What athletics can do for a universtiy

Baby Arm! · March 28, 2006

Interest in George Mason jumps

University in Virginia celebrates improbable run to the Final Four

02:31 AM CST on Tuesday, March 28, 2006

By BRAD TOWNSEND / The Dallas Morning News

FAIRFAX, Va. – Bleary-eyed students with hoarse voices returned to George Mason University on Monday, but campus life clearly will never be the same.

The 34-year-old former commuter school, the one most people had never heard of two weeks ago, has been thrust into the national spotlight by its basketball team.

Fittingly, the sun shone the morning after George Mason's unheralded Patriots toppled mighty Connecticut. Students donned bright yellow "We Believe" T-shirts and basked in the school's overnight-celebrity status.

George Mason: NCAA Final Four team.

"We're getting calls from friends, and people we didn't know were friends, who want tickets or help with hotels," school President Alan Merten said, laughing.

Dr. Merten emerged from a meeting in which school administrators "looked a little shabby" less than 18 hours after Sunday's 86-84 overtime victory.

This is unfamiliar territory for the Colonial Athletic Association school.

George Mason is not like Final Four brethren Florida, LSU and UCLA. Those are long-established schools in major conferences.

George Mason wasn't founded until 1957, didn't attain university status until 1972 and didn't start playing Division I basketball until 1978.

With an undergraduate and graduate enrollment of 29,600, George Mason is the largest university in Virginia, yet it is overshadowed by University of Virginia, which was founded by Thomas Jefferson in the early 1800s.

George Mason, too, is named for a colonial American figure, but until 1972 it was George Mason College and a suburban branch of UVA.

Mason's modern red-brick buildings are not as striking as the colonial architecture at UVA and other Southern universities, but in the past decade or so, George Mason has fast outgrown its commuter-school status, if not the image.

Its faculty includes two Nobel Prize winners and one of the country's leading cancer biologists.

The school's focal points – including information technology, law, economics, performing arts and biological sciences – make it an ideal fit in a booming technology region, a short drive from Washington, D.C.

But in the past two weeks, basketball has put George Mason on the map.

To say the Patriots have energized the George Mason campus is an understatement. By Monday afternoon, the line to buy Final Four T-shirts snaked outside the bookstore.

In the food court at the Johnson Center and Student Union, students watched the George Mason-Connecticut game replay on a large screen and got to cheer all over again.

Boost in esteem

This out-of-nowhere esteem boost for students and alumni, Dr. Merten said, is more invaluable than he can express. The national and world visibility garnered by the basketball team, he added, can't be quantified.

"From a qualitative point of view, what it does is add the sizzle, and some steak, to the successes of the university," Dr. Merten said.

The celebration at George Mason University covered all corners of the campus.

Said coach Jim Larranaga: "I'll bet in the last 10 days, our school's Web site has had more hits than it had in the last five years."

While national TV analysts hailed the No. 11 seed Patriots' toppling of Michigan State, North Carolina and Connecticut as the greatest NCAA Tournament feat ever by a school outside the six major conferences, the university got busy celebrating.

After coaches and players finished media interviews at Washington's Verizon Center, a police motorcade led the team on the 20-mile route to George Mason's Fairfax campus in Northern Virginia.

When police blocked roads three miles from campus, fans and students pulled their cars to the side of the road and honked as the team bus rolled past.

Fireworks exploded as the players stepped off the bus, and when they entered their home arena, the Patriot Center, 8,000 screaming fans greeted them.

"This not only gives exposure to them," Mr. Larranaga said of his players. "It also gives them confidence."

Mr. Larranaga, 56, looked drained, and his voice was all but gone as he and the players held yet another news conference Monday afternoon. Judging by the crush of media, George Mason will tow a suddenly immense bandwagon to Indianapolis.

Not that the Patriots are complaining. Their average home attendance this season was 4,531.

"My cheeks are still hurting from smiling all day," senior guard Tony Skinn said.

Dr. Merten gives most of the credit to Mr. Larranaga. When Dr. Merten came to George Mason from Cornell in 1996 (ironically, he was dean of the business school at Florida, Saturday's opponent, before that), he filled 10 key openings that year.

One of them, 10 months into Dr. Merten's tenure, was the position of basketball coach. Former NBA and Loyola-Marymount coach Paul Westhead was the Patriots' coach from 1993 to 1997 but was fired after a 10-17 finish.

The school's search committee settled on Mr. Larranaga, a former Virginia assistant who at the time was with Bowling Green.

"We did a good job on all 10" hires, Dr. Merten said. "We did a really good job on the basketball coach."

Dr. Merten described Mr. Larranaga's wife, Liz, as the program's secret weapon because of the active role she takes in recruiting and the way she treats the players like family. Jim and Liz's sons, Jay and Jon, played at George Mason during the late 1990s and early 2000s.

