people who scorn a Randy Moss when he is in college embrace him (or at least his talent) when it is verified by the NFL. A former AD at Central Arkansas says that if half the people who claimed to have watched Scottie Pippen play basketball there had actually come to games they would have needed a much bigger gym.

Trying reading ALL of the "experts" not just the one who suits you.

And MAC And WAC And CUSA And MWC

Southern Miss had a 6 point win over ASU at Hattiesburg and with any luck ASU is healthy this go-round. Hopefully their dream ends in Jonesboro. Hawaii wouldn't have been "the Hawaii" of last year if BYU had pulled the upset at UCLA or had fended off Tulsa. At 11-1 they would have gone ahead of Hawaii. You rarely get second chances. With three key road games and a home rematch against UCLA, I think they miss. You have to like Utah. Only one key game on the road and its early season against a new coach. Tulsa... Arkansas has a lot to replace and this is a high pressure game for Arkansas. It will be interesting to see how they react.

I use FeedDemon on Win, NetNewsWire on Mac, and NewsGator on Blackberry. They are all by Newsgator so one registration and you are synced across all devices.