Dayton, VCU and Wichita St. to AAC?

[cheeseman]

AGB91 - I agree with your post.   Roy - worrying about our non revenue sports is fair but honestly they should never be the tail wagging the dog when it comes to what is best for basketball.  The non revenue sports exist because of the basketball program not the other way.  

[slu72]

Should this speculation about VCU and DU come to fruition what would SLU's options be?:

1.) Stay put in a watered down A10. The loss of VCU and DU would certainly downgrade the conference's rep as a solid #7 or #8 best BB league. We'd definitely be a mid major school at that point where as now we think of ourselves as a high mid. The A10 becomes a one or two bid league at the most. However, if the admin remains committed to being seen as a legit player in college hoops, we could become a Gonzaga type, ie just commit to dominating the league year in and year out. Is that realistic? Probably not. Actually if our two premiere teams leave we are up the proverbial creek w/o a paddle. And now that Mizzery and UI have their coaching situations resolved recruiting locals becomes that much more difficult, since they'd be selling a P5 conference, and we'd be pitching a different version of the Horizon League.

2.) Take the cheapest route and join the MVC. Again, not a preferred choice as this is a conference that typically receives only one bid and is primarily a collection of regional state schools that wouldn't do much for SLU's academic rep.

3.) Try and weasel our way into the AAC. Hopefully, May is on the phone w/ the AD's at VCU and DU trying to get a feel for what they're thinking if they're offered an opening. I'd be making the pitch to get us included. Granted, our hoops cred has taken a big hit over the last 3 years, but it's not like we'd be selling a totally washed up product to these guys. Here again I'm hoping May is being proactive and at least has put it out there that while we hit a bump in the road, we have had some recent success and are working hard to get back on track. I like this option the best as it would bring teams into Chaifetz that we have a history with. Hell, getting the UConn women into the Fetz once a year makes it attractive.

4.) Wait it out in the A10 and pray for the Beast to expand. W/ DU gone one would think our chance at garnering one of the two POTENTIAL open slots would be much improved. I'd put this option in the pipe dream category, as it doesn't appear the BEAST is even considering expanding. Yeah, we could hope Fox pushes them in that direction, but we've seen no indication Fox is thinking that way either.

To my way of thinking, option 3 is the best path going forward and offers SLU the best chance at remaining a truly relevant program that plays in a relevant conference.

 

[MusicCityBilliken]

11 hours ago, cheeseman said:

AGB91 - I agree with your post.   Roy - worrying about our non revenue sports is fair but honestly they should never be the tail wagging the dog when it comes to what is best for basketball.  The non revenue sports exist because of the basketball program not the other way.  

I don't know if that's true all around.

Men Soccer: when we were in GMW/CUSA it seemed we were in the NCAA every year and ranked many of those years. Now, not so much.

Women Volleyball: when we had Nolen & Kordes coaching we held our own in both conferences.

Baseball and W. Basketball may suffer. I don't know how the baseball team would do against teams like Tulane & the FL schools. For W Basketball, look at the bright side, you'd get a sell-out at the Chaifetz when UCONN comes to town. 

I have no clue how the coed sports (tennis, track & swimming) would do.

BTW, if May is hit with doing his share in cost savings for the University he should have look at W. Field Hockey. In the last 3 decades you can count on your one hand on how many games they won. Also, they still play home games way out in the county. Why do we have this sport?

[slu72 fan]

BTW, if May is hit with doing his share in cost savings for the University he should have look at W. Field Hockey. In the last 3 decades you can count on your one hand on how many games they won. Also, they still play home games way out in the county. Why do we have this sport?

 

Title IX

[cheeseman]

17 minutes ago, tarheelbilliken said:

I don't know if that's true all around.

Men Soccer: when we were in GMW/CUSA it seemed we were in the NCAA every year and ranked many of those years. Now, not so much.

Women Volleyball: when we had Nolen & Kordes coaching we held our own in both conferences.

Baseball and W. Basketball may suffer. I don't know how the baseball team would do against teams like Tulane & the FL schools. For W Basketball, look at the bright side, you'd get a sell-out at the Chaifetz when UCONN comes to town. 

I have no clue how the coed sports (tennis, track & swimming) would do.

BTW, if May is hit with doing his share in cost savings for the University he should have look at W. Field Hockey. In the last 3 decades you can count on your one hand on how many games they won. Also, they still play home games way out in the county. Why do we have this sport?

 Men's soccer has not been relevant for 30 years also, men's soccer never was a revenue producer.  My point was simple - the basketball program is the revenue producer so we have to make sure we take care of the group first.  

