(12-07-2011 11:07 AM)Buccaneerlover Wrote: Very true but again, if they're just having non-scholarship football then why build a 6,000 seat stadium? Call me crazy but with Georgia's lottery scholarship program and the trend moving towards schools needing the sport at the scholarship level just to compete for first year enrollees, it wouldn't suprise me.
First of all, a 6K seat stadium is nothing in size. Plus, its a dual purpose facility to also host Mercer's lacrosse programs which will be scholarship but again are in place to fill spots and increase enrollment.
Math (WATCH OUT!)
Lacrosse's NCAA Scholarship limit is 12.6 men/12 women. For example, Jacksonville's women's team has 39 athletes with essentially only 12 on scholarship. 27 (Paying Athletes/Grants/Need Based Aid) x $40,000 (Random Guess at Tuition Cost) = $1.08 Million
I would say the money made on a men's program would be VERY similiar. In fact, JU's men's program has even more athletes than its womens.
The reason private schools (very few public) add these sports is to generate LARGE sums of operating capital. I will guarantee the budget for these sports is minimal compared to the long term money making capital.
As far as stadium size, 6K is pretty standard for the PFL. In fact, Drake, Dayton, and several others are over 6K.
I will state again I find it HIGHLY unlikely they will go scholarship anytime in the relatively near future (10 + years). Because if you are going to go scholarship SOON, why would you not just go scholarship from the start like Kennesaw State, Georgia State and Old Dominion to name a few?
Mercer fits the bill as a long term non-scholarship program like Campbell, Jacksonville, Drake, Butler, Valparaiso, San Diego, Davidson, Stetson, Dayton, and others. That bill is small private schools with high tuitions seeking to raise enrollment and increase revenue in a time when the economy is hitting those high dollar institutions enrollment hard! Again that is why all these schools are adding high roster number sports that hand out very few scholarships in comparison.