There's lots of football talent in SD County-especially QB talent for some reason.

(04-17-2017 10:35 AM)nzmorange Wrote:  1. Who chooses a school based on its research numbers?

Anyone who is serious about research, obviously.

(04-17-2017 10:35 AM)nzmorange Wrote:  Minnesota is absolutely not a better overall school than any ivy, nor is it better than Vanderbilt.

Well I'm sure you'll tune your personal definition for "overall school" such that it makes your statement true.

But in terms of research, Minnesota absolutely is better than Vanderbilt and some of the Ivy's.

(04-17-2017 10:35 AM)nzmorange Wrote:  ASU, Arizona, Utah, Oregon, Oregon State, Colorado, and WSU are not elite academic institutions by any reasonable stretch of the imagination

Again, you'll tune your personal definition of "academic" to make that statement true.

If you strike out Oregon, Oregon State, and Washington State, then the remaining absolutely are outstanding research universities.

(04-17-2017 10:35 AM)nzmorange Wrote:  3. USNWR disagrees w/ your comment about SDSU

USNWR is meaningless, other than it's a huge views/clicks/ratings getter for USNWR, so they're going to continue to cater it so as to keep its popularity as high as it can be for high school students and their families that don't know any better.

(04-17-2017 10:35 AM)jrj84105 Wrote:  There's lots of football talent in SD County-especially QB talent for some reason.

I can believe it, just wasn't sure.

Enough talent to warrant Texas and current PAC schools desiring to make a trip to SD every other year or so?

(04-17-2017 09:03 AM)billybobby777 Wrote:  

(04-17-2017 08:39 AM)nzmorange Wrote:  

(04-16-2017 11:01 PM)jrj84105 Wrote:  

(04-16-2017 10:15 PM)nzmorange Wrote:  My point is that the top 5 schools in the PAC are fantastic. The bottom 7 aren't. I honestly don't know a lot about either SDSU or UCSD, but I'd be amazed if either had ceilings tangibly below the PAC median.

Prepare to be amazed then I guess.

By what meaningful metric is SDSU materially worse than OSU as is?

I know we're talking ceilings, but I have a hard time believing that a school that's already roughly at par w/ the bottom of the PAC isn't within striking distance of the middle.

Oregon St may be the lowest ranked school in the PAC, but they are still a state land grant research school. They are a big state school second to only Oregon in their state, and did more research than AAU member Oregon in 2016. San Diego St is not an R1. They are not an elite private school. They are a city state commuter school that isn't even within stricking distance of their MWC mates Colorado St, Hawaii and New Mexico, all three big state flagship research universities, classified R1 by Carnegie.
SDSU has good athletics and is located in a good market, but I'd bet anyone that they won't be in PAC 12 in the next 50 years. Their website says that their "one of the nations premier urban research universities." No they aren't. They are R2.

To clarify, I don't see them joining the PAC unless the turn into Miami of the 80's, or something else major happens.

I just don't think that it would be rejected because of research, and I'd be surprised if it was rejected because of academics (esp compared to the other options)

Fan following, athletic prestige/competitive teams, and a risk of over crowing Southern California (from the Cali 4's perspective) are the main forces that I think keep SDSU out of the PAC-12.

Those indeed are most of the main forces. The other main force is that its not a major research university, at least at the level of Utah and Colorado.

(04-17-2017 11:06 AM)MplsBison Wrote:  Those indeed are most of the main forces. The other main force is that its not a major research university, at least at the level of Utah and Colorado.

Why? What benefit does UCLA get from Colorado's research?

Maybe the importance of research is a sore spot because Syracuse left the AAU due to lack of research, but it is absolutely a top- if not the top- consideration for getting university president buy-in. The B1G, PAC, and SEC all moved proactively last round taking Maryland, Rutgers, Missouri, A&M, Colorado, Utah, and Nebraska. Nebraska is the only one of that group who got a flyer on research, and they came paired with two top 50 research schools.

