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+----- Thread: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt (/thread-549789.html)
CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - PATiger - 01-21-2012 01:18 AM
Folks, let's try to keep this one smack-free. We had a good discussion going for a while.
This is the current map of the remaining 17 CUSA and MWC teams.
![[Image: logomerger_map.jpg]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v159/Derby/logomerger_map.jpg)
Although my preference is to keep UTEP on our side of the conference, it would make more sense for them to slide to the MWC side and add another team to the CUSA side.
Considering that everyone in CUSA uses charter flights for the football team, geography isn't quite as much of a concern. Greenville to Houston is only 2.hours and 15 minutes, and those would be the furthest two points.
Athletic budget-wise, almost everyone in CUSA is spending between $20M to $45M. Any new additions would need to be in that range, preferably not at the low end.
Market-wise, we took a hit when we lost the Dallas and Orlando markets (and a bit of Houston). The smallest MSAs in the conference would be Hattiesburg (142,842), Huntington (287,702), and Greenville (189,510). We should not take anyone new if they would be in the bottom half of the conference market-wise. Regardless of anyone's personal feelings, market size does matter. It can make the difference in several million dollars when we get our new television contract. It would be much better financially to find programs in larger markets.
Football-wise, we want to get the strongest programs possible. Rather than looking at this seaon's Sagarin rankings or this year's bowls, it would be better to take a ten-year view. We need to find schools with a sustained level of commitment instead of a fluke year.
As for the question of FBS vs FCS, I'd be willing to take an FCS team if they showed a strong history at the FCS level. They would also need to have a CUSA sized budget.
It would also be good for the conference if the new teams were good at other sports too. The Big East is losing quality in basketball but not replacing it. We need to see if we can improve basketball, baseball, women's basketball, etc. We will only have seven schools sponsoring baseball after UCF and Houston leave, so it would be good to find someone to help fill that gap.
Right now, my top three would be Temple, FIU, and ODU.
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - PredatorUTEP - 01-21-2012 01:25 AM
I think its funny how UTEP, UNM, CSU, AFA, and Wyoming are lined up. Geographically, they belong together in a conference because of the close vicinity of the teams (UTEP fans would love to travel to Colorado, including me). However, I prefer, like you said, to stay with the C-USA brethren. I hope there are cross-over games if this merger does happen with 18 teams.
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - HawaiiMongoose - 01-21-2012 01:52 AM
Just for reference, here are final 2011 records and average home attendance figures for various prospects:
Louisiana-Lafayette (9-4) - 29,171
Temple (9-4) - 28,060
Louisiana Tech (8-5) - 21,518
Arkansas State (10-3) - 21,257
Ohio (10-4) - 19,891
North Texas (5-7) - 18,864
Florida International (8-5) - 18,411
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - TomorrowHerd - 01-21-2012 02:15 AM
PATiger, I agree with every word you said.
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - Native Georgian - 01-21-2012 02:44 AM
There is no need for expansion right now; none of the potential candidates really brings enough to the table to justify the added split of available revenues. But later on, a few years from now, Georgia State will deserve a very close look. They would (obviously) be in a huge market (every C-USA school, with possible exception of UTEP, has a significant alumni chapter in Atlanta) and would help bridge the geographic gap in the East to Greenville and Huntington.
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - UofMemphis - 01-21-2012 02:49 AM
(01-21-2012 02:44 AM)Native Georgian Wrote: There is no need for expansion right now; none of the potential candidates really brings enough to the table to justify the added split of available revenues. But later on, a few years from now, Georgia State will deserve a very close look. They would (obviously) be in a huge market (every C-USA school, with possible exception of UTEP, has a significant alumni chapter in Atlanta) and would help bridge the geographic gap in the East to Greenville and Huntington.
it all depends on how the merger is worked out...
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - MeanGreenGem - 01-21-2012 08:29 AM
This below an excerpt from an 80 year old North Texas Exes (and a true gentleman) who has seen UNT play in 3 different on-campus stadiums since the 1940's (and 5 stadiums if you count Texas Stadium & the Cotton Bowl stadium at Fair Park where we had played games, too); this gent who lives in Dallas and who was responding to another SBC alum as far as UNT versus FIU for a possible expansion candidate if there is an expansion of membership at all (which I really don't think there will be this go around).
