(05-12-2021 03:35 PM)Ourland Wrote:  It's also important to remember that we're in a delimma here. We want a better conference, but a better conference doesn't want us. We'll have to make the best of a bad situation. Creating a regional conference does that.

The biggest challenge here is that we don't control the other schools, nor do we have a conference to invite them to, not to mention a reason to join us.

Creating a regional conference with the schools you've mentioned doesn't attract 'better' players, nor does it generate meaningfully more money. I'm not against it in concept and have proposed similar, but this without adding the tougher schools (and the big money that they offer/produce) isn't enough.

We're already essentially IN the conference you propose... with UTSA, UNT, La Tech, USM... UAB instead of Ark State and you have CUSA West. Eliminate the cross-over game and we can schedule Tx St OOC (or have another date possibility for UT or OU). That seems an easy thing to do and something many other conference schools would probably agree with. Allow CUSA schools to schedule their own crossover as they choose and NOT have it count towards the conference rankings.

Make a list of every school that would pay us to go there... or would go to Reliant and we get paid, or come here and bring 15,000+. If they don't fit that bill, they aren't on the schedule except as a last resort. Set a goal of say, $3mm in expected OOC paydays (either actual payments or increased 'gate')

I mean seriously... ONE home game (as opposed to an unattended conference cross-over) is potentially worth more than what the conference pays us for the whole season. Let that sink in for a minute.

Do that enough and the players will come, the wins will come, the money will come and the fans will come.

The thing is, if you put something like this together, you MIGHT be able to convince the administration to 'front' some of it to smooth the cashflow.