I did not write this. It's from Reddit. I've formatted it for this board. https://www.reddit.com/r/CFB/comments/pl...?context=3
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A Eulogy For USF


This will be a very long post. But every word needs to be said. Its only fair that USF gets a proper eulogy. After all, they’ve earned it.

Let me start by telling you a little about myself. I’m not just some random UCF fan taking a quick pot-shot at our rival (I mean, I AM some random UCF fan, and this will take many shots at USF), but I’m a bit more involved with USF than most UCF fans. I’m from Tampa and still live here. I was accepted to both USF and UCF, but chose UCF because of the engineering school. Most of my friends went to USF. But the thing that connects me a bit more is my significant other: he’s an alumni, was an elected officer in their Student Gov’t for a few years. After graduating he spent several hundred dollars to be a Life Member of their Alumni Association and as a result I get dragged to USF’s campus more often than I’d like. I’ve gone to every USF homecoming parade since 2013 (minus last year), under the crappy VIP alumni tent (which has gotten less crowded every year…and the food has gotten progressively worse). I’ve met former President Judy Genshaft on 3 separate occasions (nice, very short). Provost Ralph Wilcox at least 4 times (a bit stuffy). Former Chief of Staff Cindy Visot, etc. I’ve gone to football team fan days at Raymond James. Green&Gold Galas. Frat houses. Ironically, not that many USF home games. The significant other bought into Willie Taggart’s “Get on the bus” campaign and got season tickets his first season. After that McNeese State game he never wanted to go back. Small miracles. In any case, I’m around USF a lot. I watch their games because the significant other doesn’t want to put in the effort but wants to generally stay abreast of their situation. But I was a UCF alum first, and that’s the perspective I keep when I’m being inundated with USF crap.

And from all that USF crap, I’ve realized a very simple truth about USF:

USF is a cipher. A fraud. A program built on nothing and representing nothing. A program, administration and fanbase that was handed the world on a silver platter for doing nothing, immediately believed they deserved it, and proceeded to do nothing with it.

There's an old fable about the Ant and the Grasshopper that I think illustrates the situation pretty well. Bear with me. It goes something like this:

Quote: During the Summer, the air was warm and the Sun bright. Food was plentiful and all was well. The Grasshopper, pleased with his condition, spent all day and all night singing and making music. He was well-fed, he ate whatever was put in front of him without a second thought. He was larger than the other insects, could run faster, jump further and fly higher than anyone else. He was well-stationed in life, without a care in the world.

The lowly Ant meanwhile toiled endlessly, night and day. He was small and low. He could not jump, he could not run, nor fly. But he was tireless and efficient. He spent almost all of his time gathering food. When not gathering food, he spent time expanding his nest ever deeper with more passages to store his food.

One day, the Grasshopper came upon the Ant. "Why do you waste your time gathering food all day, lowly Ant, when there is plenty of food about?"

The Ant, too busy to stop for long, simply replied "To live. If you want, you can join me and we can gather food together."

"To live?!?" exclaimed the Grasshopper, mockingly, "To live to do what? Gather food? Build nests? To crawl and scavenge and toil? That's no life. You're wasting your time! You'll never jump nor run nor fly! I live! Why should I lower myself help you! There's no benefit to helping an Ant! My life means more than yours, poor Ant, for I am better at living! See what I can do! You are limited by your size and shape, you can never partake in my fun, and I shall demean myself with your work!"

The Grasshopper began to make music and sing, having a merry time, and soon left the Ant alone. The Ant shrugged and went back to work.

The days went on, and soon began to get shorter. The nights began to get longer, the seasons began to change and it was now Fall. The leaves turned brown and fell off the trees. The crops in the fields slowly withered. Soon, there was no food to be found.

The Grasshopper looked up from his merriment. The landscape had changed when he wasn't looking. Bewildered, he ran to the Ant's nest. Pounding upon the door, the Grasshopper begged "Please, Ant, let me in! I'm starved and have no food! I'm cold and have no shelter! Please give me something to eat and a place to keep warm!" The Ant opened the door and asked, "Haven't you stored anything away for the upcoming Winter, didn't you build a nest? What were you doing all Summer?" "I didn't have time to store food or build a nest during the Summer. I was so busy singing and dancing that I forgot!" cried the Grasshopper; "Before I knew it, Summer was gone."