Also, he is speaking of possible expansion schools who are all presently playing at the FBS level.
"Admittedly, I don't know or understand the purpose of the alliance set-up is but it seems that it will lose a lot in terms of NCAA basketball revenue distribution if it is only one league. From what I read, it hasn't been determined whether the merger is football only or for all sports nor for how many teams will be involved.
I don't know who North Texas' friends or enemies are but my perception is definitely different than yours. Your argument that we would get no support from the west because there's no recruiting advantage since we don't play one another. Then wouldn't the opposite be also true? Why would they vote against us since we don't play? We were in a conference with Tulsa for a dozen or so years and got along just fine. I would expect their support. You might have a valid argument about Tulane (and maybe Rice) if the other school being considered were private but it appears to me that only public universities are being considered. Furthermore, I have doubts that Rice would pick a Florida college over one in Texas for a conference partner. It's a given that ECU would prefer FIU over us but I'm not that sure about the others. Denton, Texas is exactly 18 miles further from Huntington, WV than Miami. They (ECU) also understand that there aren't other qualified candidates in their area. They might have to hold their nose but if enough are for us then I don't believe that they would remain against us. Denton is even closer to Birmingham than Miami and I don't believe that they would feel strongly about accepting or rejecting us.
Maybe it's just a sign of the times but I don't understand how you choose a school with seven years of FBS play (FIU) over one with forty years (UNT), especially when the older school has a better winning percentage. The larger one is in a larger metro area, TV market and is better located for the (Alliance) universities involved. I guess politics is just dirty at any level."
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - ECUgradstudent - 01-21-2012 08:39 AM
(01-21-2012 01:18 AM)PATiger Wrote: Folks, let's try to keep this one smack-free. We had a good discussion going for a while.
This is the current map of the remaining 17 CUSA and MWC teams.
Although my preference is to keep UTEP on our side of the conference, it would make more sense for them to slide to the MWC side and add another team to the CUSA side.
Considering that everyone in CUSA uses charter flights for the football team, geography isn't quite as much of a concern. Greenville to Houston is only 2.hours and 15 minutes, and those would be the furthest two points.
Athletic budget-wise, almost everyone in CUSA is spending between $20M to $45M. Any new additions would need to be in that range, preferably not at the low end.
Market-wise, we took a hit when we lost the Dallas and Orlando markets (and a bit of Houston). The smallest MSAs in the conference would be Hattiesburg (142,842), Huntington (287,702), and Greenville (189,510). We should not take anyone new if they would be in the bottom half of the conference market-wise. Regardless of anyone's personal feelings, market size does matter. It can make the difference in several million dollars when we get our new television contract. It would be much better financially to find programs in larger markets.
Football-wise, we want to get the strongest programs possible. Rather than looking at this seaon's Sagarin rankings or this year's bowls, it would be better to take a ten-year view. We need to find schools with a sustained level of commitment instead of a fluke year.
As for the question of FBS vs FCS, I'd be willing to take an FCS team if they showed a strong history at the FCS level. They would also need to have a CUSA sized budget.
It would also be good for the conference if the new teams were good at other sports too. The Big East is losing quality in basketball but not replacing it. We need to see if we can improve basketball, baseball, women's basketball, etc. We will only have seven schools sponsoring baseball after UCF and Houston leave, so it would be good to find someone to help fill that gap.
Right now, my top three would be Temple, FIU, and ODU.
I think you make good points. Obviously the three you mentioned are big tv markets, but what is their current athletic department budgets as that is important as you mentioned? If you are going to consider ODU (which is FCS), I think you have to include Ga State too.
I still think the merger might be looking at going to 20 teams to have 9 conference games in football (since alot of other conferences are playing 9 conference games, there will be less options for a 4th OOC game so that will be important and the merger could play no non divisional games in basketball/baseball and other olympic sports with a round robin divisional only home&home for conference games totaling 18 games). If the tv payout per team justified going to 20 teams total, UTEP could stay east and add one of the teams above along with SJSU and Utah State OR UTEP could be put in west with selecting SJSU or Utah State and then two in the east (preferrably the two would help ECU and Marshall with geography).
