Students and Alumni care more about winning than the BOR and the chanc

[GRN-WHT]

If I went to my boss and said "my goal is to be very average over a long period of time and if you're lucky, I'll be slightly above average every once in a while"

I would be quickly shown the door.

[Christopher Walker]

Students vote in a fee that is not connected to any stadium construction and allows for a $2 raise every year.

The chancellor, who's influence on legislation in Austin was a major reason for his hire, refuses to protect the legislation as written, allowing it to be tied to paying off the stadium. Stadium paid off, fee ends.

Okay, 90. Don't get mad at me. If I recall correctly, when we voted for the Referenda item within the Senate, we stripped it of the additional $2 per year provision. I believe our intent as the Senate was to bring forth a referenda vote that was most agreeable to the student body at that time.

If anything was written or published contrary, they may have been accidentally referring to the original bill, and not the end-product referenda item wording.

Now granted, I sometimes have a poor memory,and I'll look up the actual finished bill from SGA records, but I feel confident in this. As I've said before, this item was my first official bot as a Senator those years ago.

----

By the way, it was awesome meeting you last Saturday.

Edited September 19, 2013 by Christopher Walker

[TheTastyGreek]

You know that any post season is what was meant

Trying not to assume the worst, but I really hope that's not true. If we can finish around .500 and write a check, and that counts as success... That's dismal.

I can handle it if they said NCAA or NIT once every 4 years. Especially in a 14 team conference. But if CBI/CIT pay-to-play counts? And one in six? Man, that sucks.

[greenminer]

But if CBI/CIT pay-to-play counts? And one in six? Man, that sucks.

Agree

[oldguystudent]

Respond your heart out.

Don't be a hero, I demand gyros!

Oh, and thank sweet Jeebus the limericks are over.

[Graddean]

In each criterion, the level is "at least." We have gone to three bowl games since the Abner Haynes team, and we are upset because the MINIMUM stated goal is at least every other year. I will admit I would like the BB goal to be a greater challenge. As far as the 11%budget increase is concerned, I can almost guarantee no academic area is getting a budget increase of that magnitude. Finally, I believe the goals were written on paper not on stone. It is simply a quantitative starting point for the athletic department

[TheTastyGreek]

Don't be a hero, I demand gyros!

Oh, and thank sweet Jeebus the limericks are over.

Gyros are coming again, game TBD. And I won my limerick challenge, thank you very much.

[UNTflyer]

Three. Million. Dollar. Increase.

[oldguystudent]

Gyros are coming again, game TBD. And I won my limerick challenge, thank you very much.

I wonder if I still remember how to make gumbo. Thing is, I don't have the time like I did back then. That stuff takes about six or seven hours.

[oldguystudent]

Can somebody get Banowski on the phone? I was told there would be cake.

Edited September 19, 2013 by oldguystudent

[TheTastyGreek]

Devil's advocate here.

Wouldn't going to the CBI/CBTNRG/NUT/KSJS or whatever they are called actually be a sign of progress?

Hear me out. There have been some decent teams that just fell short the last few years. I seem to remember posters lamenting that we didn't pay up and reward the players. I heard "why is so and so school able to pay and play?"

So just by playing in one of those, would we have taken a step forward by stepping up the funding for the program?

(I do think every 6 years is BS if you are including those pay-to-play tournaments.)

If we're paying our way into one of those once or twice between actual earned postseason berths, that's great. If we're going to pay for the purpose of getting some extra time in and possibly making a run to build confidence for the next season, I'm all about it.

Just like I'd be happy about an international event once every 4 years the way the rules permit. Those are a great way to fund the program and spend some money to give a team a shot at some extra pre- or post-season time to build. In football terms, it's sort of like the extra practice time you get with a bowl berth.

But if we're going to consider pay-to-play tournaments an indication of success or program growth in and of themselves? That's silly.

[SSP]

Blah blah blah... We need to win a conference championship... blah blah blah....

[cdizzle86]

Not to add more fuel to this dumpster fire, but this makes me think the BOR and the AD are all still patting themselves on the back for getting us into CUSA. I'm not content with where we are. This year is a big year for us because we finally have the opportunity (publicity) to tell the college sports world that we are serious.