Louisville moved up despite academic concerns as the ACC backfilled. So I guess, if SDSU had Louisville level athletic success and the PAC were raided resulting in a backfill scenario, than SDSU would have a chance similar to Louisville.

Nebraska came before Maryland and Rutgers. It was a stupid expansion ... the Big Ten was sold a bill of goods of rotten produce, essentially.

They learned their lesson.

(04-17-2017 11:08 AM)nzmorange Wrote:  What benefit does UCLA get from Colorado's research?

That's really not the point.

The point is to associate with like status peers.

Easy to imagine the ADs demanding SoCal access. But the university presidents? To the point that they would blackball the University of Texas?

And Texas already sits on a goldmine of talent. I'd wager that the CA schools covet TX talent far more than the TX schools covet CA talent.

Texahoma-PAC marriage just doesn't make sense to me, as anything other than a last resort.

The geography of the United States is what it is. There needs to be a P conf in the west, for true western schools, and there needs to be a P conf in the central part of the continent, for those schools.

(04-17-2017 11:14 AM)ManleyPointer Wrote:  Easy to imagine the ADs demanding SoCal access. But the university presidents? To the point that they would blackball the University of Texas?

And Texas already sits on a goldmine of talent. I'd wager that the CA schools covet TX talent far more than the TX schools covet CA talent.

Athletics are revenue-neutral university advertising. That is why university presidents put up with all the problems and headaches they cause.

Where do AZ, ASU, Utah, CU, UW, and UO get top out-of-state tuition paying students? (Hint-Colorado is almost another CU campus). Also, a large portion of the alumni base (read donors) for these schools are in California. That's why university presidents want a strong presence in California.

PAC schools can never monopolize Texas talent to the extent they can retain a large share of CA talent, so CA talent will always be more important.

The University of Texas is the biggest athletic department in the country and a top academic institution. But from an academic perspective, it's still little brother to Cal, Stanford, UCLA, and even UCSD. UT isn't even on the same level as UW. UT athletics may be enough to carry a bunch of tag-alongs in the eyes of ADs/Scott, but that wouldn't pass muster with the presidents.

(04-17-2017 11:08 AM)jrj84105 Wrote:  Maybe the importance of research is a sore spot because Syracuse left the AAU due to lack of research, but it is absolutely a top- if not the top- consideration for getting university president buy-in. The B1G, PAC, and SEC all moved proactively last round taking Maryland, Rutgers, Missouri, A&M, Colorado, Utah, and Nebraska. Nebraska is the only one of that group who got a flyer on research, and they came paired with two top 50 research schools.

Louisville moved up despite academic concerns as the ACC backfilled. So I guess, if SDSU had Louisville level athletic success and the PAC were raided resulting in a backfill scenario, than SDSU would have a chance similar to Louisville.

I was wondering if Syracuse leaving the AAU a few years back had anything to do with him minimizing research importance to universities too. So to be fair, Orange? Is there a "sport spot" because Syracuse left the AAU? It's difficult to ask that without coming across as a jerk, I hope you don't think that's what I'm being. I happen to think Research is a gigantic factor the more I learn about the inter workings of colleges and their "reputations" for lack of a better way of putting it.

(04-17-2017 11:33 AM)jrj84105 Wrote:  The University of Texas is the biggest athletic department in the country and a top academic institution. But from an academic perspective, it's still little brother to Cal, Stanford, UCLA, and even UCSD. UT isn't even on the same level as UW. UT athletics may be enough to carry a bunch of tag-alongs in the eyes of ADs/Scott, but that wouldn't pass muster with the presidents.

Texas (Austin) is still top 30 in research, and one of the few in the top 30 that doesn't get the largest portion of its federal funding from health science research grants.

The U of TX system has six medical institutions that are separate from its universities, like Galveston and MD Anderson. That takes out some research from Austin, as well.