Someone posted a mpa with all the possible expansion candidates so if someone can post that, we could compare geography to other teams while considering tv market and budget.
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - PATiger - 01-21-2012 08:42 AM
Of the FCS schools, ODU has the biggest athletic budget at $29,048,014.00 for the 2009-2010 year. In fact, they have a bigger athletic budget than several FBS teams that are being discussed.
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/ncaa-finances.htm
In comparison:
Memphis - $39,520,842.00
ECU - $30,473,691.00
UTEP - $26,614,312.00
Marhall - $25,678,598.00
UAB - $23,839,180.00
Southern Miss - $19,641,550.00
WKU - $23,243,348.00
FIU - $22,509,591.00
MTSU - $20,800,017.00
GSU - $17,195,830.00
UNT- $17,105,046.00
La Tech - $16,481,887.00
App State - $16,185,310.00
FAU - $15,208,667.00
ASU - $13,332,956.00
UTSA - $12,948,900.00
ULL - $12,357,621.00
I understand that all of these numbers are a couple of years old. But it can be assumed that ALL of the schools spend more today than they did a couple of years ago. It is HIGHLY doubtful than any schools other than ODU significantly added to their athletic budgets enough to leap into the middle of CUSA.
Right now, the gap between the top and the bottom athletic budgets in CUSA is close to $20M. If a school does not have adequate funding in place, they have very little chance of competing across the board.
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - ECUgradstudent - 01-21-2012 08:45 AM
(01-21-2012 01:52 AM)HawaiiMongoose Wrote: Just for reference, here are final 2011 records and average home attendance figures for various prospects:
Louisiana-Lafayette (9-4) - 29,171
Temple (9-4) - 28,060
Louisiana Tech (8-5) - 21,518
Arkansas State (10-3) - 21,257
Ohio (10-4) - 19,891
North Texas (5-7) - 18,864
Florida International (8-5) - 18,411
If the full merger occurs, do you think Hawaii will explore all sports membership since we would be looking at division set up?
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - PATiger - 01-21-2012 08:57 AM
(01-21-2012 08:39 AM)ECUgradstudent Wrote: I think you make good points. Obviously the three you mentioned are big tv markets, but what is their current athletic department budgets as that is important as you mentioned? If you are going to consider ODU (which is FCS), I think you have to include Ga State too.
I still think the merger might be looking at going to 20 teams to have 9 conference games in football (since alot of other conferences are playing 9 conference games, there will be less options for a 4th OOC game so that will be important and the merger could play no non divisional games in basketball/baseball and other olympic sports with a round robin divisional only home&home for conference games totaling 18 games). If the tv payout per team justified going to 20 teams total, UTEP could stay east and add one of the teams above along with SJSU and Utah State OR UTEP could be put in west with selecting SJSU or Utah State and then two in the east (preferrably the two would help ECU and Marshall with geography).
Someone posted a mpa with all the possible expansion candidates so if someone can post that, we could compare geography to other teams while considering tv market and budget.
Georgia State has a significantly smaller athletic budget than ODU, so I'd consider ODU much quicker than GSU. Plus, GSU has a lot more competition in their market than ODU does.
20 teams are too many. A nine game conference schedule is not balanced. There would be some teams with more home games than road games and others with more road games than home games. 18 teams allows for a balance of four home and four road conference games.
Geography is less of an issue as teams will charter flights to games. If it's only 2 hours and 15 minutes from Greenville to Houston, then teams do not have to be located in the geographic center of the conference. FIU is a short hour and a half flight from Greenville. It's also a two hour flight from Houston. ODU is a two and a half hour flight from Houston and a two hour and fifteen minute flight from Tulsa. Contrary to some unusual posts by the fans of non-CUSA schools, this is not a bus league and it never will be.
Honestly, I'd use athletic budget and market size as the first two cut-off points in selecting new candidates. They need to offer us a decent market in order to negotiate better television contracts and they need to have an adquate budget to compete in all sports in CUSA. If they don't have those two, I'd have to vote them down.
