Taj79

Okay .. bashing may be a little harsh but still .... Once again I went over to a sister school ... in this case, Xavier ... and looked at their situation. Considering they were with us in the MCC and have advanced to what I would call greater heights than we have since we parted ways and that they just completed their Cintas Center, it seems to make sense to look at that. Cintas is smaller than what we keep hearing for SLU .... only 10K seats. But its design and auxilliary features are state-of-the-art as far as meeting rooms, audio-visuals, dining facilities, and offices are concerned. I would think such features would be incorporated into whatever whomever anywhere builds. Xavier has exactly what Saint Louis has as far as sports are concerned ... men's basketball, women's basketball and volleyball all call Cintas home. Counting exhibitions, men's basketball played 17 dates at Cintas in 02-03; the women had 13 dates; and the volleyball team had 12 matches. Even if they were all separate dates, that's 42 sporting events total not counting practices. Other items on their current schedule include one concert the whole month of July (the Isley Brothers) and things like a "Spirit Celebration," Founder's Day, a latin Dance, "WorldQuestTrivia" contest, and a Homecoming Dance in November. Other things mentioned include local high school graduations, and some meetings that obviously would not occupy the entire building. Last time I checked, Cincinnati and St. Louis were similar cities ... population and size-wise. Great American Ballpark, Paul Brown Stadium, Riverfront Coliseum versus Busch Stadium, Jones Dome and Savvis. UC has the Shoe; X has Cintas; Riverfront has maybe minor league hockey at best. St. Louis? All right, throw in St. Charles for arguments sake and we'll call it even, even without UMSL or Washington U. Every city you go to is going to have its Fox theater, Riverfront venue and others so I think that becomes a wash. And besides, who says this King Billiken Roy Dome has to make money? You'd like it to but .... Does Ritter Hall make money? DuBourg? Or was that DeSmet? Showing my age. You can call for all the metropolitan revitalization you want ... I can't argue for or against david or bonwich, but frankly, I only care about the fortunes of Saint Louis University in general and the men's basketball team in particular. To me, the difference in college and pro sports is the atmosphere. I fully believe that is what you get with your own place. You practice there, you play there, you reap the benefits of no rent, total concession control, create a winning aura, keep the locals at home, generate sustained local interest, get more NCAA bids, reap the benefits of money from going to the NCAA more often than not and regenerate the program. You could integrate more of the U. into the everyday fabric of St. Louis. Why not have every high school graduation in the city at the roy Dome? I have to go to Towson University for my kids' high school graduation ..... that's a 50 mile round trip and my kids' school isn't even in Baltimore County to logically use Towson. Hell, how about a Saint Louis University graduation on campus? I did my in the old Kiel ... do they still use it in its current Savvis incarnation? What scares me is this: as noted in roy's search for merchandise indicates, I have yet to see the rocket scientist equivalent of marketers for anything being employed by old Alma Mater U. You build a top-notch facility, you need top-notch folks running it. Maybe not PeeWee Leonard or Luther Burden. Building anything is a risk. Its a gamble. Its an investment. Only sure things are death and taxes. Billiken Basketball needs to be a full body contact sport! For the fans as well. You want creature comforts .... the Fox is down the street. Fan yourself at the Muny. Enjoy your eight-dollar, watered-down fuzzy navel while the latest European import avoids digging in the corners and Quenneville troops realize their overrated again. Traditions start at home. We don't have one. I want one. I'm an Liliputuian idiot. Bon Jovi .. July 27 ... AGAIN!!!!!!

