WKU Football Gets Pricey Gift

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Post off the Sun Belt Delphi board.

WKU football gets pricey gift

By OJ STAPLETON, The Daily News, bgdailynews.com

Thursday, October 27, 2005 12:24 PM CDT

The Western Kentucky football program received an approximate $1 million gift from a pair of alumni - brothers Dennis Koon of Bowling Green and Gary Koon of Glasgow.

The donation came in the form of property near Barren River Lake. In July, 22 lots sold at auction for more than $500,000. The remainder of the lots will be sold at a later date and should bring the total gift to about $1 million.

“We’re just real big supporters of athletics,” Dennis Koon said. “That gives the community something to get behind. I think a strong athletic program also brings in quality students. A lot of people don’t realize that, but it does.”

The money will go specifically to the football team.

“It’s exclusively for football operations,” WKU athletics director Wood Selig said. “It could be for scholarship support, summer school opportunities - it is just for the overall enhancement of our football program.”

Dennis Koon’s son Andrew played football for two years at Western Kentucky. Dennis Koon said he and his brother have made several smaller donations in the past, but felt the time was right for a more sizable gift.

“We just felt like this was the right thing to do,” he said. “We’re hoping that other people in the community will realize the importance of Western athletics to Bowling Green and will do the same.”

Selig said this is the third million-dollar donation football has received in the past five years.

“I think this just demonstrates the kind of support that exists for our football program and it has to put us among the top schools in I-AA,” Selig said.