I completely agree. The MAC does not have the basketball facilities nor the will to kick its programs up to the level of the MVC. The MVC has it all over the MAC which makes all the talk of getting one or more of their members to move up to D-1A football and join the MAC laughable. The money and recognition are in basketball for mid-major conferences and until the MAC steps up its budgets and facilities we will continue to be the 9th to 14th best baskteball conference from year to year. The MVC has become big-time. They are a powerhouse again this year and only a short handful of MAC teams could compete there year in and year out.
To add: the MVC is not our competition anymore. We are on a level with the Horizon, the A-10, and CUSA in our good years, and closer to the Sun Belt and the Mid-Con in our weaker years. Our schools pour money into football that runs in the red conference wide and tries to run basketball on the cheap, with salaries and facilities more similar to the Mid-Con than the MVC.
That's harsh, but it's our reality.
The MVC will be rolling in NCAA dough for the next decade.
The MVC schools with football have the right mix. D-1AA to keep costs down, be competitive, and draw fan interest below the Big 12, Big 10 radar. Expend money where there is the greatest return in terms of $ and exposure - the NCAA tourney.
The MAC is a group of pretenders that have wasted resources on football. Honestly, there may come a time when there is a MAC split over this. Particularly as the state schools are required to look at their budgets and enrollments decline. Some of the OU posters have mentioned that they are not enamored with the football push at the expense of basketball. Kent fans have had the same debate. The time may come...sooner rather than later.
Football is only part of the explanation for the recent decline in MAC hoops.
Another reason could be the lack of at-large bids the MAC deserved in the late 90's and early 00's. The Valley got 'em and the MAC didn't. I have to believe that now plays a role in the recruiting wars for "beyond-BCS" talent.
It sounds like somebody is a little bitter now that their Football season is taking a dive.
The fact is the MAC is now pumping people into the NFL. There are far less schools for us to compete with for players in football than b-ball and the former is where we are making our strides.
That said however, I don't thimk that we have given up on B-ball. I can't speak for other schools but WMU is giving a lot attention to the game. In fact, when Cubit came to Western, he used the basketball games for recruiting and stated that he would like to see the football program recieve this much as much support.
A few years back, Kent made it to the Elite 8. Nobody in the conference is trying to discurage you from doing it again or doing better for that matter, so stop crying and start winning.
westernwilly Wrote:It sounds like somebody is a little bitter now that their Football season is taking a dive.
The fact is the MAC is now pumping people into the NFL. There are far less schools for us to compete with for players in football than b-ball and the former is where we are making our strides.
That said however, I don't thimk that we have given up on B-ball. I can't speak for other schools but WMU is giving a lot attention to the game. In fact, when Cubit came to Western, he used the basketball games for recruiting and stated that he would like to see the football program recieve this much as much support.
A few years back, Kent made it to the Elite 8. Nobody in the conference is trying to discurage you from doing it again or doing better for that matter, so stop crying and start winning.
This has nothing to do with the football season this year. It has to do with the economics at the university and best use of resources. Kent can win the MAC and a bowl and it won't amount to much for the university. However, the Elite 8 run and b-ball success has done wonders for Kent with it's alumni. Kent could win continually in football for the next decade and no one would notice. Go to the NCAA tourney and the notice is there. Everyone watches the NCAA tourney. Who watches the Tues night bowl game in early December... gamblers.
BTW, every school will makes it own choice. If Western chooses to continue on this path, more power to them. I never said that the path I suggested was mandatory or preferred for all.
NIU has spent a considerable amount of $ on both sports. The Convo Center which seats over 9K was built at a cost of $38M, not a small amount of $ for a midmajor program. NIU's seating and overall arena amenities are in line with Northwestern, UIC and SIU (which has an older hoops arena by MVC standards). Bradley plays in a larger arena because Peoria(IL) has the political clout to get state and county $ to build a civic center whose centerpiece is the basketball arena Bradley plays in.
DePaul does not play in their own facility, they rent the 18K seat Allstate Arena. Loyola's arena is also new but seats 3K less than the Convo Center. Illinois St recently build an impressive Redbird Arena and got the funding in part because of the population base in Bloomington/Normal plus the local and state funding (Republican candidate for Gov in 02 was a Bloomington native) were amassed to build it.
Considering that DeKalb is one of the smaller Illinois cities/counties with a D1 hoops program, the Convo was a good get for the program and the right size (if not too big) for the hoops interest level at NIU.
