The southern Conference apparently never voted to kick ETSU out, ETSU left. WOW! WOW! WOW!

http://www.tricities.com/tristate/tri/ne...-0010.html

That's a cop out by Stanton, plain and simple.

A poster broke the story of ETSU dropping football on the old soconhoops.com board.

It wasn't "days" before the speech was to be given, but rather a few weeks. And to announce football's demise as an "oh, by the way" thing in a year end "state of the university" speech shows Stanton's lack of understanding of the situation.

Do you honestly think that if, say, the medical school was going to be dropped they could keep it under their hats for two weeks? And that it would be appropriate to announce the departure that way?

So many additional questions now come to the surface, such as-

If you were going to cut football at the end of the 2003 season, why did you give Paul Hamilton an extension for 2004 a month before?

Why were assistant coaches leaving left and right prior to the announcement? Their departures coincided when Mullins took over as interim AD, including one coach leaving to a HIGH SCHOOL?

Paul Hamilton has stated he asked for "one more year" when the annoucement was made. Does this mean that Hamilton was lying- or was football to be dropped immediately and no 2003 season was to be played originally?

Personally, I find Stanton's earlier comment that he was always behind football to be disingenous. So what if he goes to games? It is akin to a guy who cheats on his wife and spreads rumors about other people saying "I'm a good Christian. I always go to Sunday service!"

Ultimately, Stanton's the guy who dropped the program and passed the buck on the sport's revival to the students instead of making the decision himself. He cannot go blameless.

As far as taking money from academic programs to keep football afloat, this also shows a lack of understanding. Why not take money from the athletic budget for football, like every other college in America would have?

For example, Pitt had to make some sacrifices to keep their football team at a BCS level themselves. For the Panthers, it ultimately led to de-emphasizing tennis and making some other sports- such as baseball- operate with less than a full allotment of scholarships.

You can tell the golf and tennis teams that it is unfair to allow them to have these extraordinary budgets and to bring in players from overseas when football has to suffer as a result. You can hold Fred Warren to the fire and demand more than just an Top 20 finish when you allow golf to get a $2 million tennis facility as you're crying poor to other sports- namely asking the team to compete for a National Championship instead of a mere Top 20 ranking.

As far as I'm concerned, the golf team is not getting the proper return for the investment- especially when Lamar and Coastal Carolina can finish in a tie for third in the NCAA while ETSU has to be content with also-ran status despite having the best player in college golf.

I take exception to the idea that other sports are better off without football. The majority of sports are not better off in the A-Sun.

Okay- golf finished No. 16 in the country and tennis No. 51 (or whatever it was).

This is the benefit of dropping to the A-Sun and not having football?

It's not worth it.