"Singing and making music, were you?" said the Ant "Very well! Now dance!" and he slammed the door in the Grasshopper's face.

Winter came. The Grasshopper starved and froze to death. It doesn’t matter which came first. The Ant sustained himself off his prior hard work and lived to see Spring.

Now, this is a very long-winded analogy, admittedly, but I really want to drive the point home. If it wasn’t obvious, UCF is the Ant, tirelessly building itself up. Slowly, steadily. Building its modest facilities. Putting away wins and national recognition. Accruing a fanbase. All for the goal of working its way up the ladder.

USF is the Grasshopper. Vain and lazy. Taking the advantages handed to them and totally wasting them. Looking down upon UCF for being supposedly inferior. Holding UCF in disdain for even suggesting they could work together or be on the same level. Mocking UCF's planning and building. All the while wasting their superior position and accomplishing nothing in the process. Building nothing. Not getting ready for when the hard times, the last rounds of conference realignment, came. Its not a perfect analogy, but you get the drift.

Now you, as a neutral fan or younger fan, may not understand the bad blood here. Let’s break things down between USF and UCF. We’ll start at the beginning…

PART 2

USF and UCF started out on roughly equal footing. UCF started playing football in Div-1 I-AA (now FCS) in 1990 after more than a decade in Divisions II & III and began play in I-A (FBS) football as an Independent in 1996. USF’s program began when they joined I-AA in 1997 and I-A as an Independent in 2001. UCF joined the MAC in 2002. USF joined C-USA in 2003.

The reasons USF got the Big East invite in 2003 over UCF are a bit arcane. Specifics can be found in this Orlando Sentinel article. Basically, before Boston College left the Big East for the ACC, the Big East was looking for another football-only member, as BC was blocking the conference from adding more all-sports teams. In July of 2003, USF and UCF were on list of teams to consider. UCF was listed as "recommend/consider". And USF was listed under "Dismiss".

But then BC accepted an invite to the ACC and the Big East needed a full member. In October, they chose USF because their non-football programs (i.e., basketball) were more developed than UCF's, with better facilities. And at the time, it was absolutely the case. USF's Sun Dome could seat 10k and was recently renovated in 2000. UCF Arena, built in 1991, could only seat 5k and was rather pathetic in comparison. That's it. If not for a basketball arena, the 2 schools were a coin-flip. And off to the races we go.

USF moved up the BCS auto-bid Big East in 2005, UCF took their spot in C-USA. UCF & USF had previously agreed to a home-and-home football series set for '05/'06 back when they were in the MAC and C-USA, respectively. This series was extended 2 years through 2008 by an agreement USF made with C-USA as part of their leaving the conference. But USF didn’t want to extend past that. They had moved past UCF. They were out of our league. They were aiming higher. USF’s coach Jim Leavitt said so every time he was asked about it. They wanted to make themselves part of the “Big Four” of Florida college football, and even put up billboards about it. To put it lightly, USF’s move to the Big East caused their administration and fans to grow huge egos without actually accomplishing much first.

Adding insult to injury, USF ran up the score in the 2007 game, 64-12, during what was to that point UCF’s most successful season. By the time the series ended, UCF was 0-4. And USF fans never passed up an opportunity to let us know it. The abuse was endless online. UCF’s futility, many near-misses and fan’s insistence that if given the chance UCF could be a juggernaut earned us the nickname “UCiF”. That same year, after the 64-12 drubbing of UCF, in part to the mass-chaos of 2007, USF rocketed all the way to #2 in the AP Poll. The sky was the limit for them, and they were at the peak of their program’s history. It was all downhill from there. But more on that later.

