06-02-2007, 10:07 AM
What would that have meant to ETSU athletics?
I would think it SHOULD be a crown jewel for ETSU. I mean, wouldn't putting down a NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP be an act of extreme cynicism?
Perhaps. Although as I've said all year long to the Tom Taylors who would talk about how incredible it was for ETSU to be a national power in golf- not really when you horde all the athletic funding to go to that sport, have a country club AD, pay your coach among the top golf coaches in the country, recruit internationally, and, well, Lamar and Coastal Carolina are still playing.
I'd say it would be a much bigger story if ETSU DIDN'T win like this!
The idea that it's incredible for ETSU to win in golf is playing into the ETSU inferiority complex.
Anyway, can you imagine if ETSU had won this thing? David Mullins stepping over his dead bodies to go to the mike and tell people they were "winning the right way," which evidently means de-emphasizing football and basketball and dropping down to a lesser conference for success in non-spectator sports?
Can you imagine how hard it would be to try and convince even a new administrative regime this isn't the way to go?
ETSU would have been buried- forever- as a mediocre athletic department- just like Lamar.
I would think it SHOULD be a crown jewel for ETSU. I mean, wouldn't putting down a NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP be an act of extreme cynicism?
Perhaps. Although as I've said all year long to the Tom Taylors who would talk about how incredible it was for ETSU to be a national power in golf- not really when you horde all the athletic funding to go to that sport, have a country club AD, pay your coach among the top golf coaches in the country, recruit internationally, and, well, Lamar and Coastal Carolina are still playing.
I'd say it would be a much bigger story if ETSU DIDN'T win like this!
The idea that it's incredible for ETSU to win in golf is playing into the ETSU inferiority complex.
Anyway, can you imagine if ETSU had won this thing? David Mullins stepping over his dead bodies to go to the mike and tell people they were "winning the right way," which evidently means de-emphasizing football and basketball and dropping down to a lesser conference for success in non-spectator sports?
Can you imagine how hard it would be to try and convince even a new administrative regime this isn't the way to go?
ETSU would have been buried- forever- as a mediocre athletic department- just like Lamar.