For example, La Tech is mentioned quite a bit. If they were to join, they would have an athletic budget several million dollars lower than Southern Miss (who is near the bottom). They would also be the smallest market with 58,349 in Lincoln and Jackson parishes, or roughly 40% of the size of the Hattiesburg market. There is absolutely no way they would have either the market to benefit the other nine teams with a new television contract nor the resources to compete on a regular basis. They would be a resounding NO.
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - PATiger - 01-21-2012 08:59 AM
(01-21-2012 01:52 AM)HawaiiMongoose Wrote: Just for reference, here are final 2011 records and average home attendance figures for various prospects:
Louisiana-Lafayette (9-4) - 29,171
Temple (9-4) - 28,060
Louisiana Tech (8-5) - 21,518
Arkansas State (10-3) - 21,257
Ohio (10-4) - 19,891
North Texas (5-7) - 18,864
Florida International (8-5) - 18,411
One year's record in football is less significant than a ten-year list of accomplishments. It avoids adding a team that had a fluke year.
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - nastybunch - 01-21-2012 09:08 AM
Not interested in market, interested in schools with athletic background.. Bring in Louisiana Tech, forget Temple
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - ECUgradstudent - 01-21-2012 09:15 AM
(01-21-2012 08:42 AM)PATiger Wrote: Of the FCS schools, ODU has the biggest athletic budget at $29,048,014.00 for the 2009-2010 year. In fact, they have a bigger athletic budget than several FBS teams that are being discussed.
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/ncaa-finances.htm
In comparison:
Memphis - $39,520,842.00
ECU - $30,473,691.00
UTEP - $26,614,312.00
Marhall - $25,678,598.00
UAB - $23,839,180.00
Southern Miss - $19,641,550.00
WKU - $23,243,348.00
FIU - $22,509,591.00
MTSU - $20,800,017.00
GSU - $17,195,830.00
UNT- $17,105,046.00
La Tech - $16,481,887.00
App State - $16,185,310.00
FAU - $15,208,667.00
ASU - $13,332,956.00
UTSA - $12,948,900.00
ULL - $12,357,621.00
I understand that all of these numbers are a couple of years old. But it can be assumed that ALL of the schools spend more today than they did a couple of years ago. It is HIGHLY doubtful than any schools other than ODU significantly added to their athletic budgets enough to leap into the middle of CUSA.
Right now, the gap between the top and the bottom athletic budgets in CUSA is close to $20M. If a school does not have adequate funding in place, they have very little chance of competing across the board.
Thought I would add below the budgets of a few other schools we have talked about.
Ga State - $19,534,366.00
Temple - Not listed
Ohio - $23,905,953.00
I will try to post others if I can find that other map, but I agree with you on the budget. Looking at it now, I would say remove Ga State b/c of athletic budget and remove Ohio b/c it is in the same tv market as Marshall so does not add a new or even big tv market. Looking at your list alone, I would say WKU and FIU is not even large enough athletic budget so I would say we have to look at Temple and even look hard at football only if they will not bring all sports for the tv market.
Of course, I would ask any fans if their athletic budget is like ECU as I have always been told ECU Athletic Department does not include any money they do not collect direct in their overall budget (not sure if that is for tax reasons or whatever else) so that would mean our annual PirateClub donation would put an additional approximate $6 to $7 million to our budget above plus other specific facility/special project donations so that could make a WKU and FIU look much better not to mention the additional tv revenue increase for both with even a current CUSA revenue deal versus Sunbelt revenue.
I will have to look up tv markets for each but it looks likes the east teams to consider would be WKU, FIU, ODU, and Temple (either all sports or football only).
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - MeanGreenGem - 01-21-2012 09:18 AM
(01-21-2012 08:42 AM)PATiger Wrote: Of the FCS schools, ODU has the biggest athletic budget at $29,048,014.00 for the 2009-2010 year. In fact, they have a bigger athletic budget than several FBS teams that are being discussed.
