CSNbbs

ACU drops beach volleyball and adds women’s golf, a move that will more closely align with WAC sports.

https://acusports.com/news/2022/5/31/gen...tions.aspx

Why? ACU is getting ready to leave the WAC as are all the TX schools...

Yeah!! Been waiting on woman's golf for a long time. This is a great move. We have a fine course that hosted a difficult professional tournament for many years. In the book, "Courses of the PGA Tour" two of the hardest holes on the Tour were on this course. It produced a bunch of state champions and was a dominate course in the state for several years. The women will enjoy the layouts and good greens on three fine courses, 36 holes at the country club and 18 holes designed by a past Master's Champion, Charles Coody. We have a muni course as well but it is not really long enough. On campus we have a complete short game practice area and club house named after Byron Nelson, who supported our golfers. Go to the ACU web page and check out the Nelson Center -- pretty special.
https://acusports.com/facilities/byron-n...ubhouse/41

Any news about ACU leaving the WAC is not something I have heard.

(05-31-2022 05:23 PM)PojoaquePosse Wrote: [ -> ]Why? ACU is getting ready to leave the WAC as are all the TX schools...

ACU isn't looking to leave the WAC and we have been clear on this board that we are happy to be in the WAC. We have spoken positively about it in general from conception. We would like to see the WAC only get better across the board. I think swapping our beach volleyball program for ladies golf will help.

(05-31-2022 05:23 PM)PojoaquePosse Wrote: [ -> ]Why? ACU is getting ready to leave the WAC as are all the TX schools...

Please no, please don't include us in those leaving. I want us to stay a long time. I am getting dizzy from all the moving we have been doing

Even I have argued that ACU would be the one most likely to stay. There isn’t one conference that would take them that has more peer institutions than the WAC, so they may as well stay put unless they are determined to be the odd man out forever. Some ACU fan was determined to get mad about that point, but failed to name any of the other conference options they had.. However, he was one of those jistbdetermined to say the opposite of me I suspect.

Competitively, this is a smart move. Regardless of what the rest of the conference offers, the beach volleyball program there was horrible this year, and probably in others as well. They were losing repeatedly to D2, D3, and NAIA schools. Golf is almost certain to be able to put up a better showing than that.

(06-01-2022 02:04 AM)Todor Wrote: [ -> ]Even I have argued that ACU would be the one most likely to stay. There isn’t one conference that would take them that has more peer institutions than the WAC, so they may as well stay put unless they are determined to be the odd man out forever. Some ACU fan was determined to get mad about that point, but failed to name any of the other conference options they had.. However, he was one of those jistbdetermined to say the opposite of me I suspect.

Competitively, this is a smart move. Regardless of what the rest of the conference offers, the beach volleyball program there was horrible this year, and probably in others as well. They were losing repeatedly to D2, D3, and NAIA schools. Golf is almost certain to be able to put up a better showing than that.

Yeah, GCU, Seattle and Cal Baptist are all private, religiously affiliated schools as is ACU. Unfortunately none of them play football which takes away from the institutional goodness of fit.

There are two conferences that offer better institutional fit but there are logistical issues with both- if I could pick a conference for ACU based on no consideration other than institutional profile (private, religiously affiliated), I’d go with the soCon with Furman, Mercer, Samford and Wofford. Geography isn’t good though. The other good institutional fit for ACU is the Pioneer Football Conference which is made up almost exclusively of peer institutions,but it’s a non scholarship league and that’s not the direction ACU wants to go.

There are NO FBS conferences that would be a good fit for ACU. There are only two schools in FBS with comparable enrollment- Rice and Tulsa, neither of which are known for their football prowess.

So all thing considered, the WAC works for us.

(06-01-2022 09:28 AM)OscarWildeCat Wrote: [ -> ]

(06-01-2022 02:04 AM)Todor Wrote: [ -> ]Even I have argued that ACU would be the one most likely to stay. There isn’t one conference that would take them that has more peer institutions than the WAC, so they may as well stay put unless they are determined to be the odd man out forever. Some ACU fan was determined to get mad about that point, but failed to name any of the other conference options they had.. However, he was one of those jistbdetermined to say the opposite of me I suspect.

Competitively, this is a smart move. Regardless of what the rest of the conference offers, the beach volleyball program there was horrible this year, and probably in others as well. They were losing repeatedly to D2, D3, and NAIA schools. Golf is almost certain to be able to put up a better showing than that.

Yeah, GCU, Seattle and Cal Baptist are all private, religiously affiliated schools as is ACU. Unfortunately none of them play football which takes away from the institutional goodness of fit.

There are two conferences that offer better institutional fit but there are logistical issues with both- if I could pick a conference for ACU based on no consideration other than institutional profile (private, religiously affiliated), I’d go with the soCon with Furman, Mercer, Samford and Wofford. Geography isn’t good though. The other good institutional fit for ACU is the Pioneer Football Conference which is made up almost exclusively of peer institutions,but it’s a non scholarship league and that’s not the direction ACU wants to go.

There are NO FBS conferences that would be a good fit for ACU. There are only two schools in FBS with comparable enrollment- Rice and Tulsa, neither of which are known for their football prowess.

So all thing considered, the WAC works for us.

Yep

I hate to see a sport dropped but it probably doesn’t effect anyone since the coaches and players are all on the indoor team so nobody is losing a scholarship or a job.

Good to see a school add a league sport.

(06-01-2022 03:23 PM)Outsider Wrote: [ -> ]

(06-01-2022 09:28 AM)OscarWildeCat Wrote: [ -> ]

(06-01-2022 02:04 AM)Todor Wrote: [ -> ]Even I have argued that ACU would be the one most likely to stay. There isn’t one conference that would take them that has more peer institutions than the WAC, so they may as well stay put unless they are determined to be the odd man out forever. Some ACU fan was determined to get mad about that point, but failed to name any of the other conference options they had.. However, he was one of those jistbdetermined to say the opposite of me I suspect.