At Mr. Larranaga's request, Dr. Merten meets as many recruits as his schedule allows. Another difference between the George Masons of college basketball and major conference schools is money.

A different approach

According to the Department of Education, Connecticut's annual basketball operating expenses break down to about $100,000 per player. George Mason's are about $20,000 per player.

"Now, I'm not picking on them for doing it," Dr. Merten said. "But they do it one way, we do it another way."

One Patriots player, Mr. Skinn, has had an eventful postseason. During George Mason's Colonial Athletic Association tournament semifinal loss to Hofstra, Mr. Skinn punched an opponent in the groin with 55 seconds left.

Mr. Larranaga suspended Mr. Skinn for one game, even though it jeopardized the Patriots' chances of receiving an NCAA at-large bid. The tournament selection committee strongly considers injuries and suspensions when considering whether a team is bid worthy.

As it turned out, George Mason received the bid and Mr. Skinn sat out the Patriots' first-round upset of Michigan State.

"I think Tony knew he made a mistake and that it was going to be dealt with swiftly and appropriately," Mr. Larranaga said.

Lesson learned, Mr. Skinn returned to help the Patriots on this improbable joyride that has lifted the spirits and profile of a previously little-known Virginia school.

"It's like going to Disneyland," Mr. Skinn said. "I can't wait to get up there."

To the Final Four, that is. As if there ever was a doubt.

E-mail btownsend@dallasnews.com

ABOUT GEORGE MASON

Founded: 1957, as George Mason College. It was the University of Virginia's Northern branch until it became an independent university in 1972.

Enrollment: 29,600 (about 16,000 undergraduate).

Three campuses: George Mason has three Northern Virginia campuses – in Fairfax, Arlington and Prince Williams Counties.

Notable: George Mason has competed in Division I basketball since the 1978-79 season . . . It competes in NCAA Division I-AAA in other sports, winning the 1985 national women's soccer title and the 1996 men's Indoor Track and Field title. . . . George Mason does not have a football team. ... Texas basketball coach Rick Barnes' first college head coaching position was at George Mason. The Patriots were 20-10 in 1987-88, Barnes' only season.

NCAA Men's Final Four, Saturday, RCA Dome, Indianapolis (Ch. 11): George Mason vs. Florida, 5:07 p.m.; LSU vs. UCLA, 7:47 p.m.

March 29, 2006

The comparison figures for UConn should not disguise the fact that achieving this bit of notoriety required a serious commitment from Mason's administration to foster the chance for it to take place. There's a lot of insanity going on in college sports and the spending, but the situation we have at NT is a disgrace. Is there anyone who seriously believes NT can just do without football and basketball? I think even the most ardent detractor would have to admit that such a large school not offering those programs would be a disgrace. So given that the school must offer them, let's not offer them in a way that disgraces the school's image. The fact is, offering these programs and not having a disgrace is going to take more of a commitment to it.

I would think that the school would have several people on staff whose day job it is, to go out and appeal in every way possible for money to support the cause of improving the school's image. No one has reached out to me with this specific appeal, so I have to think they aren't reaching out to anyone else. Oh maybe they have a couple of people, who approach the few (relatively OK) people who have a lot more money than me. But that is never going to get it for North Texas. We just don't have that many super-rich graduates. But we do have a LOT of graduates. North Texas needs a small army of fundraisers to address all those targets. Of course, you have to pay that army. That is the seed investment. Shouldn't they devote more of the budget to that initial step? You have to spend money to make money.

Or as an alternative, they coordinate some of the alumni to carry out such a campaign, dividing up the other alumni, who are the targets, among graduating class leaders or area leaders. That is what Virginia does. There is a lot of peer pressure in it, though they also have a large fundraising staff to coordinate the efforts.

It may seem noble to not have to make mass, relentless appeals for money. But the result of not doing it is actually detracting from NT's nobility.

FirefightnRick · March 29, 2006

I would think that the school would have several people on staff whose day job it is, to go out and appeal in every way possible for money to support the cause of improving the school's image. .......No one has reached out to me with this specific appeal, so I have to think they aren't reaching out to anyone else.
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You would think so wouldn't you? It will happen when everyone, university wide gets on the same page. Everyone, from RV on up needs some help. They need people with Mean Green Pasion working for them to help go the extra mile to make it happen, from marketing, merchandising, fundraising and overall awareness at getting the message out. I see this every day, and with every trip to Denton. I see it. How to get them that help though, I have no idea? There are several who live in or around Denton that have offered, or would offer if the university would only ask. Our very own poster "drex" comes to mind. I feel helpless every time I think about it actually. Just look at how many people, such as those here on this board have contributed free hours tirelessly working and supporting certain causes to help get the Mean Green message out. Just think if some of these individuals were actually on the payroll putting in that same effort?

Very good post AV.

Rick

Edited March 29, 2006 by FirefightnRick