(11-15-2011 01:06 PM)etsubuc Wrote: From reading the article, seems like that college has many more problems to deal with than football. It has under a 3 million dollar annual budget, and they need 100 million for revitalization. Sounds like its about time to eliminate that university altogether.
They have big, big problems up there...
Noland actually mentioned them in his discussions about using Athletics for enrollment management. What he failed to mention is that Frank Pergolizzi is the Athletic Director and that they have struggled just to keep the lights on for the entire school for years.
The "kill notice" came when the "revitalization" efforts indicated that the only option was to eliminate football. (
http://chronicle.com/blogs/ticker/west-v...ed/38125). Guess Noland didn't want to mention too much of what was really going on (poor retention of players, high student loan debt issues for those coming to pay-to-play, etc.). CLUE: NAIA players are typically the kinds of students who don't qualify for either DI or DII NCAA schools, they aren't going to burn the academic honor rolls up, in most cases.
Another article spells it out more clearly (
http://www.wvmetronews.com/news.cfm?func...id=48437);
If anyone knows anything about West Virginia, they know that Tech was forgotten years ago. They've tried to survive on student fees, and infusion for WVU and the state, they've had no real appreciable "investment" by a sugar-daddy like Tusculum enjoyed when they shifted their enrollment strategy to use Sports as the cash cow that it can be.
NOW... with that said, I would not be surprised to see them transition to DII. Go ahead, giggle. But it makes sense if you think about it. Kill football, move your money into improving facilities, add other mid-roster, low expense sports to up your enrollment issues and move to an area where you can get some game cash from playing an occasional DI team as a basketball warmup. It won't pay the bills, but it might keep the lights on.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out as well and how Pergolizzi weather's the initial "heat" that will come from "the alumni." Not that it will matter. The Gubment has spoken ;-)