Competitively, this is a smart move. Regardless of what the rest of the conference offers, the beach volleyball program there was horrible this year, and probably in others as well. They were losing repeatedly to D2, D3, and NAIA schools. Golf is almost certain to be able to put up a better showing than that.

Yeah, GCU, Seattle and Cal Baptist are all private, religiously affiliated schools as is ACU. Unfortunately none of them play football which takes away from the institutional goodness of fit.

There are two conferences that offer better institutional fit but there are logistical issues with both- if I could pick a conference for ACU based on no consideration other than institutional profile (private, religiously affiliated), I’d go with the soCon with Furman, Mercer, Samford and Wofford. Geography isn’t good though. The other good institutional fit for ACU is the Pioneer Football Conference which is made up almost exclusively of peer institutions,but it’s a totally non scholarship league and that’s not the direction ACU wants to go.

There are NO FBS conferences that would be a good fit for ACU. There are only two schools in FBS with comparable enrollment- Rice and Tulsa, neither of which are known for their football prowess.

So all thing considered, the WAC works for us.

Yep

ACU has students from places around the world (typically around 50 countries or so) but in our immediate neighborhood, women playing golf is a lot more common than beach volleyball. The nearest ocean is a long, long distance away. I see younger girls playing golf at the courses all the time so this is a good move to provide more students with athletic options. The numbers alone say women's golf is a better choice.

(06-01-2022 09:28 AM)OscarWildeCat Wrote: [ -> ]

(06-01-2022 02:04 AM)Todor Wrote: [ -> ]Even I have argued that ACU would be the one most likely to stay. There isn’t one conference that would take them that has more peer institutions than the WAC, so they may as well stay put unless they are determined to be the odd man out forever. Some ACU fan was determined to get mad about that point, but failed to name any of the other conference options they had.. However, he was one of those jistbdetermined to say the opposite of me I suspect.

Competitively, this is a smart move. Regardless of what the rest of the conference offers, the beach volleyball program there was horrible this year, and probably in others as well. They were losing repeatedly to D2, D3, and NAIA schools. Golf is almost certain to be able to put up a better showing than that.

Yeah, GCU, Seattle and Cal Baptist are all private, religiously affiliated schools as is ACU. Unfortunately none of them play football which takes away from the institutional goodness of fit.

There are two conferences that offer better institutional fit but there are logistical issues with both- if I could pick a conference for ACU based on no consideration other than institutional profile (private, religiously affiliated), I’d go with the soCon with Furman, Mercer, Samford and Wofford. Geography isn’t good though. The other good institutional fit for ACU is the Pioneer Football Conference which is made up almost exclusively of peer institutions,but it’s a non scholarship league and that’s not the direction ACU wants to go.

There are NO FBS conferences that would be a good fit for ACU. There are only two schools in FBS with comparable enrollment- Rice and Tulsa, neither of which are known for their football prowess.

So all thing considered, the WAC works for us.

I mean we did have UIW and Houston Baptist and I ain’t losing any sleep over not being in a conference with them anymore. (Assuming UIW stays in the SLC).

I wonder how long ACU will take to be competitive. UTA started their program in 2017/18. We have yet to finish in the top half of any conference championship. We have a great history in all sports, but this is the only one to not be a major player. Still young I know as we had the Sun Belt’s #2 player overall. It will be interesting to compare the two schools.

Great question. Who knows how long it will take? Personally the two key things in my experience are the coaching choice (both recruiting and training) and the home course and practice areas. We all know the short game is still a very critical skill. With all athletic programs, success breeds success so I am hopeful ACU can get going relatively soon. I know there is a lot of enthuasism for women's golf, and I heard very little about beach volleyball.

Womens golf is a challenge to recruit for is the refrain I’ve heard from those who coach the sport. I don’t believe there is as much D1 talent out there in the same way there may be for other sports, particularly in some regions of the country.

If I am not mistaken, our old friends in the Louisiana half of the SLC don’t have womens golf. One of reasons? Not a lot of homegrown talent in the state on the womens side is available. Believe UL Lafayette and La Tech also are without the sport. Texas is probably a good bit easier to find student athletes.

Yes Louisiana was the only SBC school with no women's golf. ULM has it, but like most of their athletic department, they were terrible at the sport.

I imagine you are spot on about the scarcity of D-1 level talent available, but no doubt the warmer states, especially places like Texas, will have more women's golfers per capita. Afterall, women's golf is a normal sport in a lot of high schools in Texas. I just left our club and it was jammed packed with junior boys and girl golfers from all over west Texas playing in a very big tournament. I did not see any of that for beach volleyball. Hopefully the high school women's golf teams will provide enough players but I can certain see the issue you raise. A recent issue of Golf Magazine had a cover story about the explosion of women's golf and how millions more ladies are play golf than ever before -- so there is hope.

Here’s the ranking for high school girls golf. It should give a good idea about where high school talent is concentrated.

https://www.highschoolgolf.org/app/golf-...-2020-2021

Looking at a couple of rosters for woman’s golf at other WAC schools it looks like a lot of their players are from other countries.

(06-02-2022 01:36 PM)OscarWildeCat Wrote: [ -> ]Here’s the ranking for high school girls golf. It should give a good idea about where high school talent is concentrated.

https://www.highschoolgolf.org/app/golf-...-2020-2021

Wow, looking at these rankings suggests Texas is a poor place for ladies golf. Some of those individual scores suggests layouts might be quite different in different parts of the country. Average scores of 63 and 65 are astonishing.