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/ncaa-finances.htm
In comparison:
Memphis - $39,520,842.00
ECU - $30,473,691.00
UTEP - $26,614,312.00
Marhall - $25,678,598.00
UAB - $23,839,180.00
Southern Miss - $19,641,550.00
WKU - $23,243,348.00
FIU - $22,509,591.00
MTSU - $20,800,017.00
GSU - $17,195,830.00
UNT- $17,105,046.00
La Tech - $16,481,887.00
App State - $16,185,310.00
FAU - $15,208,667.00
ASU - $13,332,956.00
UTSA - $12,948,900.00
ULL - $12,357,621.00
I understand that all of these numbers are a couple of years old. But it can be assumed that ALL of the schools spend more today than they did a couple of years ago. It is HIGHLY doubtful than any schools other than ODU significantly added to their athletic budgets enough to leap into the middle of CUSA.
Right now, the gap between the top and the bottom athletic budgets in CUSA is close to $20M. If a school does not have adequate funding in place, they have very little chance of competing across the board.
PATiger, here is a more recent updated and more accurate budget (in the link below) for North Texas which shows our present budget as it is, $22M and some change. Our budget is already set in stone to be $24M+ in the 2012/2013 fiscal year and is projected to increase yearly from that juncture on. Maybe that puts us more toward the middle but there are other athletic budget "money saving" considerations which should be considerred as described in the next paragraph.
With the University of North Texas south/central USA location, we don't have to spend as much of our athletic budget in air travel as say a school who flies from one time zone to one that is 2 or 3 time zones away which will be the case for some schools in the Alliance if that league really ever takes off or comes to fruition. We have 2 airports that are 15 minutes and 30 minutes from our campus, ie, Alliance Airport and DFW Airport, respectively; and subsequently, we also don't have to take a 2 hour (or more) bus ride from our campus to get to a major airport and then take a 2 hour bus ride back to campus upon return from a Game Day.
I think most would agree that it is air travel expenses for all varsity teams (men and women) that takes a big bite out of most FBS school's athletic budgets.
http://www.ensbsn.com/2011/11/college-sports-revenue-2011-the-list/
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - PATiger - 01-21-2012 09:24 AM
(01-21-2012 09:08 AM)nastybunch Wrote: Not interested in market, interested in schools with athletic background.. Bring in Louisiana Tech, forget Temple
La Tech has neither market nor an athletic background.
And you'd better care about market if you want your school to make money on the television deal. No network is going to pay any significant amount for the Ruston market,which is 40% of the size of the Hattiesburg market.
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - PATiger - 01-21-2012 09:29 AM
(01-21-2012 09:18 AM)MeanGreenGem Wrote:(01-21-2012 08:42 AM)PATiger Wrote: Of the FCS schools, ODU has the biggest athletic budget at $29,048,014.00 for the 2009-2010 year. In fact, they have a bigger athletic budget than several FBS teams that are being discussed.
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/ncaa-finances.htm
In comparison:
Memphis - $39,520,842.00
ECU - $30,473,691.00
UTEP - $26,614,312.00
Marhall - $25,678,598.00
UAB - $23,839,180.00
Southern Miss - $19,641,550.00
WKU - $23,243,348.00
FIU - $22,509,591.00
MTSU - $20,800,017.00
GSU - $17,195,830.00
UNT- $17,105,046.00
La Tech - $16,481,887.00
App State - $16,185,310.00
FAU - $15,208,667.00
ASU - $13,332,956.00
UTSA - $12,948,900.00
ULL - $12,357,621.00
I understand that all of these numbers are a couple of years old. But it can be assumed that ALL of the schools spend more today than they did a couple of years ago. It is HIGHLY doubtful than any schools other than ODU significantly added to their athletic budgets enough to leap into the middle of CUSA.
Right now, the gap between the top and the bottom athletic budgets in CUSA is close to $20M. If a school does not have adequate funding in place, they have very little chance of competing across the board.
PATiger, here is a more recent updated and more accurate budget (in the link below) for North Texas which shows our present budget as it is, $22M and some change.
With the University of North Texas south/central USA location, we don't have to spend as much of our athletic budget in air travel as say a school who flies from one time zone to one that is 2 or 3 time zones away which will be the case for some schools in the Alliance if that league really takes off or comes to fruition.
Our budget is already set in stone to be $24M+ in the 2012/2013 fiscal year and is projected to increase yearly from that juncture on.
http://www.ensbsn.com/2011/11/college-sports-revenue-2011-the-list/
That link is a list of revenues, not expenses.