In the meantime, UCF quickly learned its lessons from the 2003-2005 round of conference realignment and set-out to upgrade its facilities once they entered C-USA. The football operations center built in 2003. The indoor practice facility built in 2005, the first in the state. The on-campus stadium and new arena in 2007. And Bulls fans endlessly teased and mocked how barebones the and cheap they all appeared to be. The IPF looked like a dairy barn. The stadium was an “erector set” that lacked water fountains at opening, the stands bounced, and there was a lack of seatbacks or cup-holders like they had at the Bucs’ Raymond James Stadium. The general consensus among USF admins and fans was (and until VERY recently continued to be) against the idea of building an on-campus stadium. Why build inferior facilities when what we have is perfectly fine? Recruits love the NFL stadium! Plus, UCF took out $100+ million in bonds to finance all the construction. Shady dealings! Underhanded methods! Etc. We were doing things “the wrong way” to their tastes. We were cutting corners and building a subpar product and certainly shouldn’t be taken seriously, much less be emulated. If they were going to build facilities, they’d do it “the right way”. That “right way” refrain has continually been tossed around by the admin and fans for 15 years. Suffice to say, the right way seems to be incredibly slow-going.

Behind the scenes, the administration at USF was scared. The Big East had 8 football-playing members, leaving them short for round-robin scheduling and more importantly easily knocked off balance if they were ever raided. A 9th member was needed. UCF was clearly the best choice. But USF’s President, Judy Genshaft, spent years blocking the school from getting in. Rumors floated around that Judy’s preferred solution was having FCS Villanova upgrade to FBS level, rather than add UCF. Finally, in November 2010, the Big East invited TCU. Genshaft got her wish, but In May 2011, ESPN offered the Big East 1.4 billion over 9 years on the contingency that they add UCF in addition to TCU, in order to further increase the league’s stock of games. They turned it down, many blaming Genshaft for the move. We’ll let Brett McMurphy’s reporting from several years ago speak for itself:

Quote:"At that point when the Big East was intact, the only school the Big East could have legitimately added that made sense was UCF," an industry source said. "Maryland and Boston College? They wouldn't even return the Big East's calls. But the Big East couldn't add UCF because [South Florida president] Judy Genshaft kept shooting down UCF."

Genshaft's continuing insistence to block UCF from the league was a huge contributing factor which ultimately led to the league's current instability, a league source said. That's because in April of 2011, with TCU on board, Marinatto and the league negotiated a nine-year deal worth $1.4 billion for its new media rights deal. Marinatto recommended to his presidents that they accept the offer and they promptly voted against it.

"I think that was the stupidest decision ever made [to turn it down] in college athletics," a league source said. "To have the equity of ESPN as your brand and the stability that would have gone with it."

Five months after the league's presidents turned down $1.4 billion on the night of Sept. 16, 2011, I (McMurphy) reported that Syracuse and Pittsburgh were leaving the Big East for the ACC.

"If the TV deal was accepted and UCF had been added [as a 10th football member], who knows if Pitt and Syracuse ever leave," an industry source said.

"Everyone left because of stability and right there was your stability with that TV deal."

PART 3

McMurphy was even more blunt in a recent interview:

Quote: “Karma,” McMurphy said, “is a *****.”

McMurphy is now a national college football reporter for the Action Network, but spent much of his career as the USF beat writer for the Tampa Tribune. McMurphy covered the Bulls and the Big East and his reporting on conference realignment gained him national recognition. He reported then and reiterates now that Genshaft was instrumental in keeping the Knights out of the Big East.

“At one time, you could make an argument that Big East was actually as good as the ACC,” McMurphy explains. “Well, it would come up at the conference meetings that they should add UCF (and others) to try to grow the league. UCF was starting to gain its footing and was an up-and-coming program in a big TV market. Every time the subject of UCF would come up in those meetings, Judy Genshaft would basically shoot it down. How do I know that? Because every AD in the league told me that while it was happening and former commissioner John Marinatto told me after the fact.

“The way it worked was that if one league member had an issue with adding another program, everybody else in the league respected that decision and they moved on. It sounds asinine, but that’s how it worked. Finally, the Big East started losing so many teams — Pitt, Syracuse, West Virginia — that they became desperate. That’s when they were pretty much forced to invite UCF despite what USF’s wishes were.”