UT is huge, but it's still not Cal or Stanford, and in that respect it can't just bring along whomever it chooses. Every time I see TCU mentioned in a PAC18, it reminds me how little people appreciate the relative standing of research institutions. TCU's research is more non-existent than UCSD's athletics. The amount of investment it takes to go from nothing to something in athletics (take Boise State) is far less than the amount of investment required to move up in the research world.

(04-17-2017 02:19 PM)jrj84105 Wrote:  UT is huge, but it's still not Cal or Stanford, and in that respect it can't just bring along whomever it chooses. Every time I see TCU mentioned in a PAC18, it reminds me how little people appreciate the relative standing of research institutions. TCU's research is more non-existent than UCSD's athletics. The amount of investment it takes to go from nothing to something in athletics (take Boise State) is far less than the amount of investment required to move up in the research world.

DavidSt has said Boise St is on their way to the AAU! Multiple times.
(Boise is R3, and one of the lowest rated research universities in FBS.)

Lest we rag on Boise too much, they did 31M in research last year. Other FBS schools with lower research:
SMU 29
ECU 27
Tulsa 25
Baylor 25
LaTech 24
FAU 21
Marshall 20
W Mich 20
NIU 18
Miami 16
C Mich 13
Ball St 11
FresnoSt 9
Ark St 8
BwlGrn 8
TCU 8

(04-17-2017 04:15 PM)jrj84105 Wrote:  Lest we rag on Boise too much, they did 31M in research last year. Other FBS schools with lower research:
SMU 29
ECU 27
Tulsa 25
Baylor 25
LaTech 24
FAU 21
Marshall 20
W Mich 20
NIU 18
Miami 16
C Mich 13
Ball St 11
FresnoSt 9
Ark St 8
BwlGrn 8
TCU 8

They did double Miami. That's good. Boise and Miami remind me of each other.

(04-17-2017 04:15 PM)jrj84105 Wrote:  Lest we rag on Boise too much, they did 31M in research last year. Other FBS schools with lower research:
SMU 29
ECU 27
Tulsa 25
Baylor 25
LaTech 24
FAU 21
Marshall 20
W Mich 20
NIU 18
Miami 16
C Mich 13
Ball St 11
FresnoSt 9
Ark St 8
BwlGrn 8
TCU 8

TCU did a whopping 8 mil? Hahaha...good for last place in FBS. And yes, I see that Boise edged ECU in this category.

(04-17-2017 11:08 AM)jrj84105 Wrote:  Maybe the importance of research is a sore spot because Syracuse left the AAU due to lack of research, but it is absolutely a top- if not the top- consideration for getting university president buy-in. The B1G, PAC, and SEC all moved proactively last round taking Maryland, Rutgers, Missouri, A&M, Colorado, Utah, and Nebraska. Nebraska is the only one of that group who got a flyer on research, and they came paired with two top 50 research schools.

Louisville moved up despite academic concerns as the ACC backfilled. So I guess, if SDSU had Louisville level athletic success and the PAC were raided resulting in a backfill scenario, than SDSU would have a chance similar to Louisville.

Come up w/ an argument against me instead of taking personal shots.

I've asked multiple times why research matters if it has no apparent impact on research at other schools in the conference. I'd understand it if being in the same conference w/ a research juggernaught had a positive impact on research funding, but it doesn't. And so far, the only response that I've heard that even tried to answer that question is "because schools like fitting in." Not only is that a bizarre concept, but I doubt that there's a causal relationship between research funding and one school seeing another as a peer. I'd explore that concept further, but I can't open the web sites that explains who sees who as a peer on a phone.

My theory is that schools are managed to hit their KPI's, which are based in factors that impact the school's bottom line, alumni engagement, quality of education, research output (mostly for public schools), and ability to attract top tier students. Vague notions of belonging in smoke-filled rooms don't fit in those KPI's.

And for the record, I am a Syracuse fan, but I went to PSU, which is a CIC school and an AAU school, and it probably has a better research/ARWU ranking than it's USNWR ranking. Now rather than my resume, let's discuss the actual issue.