Nevertheless according to your own link, UNT has a smaller athletic budget than eight of the nine CUSA teams (USM is not listed). Other candidates with larger budgets than UNT are Temple, FIU, and MTSU. The list only considers FBS schools so ODU and GSU are not listed.
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - ECUgradstudent - 01-21-2012 09:37 AM
It is pretty far north but might work as an eastern candidate if Temple came aboard as well but UMASS's athletic budget is $25,229,901.00 and with amount, they would be only second to ODU in terms of budget size plus they will play 2012 as FBS. So I would add them to the list of WKU, FIU, ODU, and Temple.
What tv market is UMASS located in?
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - PATiger - 01-21-2012 09:56 AM
UMass is considered part of the Springfield, Massachusetts MSA which has 698,903 people. It includes Hampden, Hampshire, and Franklin counties in Western Massachusetts.
The largest city in the MSA is Springfield, which is 20-25 miles south of Amherst.
RE: CUSA/MWC map - 2nd attempt - MeanGreenGem - 01-21-2012 10:01 AM
(01-21-2012 09:29 AM)PATiger Wrote:(01-21-2012 09:18 AM)MeanGreenGem Wrote:(01-21-2012 08:42 AM)PATiger Wrote: Of the FCS schools, ODU has the biggest athletic budget at $29,048,014.00 for the 2009-2010 year. In fact, they have a bigger athletic budget than several FBS teams that are being discussed.
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/ncaa-finances.htm
In comparison:
Memphis - $39,520,842.00
ECU - $30,473,691.00
UTEP - $26,614,312.00
Marhall - $25,678,598.00
UAB - $23,839,180.00
Southern Miss - $19,641,550.00
WKU - $23,243,348.00
FIU - $22,509,591.00
MTSU - $20,800,017.00
GSU - $17,195,830.00
UNT- $17,105,046.00
La Tech - $16,481,887.00
App State - $16,185,310.00
FAU - $15,208,667.00
ASU - $13,332,956.00
UTSA - $12,948,900.00
ULL - $12,357,621.00
I understand that all of these numbers are a couple of years old. But it can be assumed that ALL of the schools spend more today than they did a couple of years ago. It is HIGHLY doubtful than any schools other than ODU significantly added to their athletic budgets enough to leap into the middle of CUSA.
Right now, the gap between the top and the bottom athletic budgets in CUSA is close to $20M. If a school does not have adequate funding in place, they have very little chance of competing across the board.
PATiger, here is a more recent updated and more accurate budget (in the link below) for North Texas which shows our present budget as it is, $22M and some change.
With the University of North Texas south/central USA location, we don't have to spend as much of our athletic budget in air travel as say a school who flies from one time zone to one that is 2 or 3 time zones away which will be the case for some schools in the Alliance if that league really takes off or comes to fruition.
Our budget is already set in stone to be $24M+ in the 2012/2013 fiscal year and is projected to increase yearly from that juncture on.
http://www.ensbsn.com/2011/11/college-sports-revenue-2011-the-list/
That link is a list of revenues, not expenses.
Nevertheless according to your own link, UNT has a smaller athletic budget than eight of the nine CUSA teams (USM is not listed). Other candidates with larger budgets than UNT are Temple, FIU, and MTSU. The list only considers FBS schools so ODU and GSU are not listed.
My bad...
Yet our students voted to fund a large portion of our new stadium and to also fund year to year increases of our athletic budget with $22M now and $24M next year the numbers I've read on our board. I don't think those were expense numbers unless athletic budgets are expense numbers.
Still our geographical location with less air travel expenses because of it still saves us what other schools undoubtedly have to increase their budgets since that part of their budgets are not just for football, but all men and womens varsity sports travel expenses. I guess the main question is: Where can a link of updated FBS athletic dept. budgets for 2010 or even better, 2011 be found on the internet?
But this link even has the 2011 CUSA football champion even under or close to several SBC schools and (seriously) I just don't think I understand or really believe that; that is, unless USM is the most frugal outfit in CUSA and really knows how to get more bang for their buck.
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/285979-will-athletic-budgets-be-used-to-classify-schools-as-di-after-2010