Even as late as Sept 28th of that year, Genshaft was resisting calls to add UCF. From ESPN:

Quote:So what exactly is the plan to keep this league intact? Would you believe it includes staying out of areas where the Big East already has a team? USF president Judy Genshaft said Tuesday during a legislative meeting on her campus that the Big East wants to look outside footprint areas when asked specifically whether she was blocking UCF from the league. "I am not stopping any university from coming in," Genshaft said, according to The St. Petersburg Times. "What is happening is the league, or the conference, now is looking at schools and they have looked very much at schools that are not in any of the states that are represented by the Big East schools right now. The ones that they're looking at right now, they do not sit in any state that the Big East schools currently are in." If Genshaft is right, this plan makes absolutely no sense. The Big East needs to add quality institutions at this point that bring value to a future television contract. Why would it just eliminate schools from contention because they are in a state that already has a Big East school? Look across the other AQ conferences -- yes, every single one of them has multiple schools from the same state. In the case of UCF and Houston, for example, those two cities are separate markets from Tampa (USF) and Fort Worth (TCU). Simply put, they might be in the same state, but they certainly are not in the same cities. One other part of the article in the St. Petersburg Times struck me. The newspaper asked Genshaft after the session whether she supports UCF entering the Big East. Her reply: "That isn't the question now."

On October 6, TCU left for the Big 12, 2 weeks later WVU joined them. By early December, The Big East finally added UCF along with a cadre of other much-needed schools to backfill their losses. The Big East became a basketball-only league and the American Athletic Conference was formed, much diminished in its present iteration. UCF started play in the AAC in 2013, the last year it had a BCS auto-bid.

But let’s pause to look at what UCF and USF had each done since that first round of realignment in 2005. UCF won the East division in C-USA in 2005, 2007, 2010 & 2012 and the conference title in ‘07 & ‘10. They finished the season ranked #21 in 2010. UCF built the aforementioned IPF, stadium and arena in that time.

USF…got to #2 for a week in 2007. Immediately after that beatdown of UCF they lost 3 weeks in a row to Rutgers, UConn and Cincinnati and finished the season unranked. They’re the only team ever to get to #2 to do so. They never finished a season in the Big East higher than tied for third. Then their coach, Jim Leavitt, got fired for slapping a player and lying about it. Then they fired their next coach, Skip Holtz, because he’s a lazy idiot (and still is). USF built no new football facilities during their tenure in the Big East. They had no dedicated football center and no indoor practice facility (they still don’t have either). They did a major renovation of the Sun Dome and built a soccer stadium, that’s about it.

With UCF now in the same conference, Judy Genshaft’s worst fears came true: UCF immediately surpassed USF.

Its easy to pinpoint the exact day it happened: January 1, 2014. UCF, having won the AAC their first season, beat Baylor in the Fiesta Bowl. USF won the Capital One Mascot Challenge and held a celebratory press conference complete with confetti and big fake check. No one from Capital One was in attendance.

McMurphy agrees:

Quote: “Jan. 1, 2014 is the day that UCF beat Baylor in the Fiesta Bowl and you know what USF did on that same day? I kid you not, USF called a press conference to announce that the school mascot — Rocky the Bull — had won an on-line contest and had been named mascot of the year. Judy Genshaft actually required the football coach (Willie Taggart) and all of the other coaches in the athletic department to be at the mascot press conference. Approximately, eight hours later UCF beats Baylor to win its first major bowl game.

“That sums up when UCF officially bypassed USF — and there’s been no looking back.”

In less than 7 years since USF’s peak, the 2 teams had switched places. But we’re not done yet.

A humble administration would’ve seen where things had gone wrong and tried to right the ship for the inevitable next round of conference realignment, but not USF. They doubled down on where they thought their strength compared to UCF was, academics, and continued to neglect athletics. Willie Taggart finally got the team to a better place after 4 years thanks to a good QB and then immediately left to fleece Oregon and FSU. USF responded by hiring Texas re-tread Charlie Strong, partly based on name and partly based on the fact Texas would be paying most of his salary for the first 2 years. In his first year, he got the Bulls to 10 wins thanks again to great QB play from Quinton Flowers. Then Flowers graduated and Charlie Strong tanked the program, as he is wont to do. They still haven’t recovered.

