(10-23-2020 10:39 AM)Fighting Muskie Wrote: I’m a football fan first and foremost but I have to wonder what programs like UMass, UConn, and URI could achieve if they dropped football and diverted those investments towards basketball?
Name ANY school that has dropped football in the past 30 years that has reaped any meaningful and sustained success in basketball. Here's a list.
Long Beach St. 1991
UC-Santa Barbara, 1991
Fullerton St., 1992
Santa Clara, 1992
Pacific, 1995
Boston U, 1997
Evansville, 1997
Northridge St., 2001
Fairfield, 2002
St. John's, 2002
Siena, 2003
St. Peter's, 2006
LaSalle, 2007
Iona, 2008
Hofstra, 2009
Northeastern, 2009
(10-24-2020 11:43 AM)Steve1981 Wrote: DFW-HOYA never going back to fcs and should never had chose 1AA over 1A. Once that decision was made, Dick MacPherson left UMass. At the time the temporary seating had the stadium at 20k and was playing Boston College on campus.
I was referring to VCU above, not UMass.
None of those schools had much of a basketball pedigree before to build upon.
(11-28-2020 06:22 PM)quo vadis Wrote: In four games so far, UMass has been outscored 161 - 12. And they have not been playing Clemson and Notre Dame.
But i salute them for playing.
The players wanted to play. As far as I’m concerned, playing four games and being beat down is going to provide more experience for the players and the coaches than not playing at all.
It’s not impossible to field good teams up in New England. We’ve seen that with BC, UConn, and UMass at the FCS level, where one could argue those teams were better than their FBS incarnations. Personally, I don’t think they should have canned Mark Whipple. A situation like that you will probably need a coach to build over years to firmly establish a consistent program.
(11-28-2020 09:33 PM)Fighting Muskie Wrote: If UMass were to move down would the America East schools consider spinning off to create a new FCS league:
Maine
New Hampshire
Albany
Stony Brook
Rhode Island*
UMass*
Monmouth*
Robert Morris*
No. Maine and UNH in particular have been playing Delaware, Villanova, W&M, Richmond, JMU, and Towson for decades at this point. Having UMass back would be nice. Trading rivals who are the cream of the FCS crop for Monmouth and Robert Morris is a downgrade. And the travel wouldn't even be much better.
(This post was last modified: 11-29-2020 12:20 AM by ccd494.)
(10-23-2020 08:18 AM)Eldonabe Wrote: What they really need is a couple more large schools to move their football up.
VCU, Rhody, Maine, Villanova, ODU, UConn, Umass - that is a decent start to a regional football conference. I am sure I am missing a couple obvious schools that would fit in there too. Hell, Maybe Army would be interested in FB only in that group - pipe dream, but it is a landing spot leaves them 3 or 4 slots for Navy and a few other high profile OOCs?
Throwing Maine onto that list is delusional.
In response to a message I received earlier from Steve - this would be a football-only alliance. That keeps everything else as is - Villanova (or Uconn for that matter) isn't moving basketball anywhere.
As for above, I am merely spit-balling here. If Maine had any aspirations of FBS, this set up makes too much sense. Plus there are others who would need to make the move up as well.
If people can put up the Dungeons and Dragons Fantasy Football pipedream posts here, I can play that game too
Maine has no FBS ambitions, no constituency (either among the less than 10,000 undergrads on campus or among the geographically isolated, graying local population), and no money for this. Complete non-starter.
Your probably right but they just got a 94 million dollar donation to athletics they have money.
(10-23-2020 11:42 AM)Steve1981 Wrote: Both CUSA and the MAC had inquires to UMass in 1998 regarding joining.
Source?
From 1995, regarding the formation of the yet unnamed Conference USA:
When UMass was mentioned as a possible 11th or 12th member in basketball and seventh or eighth member in football, one source close to the league's negotiations said, "That would make a good fit. I think there is interest in them, if they said they want to be a part of it. But if UMass wants to do something, they had better get things together. We're pretty far along in the process of putting things together." UMass athletic director Bob Marcum, who is here at the NCAA convention, said his focus remains the East. "If you look at that league, it goes from Houston to Cincinnati," said Marcum. "I'm not sure if that makes sense for us financially."
