Could two school support one football team?
i.e. Rice_houston team, hire relative independent coach, half student from each school, with invest from two schools, we could be top 10.

i know too naive, but that make g5/small school more competitive.

The Texas version of the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps Stags and the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps Athenas?

I think a shared stadium model could work fine. But no program that was average or better would want to merge with another program. So you're left with two sub-par programs united - I don't see that product turning into a "power."

Or you could have IUPUI-Indianapolis???

It's actually kind of an interesting idea. I assume the OP was alluding to UH and Rice teaming up, since they are so close (I would guess that UAB-Alabama might not go over so well right now in Birmingham in light of the recent unpleasantries regarding UAB dropping and then reviving football.)

Questions would be what colors to wear? What mascot to use? (can one mate an Owl and a Cougar? Yeeesh) what conference to play in (well, AAC would be better than CUSA). If it was done as a joint venture to try to get a bid/spot in a P5, it might not be all that bad. The spot would have to be granted before it came to pass, but certainly, colleges collaborate all the time on academic endeavors, why not explore an athletic partnership?

Yeah, kinda interesting -- would only work as an improvement/P5 move if the recruited athletes to each school understood up front that they had a 50% lower chance of being on the field/court/track....

NCAA would probably not approve it. Pro football had the Steegles during WW2 to conserve talent. Played half in Pittsburgh and half in Philadelphia.

(05-17-2016 04:52 PM)GoodOwl Wrote:  It's actually kind of an interesting idea. I assume the OP was alluding to UH and Rice teaming up, since they are so close (I would guess that UAB-Alabama might not go over so well right now in Birmingham in light of the recent unpleasantries regarding UAB dropping and then reviving football.)

Questions would be what colors to wear? What mascot to use? (can one mate an Owl and a Cougar? Yeeesh) what conference to play in (well, AAC would be better than CUSA). If it was done as a joint venture to try to get a bid/spot in a P5, it might not be all that bad. The spot would have to be granted before it came to pass, but certainly, colleges collaborate all the time on academic endeavors, why not explore an athletic partnership?

(05-17-2016 05:25 PM)Barney Wrote:  Yeah, kinda interesting -- would only work as an improvement/P5 move if the recruited athletes to each school understood up front that they had a 50% lower chance of being on the field/court/track....

Percentages wouldn't change as I'm sure the NCAA would institute the same scholarship / roster limits.

there would only be one set of coaches as well.

The issues with a single team representing two schools:

* which school's classes would they attend?
* would you have different admissions standards based on where they went to class?
* where would they play?
* why would the students at a school like Rice, which already have some difficulty in attending games, invest energy and emotional capital in a 'joint venture', particularly if some games were played at U of H?

Personally, I think it would be completely unworkable, and totally misses the point / intent of intercollegiate athletics.

It works for Claremont because they're essentially a single university. Harvey Mudd is "the Claremont School of Engineering and Natural Sciences," Claremont McKenna is the "the Claremont School of Economics and Policy Studies," etc. There is no precedent for combined athletics of two otherwise fundamentally separate institutions.

(05-17-2016 08:49 PM)franklyconfused Wrote:  It works for Claremont because they're essentially a single university. Harvey Mudd is "the Claremont School of Engineering and Natural Sciences," Claremont McKenna is the "the Claremont School of Economics and Policy Studies," etc. There is no precedent for combined athletics of two otherwise fundamentally separate institutions.

It's a little bit more complicated than that. There are five undergraduate "Claremont" colleges, each with their own campus, administration, admissions, faculty, trustees, endowment etc. Students can take classes at each of the Claremont colleges and there are many Claremont-wide "C5" activities and groups.

But they field two D-III athletic teams, the CMS Stags/Athenas, as noted above, and the Pomona-Pitzer Sagehens.

(Teams from Pomona, founded in 1887, were originally known as "The Huns." In 1923, the Huns played another old LA-area private school, USC, in the first football game played in the L.A. Memorial Coleseum. Pitzer was created in 1963. Its curricular emphasis is on the social sciences, behavioral sciences, international programs and media studies)

(05-17-2016 08:49 PM)franklyconfused Wrote:  It works for Claremont because they're essentially a single university. Harvey Mudd is "the Claremont School of Engineering and Natural Sciences," Claremont McKenna is the "the Claremont School of Economics and Policy Studies," etc. There is no precedent for combined athletics of two otherwise fundamentally separate institutions.

I agree, and I think the original suggestion is a terrible idea (no offense) for Rice in this context. But I strongly approve of creative thinking as a general proposition and the thought process about this idea could always lead to useful insights.

Do not laugh at the naive idea, things may change. Rember UAB? say 5 years later, both Rice and UH face a challenge that either close the football dept or merge with other school to get enough funding and competitive to survive, then it could happen.

(05-18-2016 01:21 PM)junrice Wrote:  Do not laugh at the naive idea, things may change. Rember UAB? say 5 years later, both Rice and UH face a challenge that either close the football dept or merge with other school to get enough funding and competitive to survive, then it could happen.

I'd rather close the program. It makes no sense and defeats the purpose of intercollegiate athletics.

(05-18-2016 01:21 PM)junrice Wrote:  Do not laugh at the naive idea, things may change. Rember UAB? say 5 years later, both Rice and UH face a challenge that either close the football dept or merge with other school to get enough funding and competitive to survive, then it could happen.

I think it is a fun discussion topic, but I'm with cr11owl in that I would probably rather just dump football or go FCS or DIII before combining with UH. The Claremont schools are different because they are all very small and all very good academic schools with different focuses. Rice and UH are nothing alike as academic institutions.

(05-18-2016 02:17 PM)mrbig Wrote:  

(05-18-2016 01:21 PM)junrice Wrote:  Do not laugh at the naive idea, things may change. Rember UAB? say 5 years later, both Rice and UH face a challenge that either close the football dept or merge with other school to get enough funding and competitive to survive, then it could happen.

I think it is a fun discussion topic, but I'm with cr11owl in that I would probably rather just dump football or go FCS or DIII before combining with UH. The Claremont schools are different because they are all very small and all very good academic schools with different focuses. Rice and UH are nothing alike as academic institutions.

+1