Honestly it's unfair to the fans, coaches, and more importantly the student athletes. We ask so much from them and the university doesn't back that with commitment to bettering our program.

[JRock]

I met Jackson recently at an event. I mentioned I was an Alum. He looked at me like my hair was on fire. Very disappointed in him.

[Greendylan]

If we're paying our way into one of those once or twice between actual earned postseason berths, that's great. If we're going to pay for the purpose of getting some extra time in and possibly making a run to build confidence for the next season, I'm all about it.

Just like I'd be happy about an international event once every 4 years the way the rules permit. Those are a great way to fund the program and spend some money to give a team a shot at some extra pre- or post-season time to build. In football terms, it's sort of like the extra practice time you get with a bowl berth.

But if we're going to consider pay-to-play tournaments an indication of success or program growth in and of themselves? That's silly.

This Athletic Department's policy toward postseason basketball in recent years has been NIT, NCAA or bust. We have never shown even the tiniest interest in the CBI/CIT as far as I have seen. Thus, this edict surely refers just to NIT/NCAA, right?

[Dr. Seuss]

And a $30+ million budget which is above/on par with everyone else in CUSA.

90, I think you went to the wrong school. SMU seems the place for you.

30 mill is a joke compared nation wide.

The athletic fee is just like a library fee, transportation fee, or rec fee... They come with the territory

Edited September 19, 2013 by Dr. Seuss

[meangreener]

30 mill is a joke compared nation wide.

The athletic fee is just like a library fee, transportation fee, or rec fee... They come with the territory

Not compared to the rest of the gang of 5.

[JesseMartin]

Totally. When we're pulling in another $100 million from TV, endorsements, BCS bowls, and ridiculously high ticket sales in an 80,000 seat stadium, then I absolutely would expect that our athletics budget would be $130 million a year. Unless and until that happens, you can squeeze a few more bucks per semester hour into the students' contribution if you want to bring it up to where others are, but aside from that we are looking at a reasonable amount of contributions from the devoted fans, alumni, and students when compared to quite a few others in the mid majors/gang of 5.

[UNT90]

Use (raise) or lose the student fee. That is the end game.

If we don't raise it every chance we get, we WILL lose it.

[UNT Five&Dime]

So, in 26 years we've made the basketball postseason 3 times translating to 1:8.7 years; and a 1:6 goal is a bad idea? That's an imporovement of 31%. Take away that 26th year and it's 1:12.5. Interestingly, we've been once in the past six years.

Expenses are tied to revenue flow, so you aren't going to see an increase in actual Budget without increased revenues. The extra $800K from a student athletic fee increase isn't going to do squat.

An 11.5% growth in revenue (thus budget) is pretty damn good. I know my company would take it.

Edited September 19, 2013 by UNT Five&Dime

[GrandGreen]

Use (raise) or lose the student fee. That is the end game.

If we don't raise it every chance we get, we WILL lose it.

Don't think so. If I recall the student athletic fee is in force until the facility bonds are paid off. The trick is to always have something that is being paid off. This was beyond stupid, I have no idea way NT's fee was restricted unlike TSSM and UTSA who were enacted about the same time and automatically went to about the max allowed.

The fee can be raised a max of 10% a year by the BOR until it gets to $20 an hour.

I have no problem at all with not raising the fee until it is absolutely necessary.

[oldguystudent]

Let's alumni all give at a level well within our comfort levels and not give a freakin' dime to the music program, the library system, Denton public transportation, the fitness center, the dining halls or the book stores, because we don't use those services. But the students? Screw 'em. Let's soak 'em for every miserable high interest loan dime they've got. If they or their parents don't like it? Screw 'em in the back door and send 'em down to Sam Houston State. This isn't a public service institution of higher learning we're running here!

As for athletics making the university a better university, I challenge anyone here to list for me in order, where they would want their child to go if the kid were offered full rides to the following options: Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar (no athletics), MIT (Division III), Harvard (FCS, not playoff eligible), Texas (BIG ASS $BILLION FBS), UNT (The hometown fave).