I knew there was a lot of buzz around UMass in the mid-90’s. Seems like getting into the mix then would have helped big time. Apparently, they even reached out to the ACC in 1994 with the potential of exposure in the Northeastern market.
Lesson-You have to move when there is an opportunity.
UConn should have moved in the 90s to the Big East when they had a chance. If so, they would probably be in the ACC now instead of Louisville. They were just too green when the ACC replaced Maryland (coupled with their lawsuits).
(10-23-2020 08:18 AM)Eldonabe Wrote: What they really need is a couple more large schools to move their football up.
VCU, Rhody, Maine, Villanova, ODU, UConn, Umass - that is a decent start to a regional football conference. I am sure I am missing a couple obvious schools that would fit in there too. Hell, Maybe Army would be interested in FB only in that group - pipe dream, but it is a landing spot leaves them 3 or 4 slots for Navy and a few other high profile OOCs?
Throwing Maine onto that list is delusional.
In response to a message I received earlier from Steve - this would be a football-only alliance. That keeps everything else as is - Villanova (or Uconn for that matter) isn't moving basketball anywhere.
As for above, I am merely spit-balling here. If Maine had any aspirations of FBS, this set up makes too much sense. Plus there are others who would need to make the move up as well.
If people can put up the Dungeons and Dragons Fantasy Football pipedream posts here, I can play that game too
Maine has no FBS ambitions, no constituency (either among the less than 10,000 undergrads on campus or among the geographically isolated, graying local population), and no money for this. Complete non-starter.
Your probably right but they just got a 94 million dollar donation to athletics they have money.
About $75M of that needs to go to facility upgrades just to get the existing programs to barely D-I level. This isn't "step up to the big leagues" money. It's "making up for not spending any money in the past 30 years" money.
When you let all your athletic facilities rot for multiple decades, this is the price tag to rebuild so you can compete with Quinnipiac and Northeastern and Vermont, not the FBS.
Also, this money is coming from the estate/foundation of the one major donor Maine has ever had, and there's a strong sense this is the last of it. Once it is gone, it is gone, and the athletic department will have to stand on its own two feet. An FBS program in Orono, Maine averaging less than your average MAC team cannot stand on its own two feet.
Here is a good opinion of where the program is and changes from Michael Traini of Fight Massachusetts - 247sports UMass site.
Quote:Regarding Bell himself, the man isn't getting fired. Anyone is well within their rights to think he should be, but he's not going anywhere right now. Even if this had been a COVID-free 12-game season where they won one or two games, he'd still be here because you can't fire him when you brought him in ostensibly to start the thing over from scratch. People will cite Molnar and yes, CM got fired after two years of bad results but it was because he was a terrible person who destroyed the program's culture on top of being a terrible coach. Bell has not shown us much in his two seasons so far and the jury remains out, but he has established a culture within the program that his players take seriously, particularly academically, and he is by all accounts a good person as well. The coaching frankly remains to be seen and 2021 is going to be critical for him and his staff but he's going to get the chance, especially because he is Bamford's hire.
Regarding the rest of the coaching staff, I'm hearing some changes are coming as soon as this coming week. Obviously they made the one move with Jackson in-season but that clearly is just the tip of the iceberg. They need to revamp a lot on the offensive side of the ball and I believe that there will be changes there. It's vitally important to show that they are committed to winning and actually turning this thing around and that this is not just a place where Bell can bring his friends to work for him (which IMO is how it appears it started out). This is my opinion only but I would not be shocked if there is pressure coming from the admin, much like with MBB, to make the moves because RB knows his **** is on the line here too. We're a decade into the FBS era and the program is no better than it was in year one. Middle of a rebuild or not, that cannot be considered acceptable.
I can't think of many things that would matter less to the future of UMass football than who the coaching staff are. No one can win there as presently constituted.
Really ccd494, we are a top 20 public research university with many top programs and #1 dining for 5 straight years. We have two other independent teams within a few hour bus ride with Army and UConn. We always play a P5 team and teams from the MAC, CUSA and Sunbelt. Two are known and former FCS championship game opponents, App State and Georgia Southern. The team facilities are very competitive and there have been stadium improvements in the last few years with new bathrooms, hospitality plaza, video and sound system upgrades etc.
