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College athletics sold its soul 20 years ago

Harry

By Harry
in Mean Green Football

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Harry Grand Master

Harry

Posted
Posted

Shortly after he became the president of Baylor University, one of the first pieces of advice Ken Starr received was from a prominent member of the schools board of regents.

Starr was told the key to building a great school was to win football games.

Only in America does this make perfect sense.

From Georgetown to Colgate to Michigan to Texas, ballgames are the best way to build an institution of higher learning.

Since Starr took over in June 2010, Baylor has won football games. The Bears are 36-16 the past four years.

Bet every dollar you have ever had and will have that Baylors donations and applications are at an all-time high in these past four years.

This week, Baylor opens its latest toy, the $250 million McLane Stadium, where fans can watch in great comfort big games against Northwestern State, Lamar and Incarnate Word, among others.

Read more here: http://www.star-telegram.com/2014/08/18/6051708/college-athletics-sold-its-soul.html?rh=1#storylink=cpy

VideoEagle Mentor

VideoEagle

Posted
Posted

Mac Engel would have loved President McConnell. Don't raise money for athletics even though it's proven to raise more money for all programs across the board. Baylor has three major capital improvements going right now and the stadium is only one. It's the biggest, but the other two together are actually more than the stadium. At least if I remember correctly.

Back in the 80s, Rice did the first of a series of studies that showed if the university supports athletics, overall donations to the school go up. Dropping football or even just dropping to a lower level would hurt donations overall. They have repeated updated the study and keep getting the same results.

At the other end of the scale, there was an article in the DMN today about UT setting a record in overall fund raising and in non-athletic fund raising.

If Mr. Engel is completely wrong on his dates. Huey Long built LSU as a university through athletics back in the 1930s. And what year did the Rose Bowl start? Yeah, a little further back than 20 years. OU has had this approach since the 40s. Mr. Engel's rant is about 120 years too late.

  • Upvote 2
SilverEagle Mentor

SilverEagle

Posted
Posted

Mac Engel would have loved President McConnell. Don't raise money for athletics even though it's proven to raise more money for all programs across the board. Baylor has three major capital improvements going right now and the stadium is only one. It's the biggest, but the other two together are actually more than the stadium. At least if I remember correctly.

Back in the 80s, Rice did the first of a series of studies that showed if the university supports athletics, overall donations to the school go up. Dropping football or even just dropping to a lower level would hurt donations overall. They have repeated updated the study and keep getting the same results.

At the other end of the scale, there was an article in the DMN today about UT setting a record in overall fund raising and in non-athletic fund raising.

If Mr. Engel is completely wrong on his dates. Huey Long built LSU as a university through athletics back in the 1930s. And what year did the Rose Bowl start? Yeah, a little further back than 20 years. OU has had this approach since the 40s. Mr. Engel's rant is about 120 years too late.

I don't know about President McConnell, but Mac Engel would certainly have loved J.C.Matthews. He not only discouraged (he may have even forbid it) fund raising for athletics, he also (according to a reliable source) discouraged any sort of non-state-revenue monies coming to the University. It was probably that way long before he took over as president.

  • Upvote 1
drex Experienced

drex

Posted
Posted

It was J.C. Matthews who would not touch any donor money, as he said that it would result in donors wanting to run the school.

meangreendork Enthusiast

meangreendork

Posted
Posted (edited)

Things certainly are out of control. But how do you stop it? Whoever steps forward saying, "We'll put a stop to it here" will just get left behind.

Yeah, that's sadly true. I do believe in universities as academic institutions first and foremost, but it seems like the nature of the beast is that athletics play a huge part in assisting the efforts of universities by way of donations and the like unless the university is private and extremely exclusive.

Edited by meangreendork
DallasGreen Rookie

DallasGreen

Posted
Posted

Yeah, that's sadly true. I do believe in universities as academic institutions first and foremost, but it seems like the nature of the beast is that athletics play a huge part in assisting the efforts of universities by way of donations and the like unless the university is private and extremely exclusive.

As they say at OU I just want to build a university that the football team can be proud of.

meangreendork Enthusiast

meangreendork

Posted
Posted

That honestly sounds eerily like the real estate and stock markets of 2007.

The P5 jump-off will probably be what kills the whole machine. Afterwards, some will claim "if the smaller schools didn't such a stink about the BCS, then none of this would happen." And that'll totally gloss over how the BCS schools basically made the system what it was.

UNT90 Newbie

UNT90

Posted
Posted

It was J.C. Matthews who would not touch any donor money, as he said that it would result in donors wanting to run the school.

Ah, short sighted kingdom-building, the cornerstone of just about every terrible administrator.

VideoEagle Mentor

VideoEagle

Posted
Posted

I don't know about President McConnell, but Mac Engel would certainly have loved J.C.Matthews. He not only discouraged (he may have even forbid it) fund raising for athletics, he also (according to a reliable source) discouraged any sort of non-state-revenue monies coming to the University. It was probably that way long before he took over as president.

You're right, it was Matthews. Got my Presidents mixed up.

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