OT: Orlando Sentinel says MAC schools should drop football instead women’s tennis
Interesting article that outlines just how much of a bath the bottom feeders of FBS take on football compared to the other sports.
Akron has dropped men’s cross country, men’s golf and women’s tennis.
Bowling Green dropped baseball.
Central Michigan became the latest casualty today, dropping their men’s indoor and outdoor track programs.
That wasn't his point at all. There was not even a passing reference to gender disparity or misogyny. His point was that certain football programs bleed universities and he is correct. I doubt there will be MAC D-1 football in ten years. This pandemic is going to recalibrate university economics. He is implying that certain schools could beat the curve and do it now which is correct.
Directly, no, implicitly, yes. The MAC has been slicing and dicing men's sports and will probably continue to do so, but the one women's sport involved is what made the headline and got multiple mentions in the article.
That's a somewhat unique and odd angle to take. The article focused squarely on economics.
That wasn't his point at all. There was not even a passing reference to gender disparity or misogyny.
Bullshit it wasn't.
1. Of all the schools around the country announcing they are cutting sports, I have only seen the one women's tennis team getting the ax. Every other sport has been men's. Yet the headline explicitly mentions gender.
If the article wasn't click bait or meant to incite, then the author wouldn't have put "women's tennis" in the headline.
2. Title IX legislates opportunity equality anyway so the implication, again via the headline, that women's sports are being axed in favor of loss-leading football is pure shit also.
In the early 2000s the MAC was accomplishing the exact same thing it's doing now but operating on a much smaller budget and schools were eating smaller losses. Go back to that.
Would love to have how much football means for fundraising/donors at various institutions quantified. Unfortunately schools naturally have an interest in not pulling together that information or making it public.
MAC football is better when Bowling Green is better!
Since 2001, the Falcons have produced Urban Meyer (Utah, Florida, Ohio State), Dave Clawson (Wake Forest) and Dino Babers (Syracuse).
Doesn't seem like the program has recovered from the Mike Jinks era yet.
I think the best method would be split FBS into another subdivision. The Power 5 conferences become Power 4. 4 16-team conferences (FBS-A) The rest form FBS-B. In that, those teams can play week 1 and 2 games at the power schools. That gets some revenue and the FBS-B cap on scholarships is 42. Plus it basically gives a couple of tune up games vs local smaller schools before a 10 game conference schedule.
With this model, the conference championship game becomes a de-facto quarterfinal game. This eliminates the committee and makes the best 4 team playoff. The FBS-B does the same has their own playoff. The rest bowl eligible teams still play in bowl games so it keeps that structure as well.
I honestly don’t see how this wouldn’t solve a TON of problems. Cuts some costs for smaller schools, and it gives those schools a chance to actually compete for a national championship.
I think much of the G5 would protest, but they have far more in common with FCS than the power 5. The top of the FCS is probably just as good as the top of the G5. You could do something a little crazy and go back to sort of hybrid, unified D1 where the FCS/G5 teams are eligible for the FCS playoffs and the P5 is eligible for the CFP or something like that
You gotta step back ask yourself at some point: what is the point of any D1 sport? Ok the MAC loses money on football, but it also is a source of entertainment for students and alums and a major part of marketing the university. Ok, women's tennis and many other sports lose less....but then why have those sports? Almost no one watches except for family and friends. Is that expense somehow more justifiable?
Bear Bryant used to say "It's hard to rally your school around math class." It's also hard to rally your school around Women's Tennis.
Clearly the 37 students that attend Toledo Rockets games are rallied.
If you could refrain from bringing up Toledo, that would be great.