All while this is happening, the Big 12 makes it known in 2016 that they’re looking to expand and holds “try-outs” for potential members. Its widely reported that UCF & USF are considered a package deal in any potential move. USF once again emphasized academics and held a massive fundraising drive to increase its endowment and improve academics. They increased their endowment to nearly a billion dollars and gained “preeminent” status among state schools. Exactly no one cares about either besides people at USF. UCF announced an increase in athletics spending and a round of renovations and additions to its athletic facilities. These include new club seating and new scoreboard in the stadium, a new nutrition center, a renovation of the football operation center, a new academics center for athletics, an expanded baseball stadium, etc. UCF planned or spent somewhere north of $70 million on athletic facilities from 2010 to present.

USF did the absolute bare minimum in regards to athletics and announced a feasibility study for an on campus stadium in August 2017. It proposed a $200 million https://www.wfla.com/wp-content/uploads/...jpg?w=1280 No metal bench-seating for these Bulls. No “erector set” for them, no sir. They were going to build something they KNEW they deserved. They’ve earned it! USF’s Board of Trustees President recently trotted out the old stadium rendering out of desperation. Nothing concrete has been announced.

In actual tangible progress, USF finally, FINALLY announced in late 2017 that they were going to raise private donor funds for a https://gousfbulls.com/images/2019/3/1/a...obile.jpg. Again, they were going to do things the RIGHT WAY. No half-steps for these Bulls. Their facilities need to be head and shoulder above UCF; after all, they’re naturally better than them. It was announced to be built in 2018. And then 2019. And then 2020. They’re finally breaking ground this week after raising a paltry $22-25 million in 4 years. Fundraising was exceptionally slow-going. It was reported in October 2019 they’d raised $21 million to that point. Recent reporting indicates they were still somehow $5 million short of starting construction as of late August before they finally got the final boost. Final cost: somewhere between $22.5-25 million. USF was finally forced to pull the trigger on a scaled back version of their plans that only include the IPF and a renovation of their current locker rooms. In new renderings for the downgraded IPF, https://www.wfla.com/wp-content/uploads/...-PHOTO.jpg

PART 4

But its far, far too late. The bell has tolled. The Big 12 is inviting UCF and USF is not coming with us. So much for that package deal. USF spent 8 years by itself in a BCS conference, with all the money, power and exposure that entailed. And they did nothing with it. It spend the next 8 years trying to get into the AAU instead of the Big 12. And now, they’re doomed. Even if the Big 12 expands again down the road, there are more attractive candidates like Memphis, Boise State and SMU available. And who knows, maybe all of USF’s intangibles (because there’s nothing tangible to boast of) will fool the Big 12 into adding them. But UCF won’t be blocking them. We know there’s nothing to be threatened by.

USF lost 45-0 to NC State to open the season, the third season in a row they’ve been shut out in the opening game. Second-year coach Jeff Scott looks in over his head (who would’ve guessed a co-offensive coordinator with no head coaching experience may not have been the best choice?) They may not win against an FBS team again this year. They’re averaging about 15k-20k fans per game (the UF game this year should provide a boost, but the majority of the stadium will be wearing orange) and falling every year. They currently have no President after the previous one quit suddenly after 2 years. And now they’re stuck playing in a decimated AAC that they’ll still probably never win. With whatever much smaller amount of money ESPN pays the remainder of the conference.

USF will soon be the only school to go from an AQ BCS conference to being left outside of the P5 besides UConn. And UConn had the good sense to take themselves out of contention to play serious football and will probably drop down to FCS again within the next decade. Might not be a bad plan for the Bulls, too. *Note: The original author forgot Temple.

USF is a failure of monumental proportions. One that may never be equaled in college football. The program is in dire straights as far as on-field success and fan support go. It probably won’t ever fully recover. But don’t worry, remaining USF fans. At least you’ll have plenty of seatbacks and cup-holders to keep you comfortable. After all, you’ve earned it.

Anyone else feel a chill? A change of seasons is here, USF fans. And I’ll give you a prediction: Its gonna be cold. Its gonna be gray. And its gonna last you the rest of your life.

Winter is coming, Grasshoppers. Start dancing.