[MusicCityBilliken]

6 minutes ago, slu72 fan said:

BTW, if May is hit with doing his share in cost savings for the University he should have look at W. Field Hockey. In the last 3 decades you can count on your one hand on how many games they won. Also, they still play home games way out in the county. Why do we have this sport?

 

Title IX

Isn't it a one male to one female ratio?

Men soccer, basketball, baseball = women soccer, basketball, softball

women volleyball= no men sports

The coed sports (swimming, track & tennis) a wash.

I'm missing a sport or are some women sports partial scholarships?

Seems you could get rid of Field Hockey.

[BLIKNS]

Hadn't even considered the AAC as an option, but man you could have our rivals Dayton and VCU and then getting old rivals Cincinnati and Memphis....I would be onboard

[cheeseman]

22 minutes ago, slu72 fan said:

BTW, if May is hit with doing his share in cost savings for the University he should have look at W. Field Hockey. In the last 3 decades you can count on your one hand on how many games they won. Also, they still play home games way out in the county. Why do we have this sport?

 

Title IX

Also because we have to have a number of sports to stay D1  So if you drop this one you have to add another one would be my guess.  Remember when Levick dropped golf she added track and field both men's and women's.

[MusicCityBilliken]

7 minutes ago, cheeseman said:

 Men's soccer has not been relevant for 30 years also, men's soccer never was a revenue producer.  My point was simple - the basketball program is the revenue producer so we have to make sure we take care of the group first.  

Cheese I agree with you. Men basketball is it. It's important we keep the revenue flowing by putting fannies in the seats at the Chaifetz, sell tee shirts, remain on TV and get into the post season. If we stay in a depleted A10 (minus UD and VCU) all that would be jeopardized.

My point is, our non-revenue sports would not be hit that hard if we did have to move into the AAC.

[ARon]

Sorry but it is not about non-revenue sports either.

 

1 - Any conference that contains schools that play football will make their decisions based on football, not basketball.  Maybe UConn would be the exception, but their bad football team is what landed them on the outside looking in last time around.

2 - After football what matters is TV markets.  It doesn't matter that Loyola of Chicago sucks.  They are in Chicago.  Access to that TV market and recruits will always outweigh better basketball programs.

There is a reason Rutgers is in the Big 10 despite sucking.

There is a reason DePaul is in the Big East despite sucking.

There is a reason (other than strong academics) Fordham is in the A10 despite ALWAYS sucking.

3 - Finally, we must remember why universities have these athletic programs in the first place.  Yes, it can be good for school spirit. Yes, the school CAN make some money off of them (though a lot of D1 basketball programs, while being considered "revenue" sports, are revenue-neutral at best).

These basketball programs are MARKETING for the universities.  Football and basketball will get a scholl 10x mentions in the media that grants, degrees, and even new buildings will.  I believe it was either Chris Mack or Sean Miller that said if their school was accounting properly his salary would come out of the school's marketing budget.

Any of the few kids in Cedar Falls, Iowa or Normal, Illinois or Murfreesboro, Tennessee who are going to consider going to an A10 Catholic school are probably already on-board.  But that may not be the case in a big city like Chicago, or a disproportionally Catholic town like Philly.

This is why adding small-town more-southern schools is not going to work for the A10 or SLU. And why a school not really seen as being historically good at basketball would likely be the way they go with no other obvious options available.

[brianstl]

1 hour ago, ARon said:

Sorry but it is not about non-revenue sports either.

 

1 - Any conference that contains schools that play football will make their decisions based on football, not basketball.  Maybe UConn would be the exception, but their bad football team is what landed them on the outside looking in last time around.

2 - After football what matters is TV markets.  It doesn't matter that Loyola of Chicago sucks.  They are in Chicago.  Access to that TV market and recruits will always outweigh better basketball programs.

There is a reason Rutgers is in the Big 10 despite sucking.

There is a reason DePaul is in the Big East despite sucking.

There is a reason (other than strong academics) Fordham is in the A10 despite ALWAYS sucking.

3 - Finally, we must remember why universities have these athletic programs in the first place.  Yes, it can be good for school spirit. Yes, the school CAN make some money off of them (though a lot of D1 basketball programs, while being considered "revenue" sports, are revenue-neutral at best).

These basketball programs are MARKETING for the universities.  Football and basketball will get a scholl 10x mentions in the media that grants, degrees, and even new buildings will.  I believe it was either Chris Mack or Sean Miller that said if their school was accounting properly his salary would come out of the school's marketing budget.