I think the MAC hoops are better in some ways than the MVC. The Mac Tournament is held in Cleveland. There is nothing mid-major about the MAC tournament. Its in an NBA arena not some schools gym or fieldhouse. The MAC football title game is in an NFL stadium. The problem with MAC is that they depend on espn to support the three bowl games. The MAC needs play a challange with the MVC. And I mean Kent State vs Southern Illinois, Akron vs Creighton, Miami vs Wichita State, Ohio vs Bradley,Northern Iowa vs Toledo. CMU vs Wichita State is not a challange.......EMU vs Northern Iowa is not a challange. Our best vs their best. Lets see what that records look like with half of MVC top six coming to half of top six of the MAC.
I guess you could say we're better unless you look at the quality of their basketball programs, their NCAA wins, their multi-bids every year, their 3 Top 25 quality teams this year, the fact that the MVC almost always ranks higher than the MAC, their NBA players, their higher salaried and more in demand coaches, their bigger, newer arenas, their better crowds. Other than that, we kick their butts!
And they play their tournament at the 20,000 seat Scottrade Center in St. Louis, home of the Blues: it's a big league arena. The refurbished Q may be better right now, but it's a small point in our favor.
axeme Wrote:I guess you could say we're better unless you look at the quality of their basketball programs, their NCAA wins, their multi-bids every year, their 3 Top 25 quality teams this year, the fact that the MVC almost always ranks higher than the MAC, their NBA players, their higher salaried and more in demand coaches, their bigger, newer arenas, their better crowds. Other than that, we kick their butts!
And they play their tournament at the 20,000 seat Scottrade Center in St. Louis, home of the Blues: it's a big league arena. The refurbished Q may be better right now, but it's a small point in our favor.
You forgot their better regular season overall attendance, and they have better attendance at their tournament. The MAC could help themselves alot if WKU, and or Temple were to come into the league.
The MVC made a scheduling move to beef up their OOC schedules a few years ago. They actually threatened to fine programs that scheduled weak OOC competition in an effort to boost their RPI. Of course they wanted OOC wins, but mostly what they wanted was a strong SOS resume.
Contrast that to the crying we hear from a couple of MAC coaches that we have gone to 16 league games because they can't get anyone to play at home. Here's a hint...pack a bag, get on a plane, and go play somebody. NCAA wins aren't going to be run at home and neither are the wins to get there.
The MVC is flat out lapping us.
I agree the MVC is better than the MAC in hoops, but I don't agree that it has to do with MAC football.
I think it would be a very dangerous strategy for MAC teams to assume that if we eliminated football all of sudden we would have multiple basketball berths. In fact, I would argue that it probably works the other way. Good football programs aren't hurting the quality of basketball in the BCS leagues.
The MVC is much different than the MAC. Their attendance is much larger, it always has been and always will be.
Kent is the perfect example of why concentrating on hoops would be a MAC disaster. Kent has 8 straight 20 wins seasons- and they turned that into a non-existent radio package, no big name home out of conference games, a local access cable television package and attendance that struggles around 5,000. In football they have had mysery for 30 years and still got 2 nationally televised games, 3 regionally televised games, 3 major AM stations in Cleveland, Akron and Warren and attendance around 20,000 for the first three games and a home game with Minnesota.
cw--and yet basketball is our calling card, not football. I don't think your points really follow. Basketball has brought so much more revenue to the athletic dept. while the football program is an incredible drain on resources. Not really the point anyway. I was not suggesting we abandon football; I was pointing out the difficulties that make the MAC a true "mid"-major (9-14) in basketball.
Our BB attendance is fine. We get stuck by the university schedule and having almost all of our OOC games and several of the early MAC games when the school is not in session. Kent is a ghost town when school is out and attendance will be low then. But once school is back in session, our attendance is very good as visiting teams can tell you.
The scheduling problem is ongoing. I know for certain that we try to schedule tougher than we wind up getting, even knowing we are not going to get major schools to play in Kent. Best we could do this year was Temple, a storied program. I envy Miami's ability to use its connections to get some BIg Ten teams to come to town, but to think we could do that if we wanted to is simply not true. And while we were disappointed with our OOC schedule, playing at Duke and at Ohio State are a better pair of games than anyone in the conf. has this season. (assuming we play OSU this Saturday--we shot ourselves in the foot last year and missed playing Wich St. and Illinois in a tourney due to getting upset in game 1.)
chuckwalker Wrote:Kent is the perfect example of why concentrating on hoops would be a MAC disaster. Kent has 8 straight 20 wins seasons- and they turned that into a non-existent radio package, no big name home out of conference games, a local access cable television package and attendance that struggles around 5,000. In football they have had mysery for 30 years and still got 2 nationally televised games, 3 regionally televised games, 3 major AM stations in Cleveland, Akron and Warren and attendance around 20,000 for the first three games and a home game with Minnesota.
