I have put this elsewhere, but let's spin the scenario out a little:

Let's assume that back in 1992, when Nippert was condemned, the University decided to drop football.
-We play all other sports in CUSA until 2004 when CUSA decides to go "all sports." So UC is faced with a serious problem...Do we:
1) Go play in the A10? (Plusses: other similar institutions like VCU, and good BB. Negative: Xavier is already there and blocks UC.)
or
2) Go play in the Missouri Valley Conference. (Plusses: History for UC, Some good BB back in the 90's. Negative: Distance)

***Of course there were other alternatives...The Ohio Valley Conference, the Horizon, etc... But let's dismiss them as being mostly unrealistic.***

The Big East does NOT come calling in 2004, because they need a football playing team and we are not a Catholic institution (the proverbial "balance"). So the BE likely discontinues FB, moving earlier to the current configuration and eventually adds Xavier anyway because they fit the BB-centric, private, parochial nature of the rest of the BE.

So, where's UC??? UC is still playing in the MVC or the A-10 (maybe the A10 adds UC after Xavier departs...) while X is playing in the BE. Are we happy then? Remember, we had no years of BE basketball to enjoy, no Orange and Sugar Bowl runs. Who knows if Huggs would have stayed or left, but lets assume that history runs it's course there and he's still fired after the drunk driving incident. It's hard to see what follows there...does Mick come into a more lateral move from Murray State?

But the driving point is that UC is still in a "second rate conference" (though I grant that the A10 is a damn-sight better than the AAC) while Xavier is enjoying a top-rate conference. Maybe 5/3 is renovated instead of Nippert, but we probably don't have "Varisty Village" either.

Are there any other large, public universities that don't play football? George Mason comes to mind.

(12-14-2015 11:23 AM)BearcatJerry Wrote:  I have put this elsewhere, but let's spin the scenario out a little:

Let's assume that back in 1992, when Nippert was condemned, the University decided to drop football.
-We play all other sports in CUSA until 1994 when CUSA decides to go "all sports." So UC is faced with a serious problem...Do we:
1) Go play in the A10? (Plusses: other similar institutions like VCU, and good BB. Negative: Xavier is already there and blocks UC.)
or
2) Go play in the Missouri Valley Conference. (Plusses: History for UC, Some good BB back in the 90's. Negative: Distance)

***Of course there were other alternatives...The Ohio Valley Conference, the Horizon, etc... But let's dismiss them as being mostly unrealistic.***

The Big East does NOT come calling in 2002, because they need a football playing team and we are not a Catholic institution (the proverbial "balance"). So the BE likely discontinues FB, moving earlier to the current configuration and eventually adds Xavier anyway because they fit the BB-centric, private, parochial nature of the rest of the BE.

So, where's UC??? UC is still playing in the MVC or the A-10 (maybe the A10 adds UC after Xavier departs...) while X is playing in the BE. Are we happy then? Remember, we had no years of BE basketball to enjoy, no Orange and Sugar Bowl runs. Who knows if Huggs would have stayed or left, but lets assume that history runs it's course there and he's still fired after the drunk driving incident. It's hard to see what follows there...does Mick come into a more lateral move from Murray State?

But the driving point is that UC is still in a "second rate conference" (though I grant that the A10 is a damn-sight better than the AAC) while Xavier is enjoying a top-rate conference. Maybe 5/3 is renovated instead of Nippert, but we probably don't have "Varisty Village" either.

If we got rid of the football team the university would have had bigger problems than worrying about what conference to park the basketball team and other Olympic sports. UC would not have an enrollment of 43K students today, they would not have a $1.2B endowment and there would not have been all the growth and development on campus the past 20 years that we have seen.

Aside for the parochial schools, having a mid-large sized public school without football hurts the university as a whole. The university as a whole (not just the athletic department) would basically be another Wright State or Youngstown State. Having a football team in this market is very important to people in this region when it comes to their selection of universities. A lot of the people who would have walked the grounds at UC since 1992 would have gone to another school.

(12-14-2015 11:36 AM)Racinejake Wrote:  Are there any other large, public universities that don't play football? George Mason comes to mind.

A bunch of the schools in the California system- (Cal-Fullerton, Cal-Longbeach, Cal-Santa Barbara, Cal Northridge, Cal-San Diego). Those schools are all in the 25,000-35,000 range.

Wichita State has around 20,000. They used to sponsor football but dropped the program a while back. Incidentally there are talks they are going to looking into restarting the program.

So from what I can see, this would not be a good idea. Being a basketball only school works for small private/religous institutions, but not for a large public school. So in our case, Football is not an anchor to Basketball, but an engine. While for X, football would require too many resources that could be sucked away from Basketball.

(12-14-2015 11:36 AM)Racinejake Wrote:  Are there any other large, public universities that don't play football? George Mason comes to mind.

VCU

(12-14-2015 12:10 PM)BearcatJerry Wrote:  

(12-14-2015 11:36 AM)Racinejake Wrote:  Are there any other large, public universities that don't play football? George Mason comes to mind.

VCU

So what I'm hearing is that some of these schools, while having small pockets of success in a particular sport here and there, aren't the schools we want to have as our athletic 'peers' let alone aspire to be like.