Any of the few kids in Cedar Falls, Iowa or Normal, Illinois or Murfreesboro, Tennessee who are going to consider going to an A10 Catholic school are probably already on-board.  But that may not be the case in a big city like Chicago, or a disproportionally Catholic town like Philly.

This is why adding small-town more-southern schools is not going to work for the A10 or SLU. And why a school not really seen as being historically good at basketball would likely be the way they go with no other obvious options available.

It would be a huge mistake to write off the south.  Write off the small towns of the Valley, but Catholicism is growing faster in the south than anywhere else in the country.  The south now accounts for more than 27% of all Catholics in the US.   The south unlike the northeast and midwest is not saturated with Catholic colleges and universities.  

If you are trying to attract Catholic kids headed to college, the south should be one of the main areas you are targeting your marketing.  We have to get past this last century thought of the midwest and the northeast being where all the Catholics are while the south is the land of the protestants.  Just like a large portion of the overall US population has migrated to the south, so have a bunch of Catholics.  Plus, immigration has helped swell the numbers of Catholics in the south.

[Soderball]

being in a 1 or 2 bid league helps with none of this.. Wichita St was top 10 Pomeroy.. got a 10 seed and faced UK in the round of 32... had to play UD in the first round.

They have every incentive in the world to dump the MVC.

Adding Wichita to the A10 would be absolutely wonderful. Best case scenario for us.. 4 high investment programs (SLU WSU UD VCU) and add in Rhody and Richmond.. strong base for the conference there.we've been adding programs like Mason and Davidson.. that is not where this conference should want to go.

 

Due to animosity of certain schools, SLU's future seems pretty tied to the a10.

[Bizziken]

1 hour ago, brianstl said:

It would be a huge mistake to write off the south.  Write off the small towns of the Valley, but Catholicism is growing faster in the south than anywhere else in the country.  The south now accounts for more than 27% of all Catholics in the US.   The south unlike the northeast and midwest is not saturated with Catholic colleges and universities.  

If you are trying to attract Catholic kids headed to college, the south should be one of the main areas you are targeting your marketing.  We have to get past this last century thought of the midwest and the northeast being where all the Catholics are while the south is the land of the protestants.  Just like a large portion of the overall US population has migrated to the south, so have a bunch of Catholics.  Plus, immigration has helped swell the numbers of Catholics in the south.

Kinda...I believe most of that growth stems from migration to Dallas and Houston. Not rural areas traditionally considered the 'South'. And of course New Orleans has always had a strong Catholic presence due to the Frog influence.

[hsmith19]

40 minutes ago, Bizziken said:

Kinda...I believe most of that growth stems from migration to Dallas and Houston. Not rural areas traditionally considered the 'South'. And of course New Orleans has always had a strong Catholic presence due to the Frog influence.

And most of that growth is itself tied to an increase of Hispanic migration to those areas, not the other types of migration brianstl seems to be referring to above (educated whites moving to places like the North Carolina research triangle). If the idea is that a bunch of white Catholics are moving from the Northeast and Midwest to the South, I haven't seen any numbers to back that up. Always/almost always when you see Catholic growth in the U.S. in recent memory, it is tied to Hispanics.

[brianstl]

41 minutes ago, Bizziken said:

Kinda...I believe most of that growth stems from migration to Dallas and Houston. Not rural areas traditionally considered the 'South'. And of course New Orleans has always had a strong Catholic presence due to the Frog influence.

I not talking about the rural south when marketing to the south.  I am talking about the cities.  It is almost always cities when talking about Catholics.  It isn't just cities in TX.  There are as many Catholics living in GA as MO.    The Catholics in GA are younger on average than those in MO.  MO has 4 Catholic colleges/universities (not including seminaries) and GA has one.  And that school only started offering bachelor degrees 7 years ago.

[hsmith19]

Now, if you want to argue that white Catholics from traditional Catholic hotbeds in the NE and MW might be more likely to move Southward if there were more Catholic institutions (like a Notre Dame Southeast or Marquette Tidewater), that might make some sense. Because right now I suspect the lack of institutions might be playing a role in the types of educated white people who are relocating to growing metros in the Southeast and Mid-South.

[hsmith19]

10 minutes ago, brianstl said:

I not talking about the rural south when marketing to the south.  I am talking about the cities.  It is almost always cities when talking about Catholics.  It isn't just cities in TX.  There are as many Catholics living in GA as MO.    The Catholics in GA are younger on average than those in MO.  MO has 4 Catholic colleges/universities (not including seminaries) and GA has one.  And that school only started offering bachelor degrees 7 years ago.