(11-30-2020 12:39 PM)Steve1981 Wrote: Really ccd494, we are a top 20 public research university with many top programs and #1 dining for 5 straight years. We have two other independent teams within a few hour bus ride with Army and UConn. We always play a P5 team and teams from the MAC, CUSA and Sunbelt. Two are known and former FCS championship game opponents, App State and Georgia Southern. The team facilities are very competitive and there have been stadium improvements in the last few years with new bathrooms, hospitality plaza, video and sound system upgrades etc.
New bathrooms. Fantastic. It's still an FCS level facility. And not one of the 5-10 best FCS facilities.
You can list things like that for every single college and university in the country. Sure, UMass is a good school. So is UConn. So is the University of Ohio. So is Rutgers. And on and on.
Is UMass going to win any recruiting battles against any school other than UConn? And even if they beat UConn out for every recruit they want, does that get you beyond 2-10 or 3-9? What does it matter to a player if Army or UConn is nearby? Most FBS schools at the bottom of the division have 3-4 nearby conference opponents, who if you beat you can win your conference. UMass doesn't have that.
Kent State has been awful at football for decades, then they started losing their conference games by a little instead of a lot. Then they started winning some of those games. And now they are winning most of their conference games. UMass can't follow that path. If UMass reaches a point where it is good enough to start beating the low level FBS programs that it plays, those teams will just stop playing UMass (fellow independents aside). If UMass can actually beat Georgia Southern, Georgia Southern will just pay someone else to come in instead.
Also, what's so great about playing against Georgia Southern and App State on CBS Sports network? So your friends can google what that is and then watch you lose 41-0? That's a selling point? Pretty much every FBS team plays a P5. So does most of the FCS.
I see no path whatsoever for UMass football to rise to a level above "not embarrassing" in the next 10-15 years. I sincerely want to know what the plan is at UMass beyond:
1. Continue to play FBS football
2. ????
3. Profit?
Was referring to the Performance Center for the team. The stadium is being improved in increments. Having a full size practice facility is also important. The Performance Center is in the North end zone.
This is an old twitter video and my favorite as a fan is not shown, but is the terrace area for game viewing.
(11-30-2020 12:49 PM)ccd494 Wrote: You can list things like that for every single college and university in the country. Sure, UMass is a good school. So is UConn. So is the University of Ohio. So is Rutgers. And on and on.
Is UMass going to win any recruiting battles against any school other than UConn? And even if they beat UConn out for every recruit they want, does that get you beyond 2-10 or 3-9? What does it matter to a player if Army or UConn is nearby? Most FBS schools at the bottom of the division have 3-4 nearby conference opponents, who if you beat you can win your conference. UMass doesn't have that.
Kent State has been awful at football for decades, then they started losing their conference games by a little instead of a lot. Then they started winning some of those games. And now they are winning most of their conference games. UMass can't follow that path. If UMass reaches a point where it is good enough to start beating the low level FBS programs that it plays, those teams will just stop playing UMass (fellow independents aside). If UMass can actually beat Georgia Southern, Georgia Southern will just pay someone else to come in instead.
Also, what's so great about playing against Georgia Southern and App State on CBS Sports network? So your friends can google what that is and then watch you lose 41-0? That's a selling point? Pretty much every FBS team plays a P5. So does most of the FCS.
I see no path whatsoever for UMass football to rise to a level above "not embarrassing" in the next 10-15 years. I sincerely want to know what the plan is at UMass beyond:
1. Continue to play FBS football
2. ????
3. Profit?
ccd494, we have beat both Georgia Southern and App State at home since going FBS. Our current recruiting class is #98 at the moment. The goal of FBS was not to generate a profit, but to loss less money than fcs, which has been done.
(This post was last modified: 11-30-2020 02:13 PM by Steve1981.)
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What is the plan at UMass?
never going back to fcs and should never had chose 1AA over 1A. Once that decision was made, Dick MacPherson left UMass. At the time the temporary seating had the stadium at 20k and was playing Boston College on campus.
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