(05-30-2020 08:00 AM)nj alum Wrote:  I have held off commenting long enough.

The thought of cutting any sport is stupid.

If the CAA costs too much, drop down to the ODAC.

Conference affiliation is the issue here, and the costs associated with same, not the costs of a sport. Administrative overhead is the issue here, not the costs of a sport.

Furthermore, each sport and their donor / alumni base need to be given a five year “heads up” .... become self sufficient or else.

The Mickey Matthews column in today’s RTD is spot on.

Several months later, I stand behind every word.

The Labor Day Massacre is stupid. The trotting out of former Presidents and former AD’s to give cover to this Massacre is akin to Colin Powell going to the United Nations, and talking about weapons of mass destruction.

The stain on W&M that started with the Shaver firing just got deeper and larger.

(05-30-2020 08:51 AM)nj alum Wrote:  What drives the cost of a sport? Scholarships.

Compare the scholarship money from the 70’s to the scholarship money today. You start there. Plenty of us competed for the school without scholarship money in the 70’s.

What drives the cost of a sport? Schedule.

I just found the home baseball schedule from 1979. 14 home games.

Whether you want to believe it or not, the funding of athletic scholarships inures to the benefit of the academic side as it helps sustain the outrageous tuition costs on a school-wide basis.

The “fringe” sports, IMO, are the heart and soul of W&M athletics, and to a good extent, the school as a whole.

You cut a sport, you cut the College off from the type of people that that sport attracts.

This is a demographics issue, as well as a financial one.

Several months later, I stand behind every word.

Furthermore, we just went through a $1 billion dollar campaign ... not a whiff in that campaign about the need for sustainability and the cutting of seven sports. We just went through One Tribe One Day ... same thing.

Not only is this stupid, there is now a trust issue. How can the current Administration be trusted on anything?

We are no longer One Tribe One Family ... only certain family members get to stay in the current version of the Tribe.

(09-04-2020 05:36 AM)nj alum Wrote:  [quote='nj alum' pid='16839897' dateline='1590846711']
We are no longer One Tribe One Family ... only certain family members get to stay in the current version of the Tribe.

Welcome to the caste system of college sports.
Welcome to "the bare minimum" - 16 is the minimum? Ok, we'll have 16.

Reading through the doublespeak here from your administration regarding the Tribe 2025 is unnerving. ODU dropped wrestling, not a single alum was contacted in regards to bringing in the funds. They sold off the practice mats via auction within the same month and the competition mat is up for bid right now.

They even mailed back the All-American and Elite 89 awards to the alumni is left over basketball jersey boxes and they shattered in transit. I hope the admins there treat the past alumni of these sports better than ODU did its wrestling legacy.

Reading through this thread with great interest. College sports budgets h Geave been spiraling out of control for awhile. Student fees have born the brunt of those costs. There was also the huge "realignment" that took VCU, ODU and George Mason into far flung conferences and brought about the expansion of the CAA to even further distances and removed some of the closer schools. Covid19 has revealed the cracks in that system that were already there.

What should happen, but won't, is for every conference to remove the financial barriers to enter and exit so a new realignement can happen for the benefit of every school. The savings could solve the cost problems that are now bringing about schools cutting sports. Not sure how to pressure schools and conferences to do this, but it is the actual solution to the problem. The Power five can afford these crazy conferences, but everyone else would love a change.