Which isn't that many to begin with, nationally speaking. And Georgia has also seen high levels of Hispanic migration in recent years. Hell, even Missouri has.

It's also worth mentioning that what we tend to think of as "Catholic institutions" here in the Midwest (read: Jesuit universities) are in reality white Catholic institutions. They hold much less sway/appeal with Catholic immigrants from Latin America than they do with white Catholics, or even than they do with African-American Catholics.

[brianstl]

50% of southern Catholics are white compared to 59% nationally.  If you take out Texas (72% Hiapanic), the percentage of white Catholic in the south increases.   But, I don't even know why that matters.  Are you you assuming that Hispanic Catholic children are never going to go to college?  

 

Plus, states like GA, TN, FL, and NC have seen big net domestic migration gains over the last few decades.  You don't think any of those people where white Catholics?

[LongLiveLisch]

9 minutes ago, brianstl said:

50% of southern Catholics are white compared to 59% nationally.  If you take out Texas (72% Hiapanic), the percentage of white Catholic in the south increases.   But, I don't even know why that matters.  Are you you assuming that Hispanic Catholic children are never going to go to college?  

 

Plus, states like GA, TN, FL, and NC have seen big net domestic migration gains over the last few decades.  You don't think any of those people where white Catholics?

WAT IS HAPPENING TO THESE THREADS

[hsmith19]

19 minutes ago, brianstl said:

50% of southern Catholics are white compared to 59% nationally.  If you take out Texas (72% Hiapanic), the percentage of white Catholic in the south increases.   But, I don't even know why that matters.  Are you you assuming that Hispanic Catholic children are never going to go to college?  

 

Plus, states like GA, TN, FL, and NC have seen big net domestic migration gains over the last few decades.  You don't think any of those people where white Catholics?

The racial demos of all Catholics are not what you're talking about, though. You're talking about the recent growth of Catholics in those regions. The percentage of "new" Catholics in the South who are Hispanic is much higher than 50%, because that growth is fueled almost entirely by immigration from Latin America.

As for your question about Hispanics going to college, I'll just re-paste what I posted above:

"It's also worth mentioning that what we tend to think of as 'Catholic institutions' here in the Midwest (read: Jesuit universities) are in reality white Catholic institutions. They hold much less sway/appeal with Catholic immigrants from Latin America than they do with white Catholics, or even than they do with African-American Catholics."

As for the question about GA, TN, FL, and NC, the answer is not none. Just very few, relatively speaking.

[MusicCityBilliken]

1 hour ago, Bizziken said:

Kinda...I believe most of that growth stems from migration to Dallas and Houston. Not rural areas traditionally considered the 'South'. And of course New Orleans has always had a strong Catholic presence due to the Frog influence.

Except for major metro areas (Charlotte, Atlanta, Houston Dallas) where you have younger family types, most Southern Catholics are the following, older retirees from the North, Hispanics and retired military who stay close to the bases for the exchange & healthcare access. New Orleans/Mobile/Southern Louisiana areas are an exception with French influence dating back to the 18th century. When I was in the Biloxi area, south of I-10 was Catholic anything North of I-10 was Baptist. I must knew about 100 Thibodeaus.

[hsmith19]

Also, my larger point is that Catholic growth EVERYWHERE you find it in the U.S. is overwhelmingly fueled by immigration from Latin America. Not only in the South. So the percentage of white Catholics in the North vs. the South is immaterial. It's Hispanic people fueling the growth everywhere. But yes, while we're on the subject, expecting the "new" (read: Latino) Catholics to adhere to the same behavior patterns or be attracted to the same institutions as the "old" Catholics (read: white) is probably not a very good bet. Indeed, this has been a hot topic for years not only in Catholic religious circles but wherever urban planners gather.

[JMM28]

SLU is not a catholic institution. They are operated by a board of lay men and women. Come on guys. Get your together. 

[hsmith19]

7 minutes ago, JMM28 said:

SLU is not a catholic institution. They are operated by a board of lay men and women. Come on guys. Get your together. 

Indeed. TIF accomplished what Calvin and Luther never could.

[HoosierPal]

29 minutes ago, LongLiveLisch said:

WAT IS HAPPENING TO THESE THREADS

Yikes, 

What about Dayton taking Wichita State's place in the Valley?  If it happens, I called it first, here, right in the middle of the hispanic catholic thread.