This is due to our AD who is not aggressive in markeing or promotion. If our AD was proactive or media saavy, b-ball would be the toast of NE Ohio. He chose not to do anything after the Elite * run and that is why the situation is what it is. And, yes, football is king in Ohio, but that's not Kent's calling card and is a drain on the university and always will be. Better all around return on investment for b-ball.
axeme Wrote:cw--and yet basketball is our calling card, not football. I don't think your points really follow. Basketball has brought so much more revenue to the athletic dept. while the football program is an incredible drain on resources. Not really the point anyway. I was not suggesting we abandon football; I was pointing out the difficulties that make the MAC a true "mid"-major (9-14) in basketball.
Yes you are. You've talked about downgrading football for years. You could do it your way, but the MAC would lose a huge amount of its fan base. Even poorly drawing fball programs get more fans than bball.
Sure, some of those fans overlap sports...but you drop football, or even bounce it to IAA, and alot of fans are gone. Especially in OH, MI and IL.
It's like a country devaluing its currency.
The day BG drops fball, I'm a full-time ASU fan.
Now, could the MAC stand to improve itself in ALL SPORTS? ABSOLUTELY. But, that doesn't mean throwing money at bball (especially at the sake of fball).
DrTorch Wrote:axeme Wrote:cw--and yet basketball is our calling card, not football. I don't think your points really follow. Basketball has brought so much more revenue to the athletic dept. while the football program is an incredible drain on resources. Not really the point anyway. I was not suggesting we abandon football; I was pointing out the difficulties that make the MAC a true "mid"-major (9-14) in basketball.
Yes you are. You've talked about downgrading football for years. You could do it your way, but the MAC would lose a huge amount of its fan base. Even poorly drawing fball programs get more fans than bball.
Sure, some of those fans overlap sports...but you drop football, or even bounce it to IAA, and alot of fans are gone. Especially in OH, MI and IL.
It's like a country devaluing its currency.
The day BG drops fball, I'm a full-time ASU fan.
Now, could the MAC stand to improve itself in ALL SPORTS? ABSOLUTELY. But, that doesn't mean throwing money at bball (especially at the sake of fball).
No, I haven't. But it's easy to put words in my mouth and then argue against them. I have never suggested we drop football or move down a level.
And I'm still looking for a cogent argument on how one can compare one-to-one the number of football fans and the number of basketball fans a school has. Why does this even matter when the real point is how much revenue and national exposure each offers?
And as for "throwing money" at basketball (better said as "investing"), I wish we did more of that as it clearly benefits a MAC university more to have a basketball team perenially in the top fiftyof 330 +teams, whereas having a football team in the top fifty of 119 (and we don't have one this year in the MAC) is rather meaningless.
Obviously, I prefer basketball, but that's just personal. I recognize that having a football team that could garner some national attention is beneficial to the school in many ways. I think basketball is a better way to do that because so many doors are closed in football. The MAC right now had fallen off the radar in both so this whole discussion is moot. We have this discussion, but the MAC's situation not only has not improved, we find other conferences going past us. I lay that more at the feet of the individual universities, my own included, though understanding the need of some to want to scapegoat the MAC office. Our schools want to be considered big-time, but none have found a way to bring funding up to that level to give the MAC office something to work with.
axeme Wrote:To add: the MVC is not our competition anymore. We are on a level with the Horizon, the A-10, and CUSA in our good years, and closer to the Sun Belt and the Mid-Con in our weaker years. Our schools pour money into football that runs in the red conference wide and tries to run basketball on the cheap, with salaries and facilities more similar to the Mid-Con than the MVC.
That's harsh, but it's our reality.
The MVC will be rolling in NCAA dough for the next decade.
The MAC has never been on the level of the A-10 in basketball. Have you ever had 2 teams in the elite eight in the same year or 5 teams in the NCAA?
adeluca6 Wrote:axeme Wrote:To add: the MVC is not our competition anymore. We are on a level with the Horizon, the A-10, and CUSA in our good years, and closer to the Sun Belt and the Mid-Con in our weaker years. Our schools pour money into football that runs in the red conference wide and tries to run basketball on the cheap, with salaries and facilities more similar to the Mid-Con than the MVC.
That's harsh, but it's our reality.
The MVC will be rolling in NCAA dough for the next decade.
The MAC has never been on the level of the A-10 in basketball. Have you ever had 2 teams in the elite eight in the same year or 5 teams in the NCAA?
In those years, no, but the MAC was ranked several slots higher than the A-10 just a couple of years ago. So, yes, the MAC has not only been on the level of the A-10, it has been rated higher than the A-10 as well.