I'm with Thor on wherever he posted his little thing. I really enjoy what I get for my time and money at UNT. I never want to be a Texas or and Alabama. I like funding scholarships and watching our athletes graduate and go on to lucrative careers (and sometimes even become paying sponsors of this message board). I like knowing RV on a first name basis. I like having the means to get club seats at Apogee. I like knowing my fellow tailgaters, sharing beers and various charred carcasses of creatures who once roamed the earth.

We're a university first and foremost. A place that educates, and sends young adults into productive lives in the world, not a semi-pro sports franchise that acts as a check cashing service for a bunch of 18-year-old kids who just hope to lead a middle school honors band someday.

If we really want this thing to grow to a point where we can expect to go to bowls and the NCAAs every year, that responsibility really should lie on the alumni, not the student body. Alumni can choose whether to give and how much to give.

Forcing a unilateral fee on students, and insisting that it increase at a maximum level year after year after year without any input beyond a vote of students five years ago who knew they would never be subject to any fee is akin to most of the things that guys on the AM dial scream about every morning during drive-time. (I voted for the fee and paid it for one whopping semester)

[UNT90]

Don't think so. If I recall the student athletic fee is in force until the facility bonds are paid off. The trick is to always have something that is being paid off. This was beyond stupid, I have no idea way NT's fee was restricted unlike TSSM and UTSA who were enacted about the same time and automatically went to about the max allowed.

The fee can be raised a max of 10% a year by the BOR until it gets to $20 an hour.

I have no problem at all with not raising the fee until it is absolutely necessary.

And this is why we are who we are in athletics.

No one has a problem being behind UTSA and Texas St.

Just give us a .500 team every now and then and you can coach/AD here for 20 years.

Sad

Edited September 19, 2013 by UNT90

[GrandGreen]

So, in 26 years we've made the basketball postseason 3 times translating to 1:8.7 years; and a 1:6 goal is a bad idea? That's an imporovement of 31%. Take away that 26th year and it's 1:12.5. Interestingly, we've been once in the past six years.

Expenses are tied to revenue flow, so you aren't going to see an increase in actual Budget without increased revenues. The extra $800K from a student athletic fee increase isn't going to do squat.

An 11.5% growth in revenue (thus budget) is pretty damn good. I know why company would take it.

I am not sure why anyone would want to argue that the goal is appropriate because of past history. Based on the past eight years in football, then I guess you would be fine having an objective of playing at or better than 33%.

As someone who has been involved in corporate planning for a long time. I can tell you that long term (anything over a year) plans seldom mean anything because they can be changed the next year and most often are. They should however provide a focus and demonstrate an intent to where the organization wants to go.

Frankly, and I admit I having seem a lot; but, I have never seem an athletic program with such uninspiring objectives. It is usually something like being in the first quarter of the conference and contend for championships. Obviously, most schools don't meet their long term goals; but at least they are striving for championship program.

Lets look at the stated goals:

Football: Finish in the top half of the conference at least half the time, play in a bowl game at least every other year.

What this is saying is that your big objective in football average 6-6 in the regular season. Note, it doesn't say be in the top half of the conference, but qualified it by being there half the time. Have they looked at CUSA, this is not the SEC? It is full of start up programs and has few very historically successful programs.

Basketball: Finish in the top half of the conference over a three-year span and be in the postseason at least once every six seasons.

Not really sure what this goal is, but it appears to be finish at seventh or better in the conference once every three years and get to some kind of post season tournament once every six years.

All other sports combined: Put two teams in the postseason each school year.

Probably the most challenging of the objectives but very vague. I guess if say W tennis and W soccer move on to the NCAA's every year then it does not matter if everything else is last place.

Again I think most of us are making too much of this, because it doesn't mean much. However, I think it sends entirely the wrong message to coaches, players and fans. I can just see opponent football coaches on the recruiting trail, referring to NT's goals and asking recruits is that the kind of program that you want to join. It is all too telling, that records that would get you terminated at a lot of places are stated goals at NT.

Edited September 19, 2013 by GrandGreen

[3XNTGRAD]

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