(05-12-2017 11:14 AM)Mademen Wrote:  

(05-12-2017 10:41 AM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  

(05-12-2017 10:17 AM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(05-12-2017 09:42 AM)TJS_NYC Wrote:  

(05-12-2017 02:02 AM)HawaiiOwl Wrote:  Maybe someone is actually thinking about the experience for the athletes.

But obviously not the impact of starting off the semester with an unnecessarily long road trip on the players' academic requirements. How many will fall behind on their coursework because of this, and never catch up? Just seems like a boondoggle to me, especially if there's no economic benefit. Has the Patterson facility already lost its "experience" for the athletes?

Reminds me of the way the Hawaii trip was touted by the athletic department as plus for recruiting. Of course, this is voluntary, not forced.

I don't know if there is "no" economic benefit. I think there is some. I think there are other benefits, too. do the pluses outweigh the minuses, some of which you have listed? I don't know. I really have no idea what I would say if JK called me for my opinion. Maybe if he explained the pluses and minuses in more detail, that would help me to a decision. I am sure there must be some pluses, as i don't JK would make the deal if there were only minuses.

1. National TV exposure (which wouldn't have happened if at home)
2. At least some incremental revenue (above covering ALL costs)
3. Student-athlete experience (Dr. K has stated one of his goals is to give all our student-athletes one such opportunity during their time at Rice)
4. Dr. K indicated that had we not accepted the invitation we would never get another such opportunity again.

As for the concern of falling behind on academics-- you're kidding, right? They'll be out for just the first week of classes, and a short week at that since it's Labor Day weekend. What's more, they'll have 14+ hours of travel time each way to get a head start on reading course books.

Why do you think Stanford (which is probably going to be ranked) at Rice would not be on TV? UCLA at Rice was on TV.

Every year is different depending on scheduling. When UCLA played us there were few other marquess games on tap; that would not have been the case this year when originally scheduled the first weekend in September. The Sydney game is not only on national TV, but is the ONLY game on that day and is the very first college football game played in 2017. No question there will be significantly more eyeballs watching than if we were one of several national TV games on that day...and in likelihood, it would have been a regional game at best.