As noted below .... Anita is Roy's wife and its my way of having fun with Roy over getting him to facetiously pay for the new facility. I think it was Joe Fluegel who called it the King Billiken Roy Dome so I also include that into the equation. The use of Roy's wife's name is somewhat bad on my part ..... its my reverse digust at how money or naming rights are out of hand. Duke won't sell the name of Cameron to anyone but they'll name the court. Of course, its "Coach K Court" which I don't have a problem with. But when you start seeing "Matt Morris toes the Humphrey's rubber on Schnucks mound ... he wheels and delivers the Rawlings ball to Mike Matheny at Lou Fusz home plate .... Barry Bonds swings his Frito Lay bat and the Rawlings is leaving Jewish Memorial Hospital Diamond and Budweiser Field here at Anhueser Busch Stadium ...." then I've got a slight problem. Wow!!!! A little statistics crunching and I initiate tons of messages. Again, my bottom line is not justifying whether or not an arena is needed for the Billikens. All I'm trying to say is that, to me, an on-campus arena would the first step in elevating the program. I don't care if there's ever a concert booked or not. I think bonwich has his points and I'm not refuting them .. those are his opinions. They make sense but the Japanese thought bombing Pearl harbor made sense. At that pont in time, who knows, I wasn't there. I said early on in my message that I was told you can prove anyhting you want with statistics. For those bashing me on that, that's okay. It stirred more discussion. I will say that I think the Shoe, with its 92.5% capactiy night in and night out, makes for a more intimidating environment than Savvis half empty all the time. Again, my opinion. I want th esmaller venue, on-campus, instillingfear into the visitors' hearts. Savvis, for all its shine and glitter, doesn't do that for me. A guy near me has a huge sign in his yard ... "Get U.S. Out of the U.N." My sign reads "Get SLU Out of Savvis." Disagree if you want .. its your right.

First, two statements to put all this into perspective .... Number 1: My dad had an old sign he hung over his desk that read "If you can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with bullsh*t!" Number 2: I remember my first boss in my first job telling me "You can prove anyhting you want with statistics." Here goes .... I did the math myself, trying to put into context my thoughts of the previous post. Some interesting tidbits ... Savvis is listed as the ninth largest collegiate arena in the US. I did not know that. The contrast is that even though the Bills finished 49th in attendance, their average works out that they played in an arena that was, on average, 46.2% filled. In contrast, the other CUSA teams listed in this top 100 played in front of arenas filled to the following: Lousiville = 101%; Marquette 83.1%; Memphis 82.6%; Cincinnati 92.5%; Charlotte 70.5%; DePaul 37.5% and East Carolina 72.8%. Louisville was one of seven teams that played at or above 100% capacity. The others: Maryland (102.7); Oklahoma (101.5%); Arizona (100.1%) and Kansas, Michigan State and Duke, all at 100%. I find it interesting that Duke was 48% in overall attendance .. right above us. Gee ... playing at Cameron or Savvis? We are clsoer to Duke than we know. We're only one rung apart on the attendnace statistical level. As I said, we were at 46.2% capacity. Who is below us on the list of 100? Seven teams .... Villanova and Penn State both at 45.2%; La-Lafayette at 44.3%; St. John's at 43.8%; Georgetown at 42.7; Seton Hall at 38.1% and DePaul at 35.5%. But then I figured I screwed up on at least Villanova and St. John's. I did their numbers based on seating at the First Union Center in Philly and Madison Square in NYC when I remembered that Nova plays some games on campus at the 6,500 seat Pavillion and St. John's plays some on campus at 6,008 seat Alumni Hall. So these are probably skewed some what. Same is probably true for UConn ... I didn't figure Gampel into the equation. And G-town lists McDonough as another home gym with seating at 2500. I think the last time G-town played anyone ther might have been ..... us, in the mid 80's! But don't you find it interesting that of the six teams (I'm throwing DePaul out because they're already in the same conference with us) left we want to join up with four of them in the new Big East???? On a side note, both Dayton and Xavier, two other teams mentioned in all this conference juggling, averaged 92.5% capacity and 99.8% capacity respectively. And La-Lafayette plays its home games in a 12,800 seat behemoth ... but kudos for them for drawing 5670 a night for their games. Might not be much else to do in Lafayette, Louisiana to begin with. My next play with the stats is to see how these attendances translated into home wins and home records. That is my main reason for wanting Anita Court at the King Billiken Roy Dome. Atmosphere and home pits have to equal more wins in my mind. But that's to come. Let me leave you with how some other teams "packed the house" capacity speaking from the list: Wisconsin (98.8%); Illinois (92.2); UNLV (63.4); Missouri (84.1); Notre Dame (99.1); Bradley (82.8); Providence (67.6); Creighton (87.9); SIU (65.7); SMS (71.2); Butler (53.5) and Wichita State (77.6). The largest on-campus arena is the Carrier Dome with 33K; Syracuse averaged filling it to 63.4% capacity with its 20,921 average. To me if you win, the folks will come. But youneed to maximize all the advantages available to you .... starting with a home court advantage at least.

nm

Not that it means anything more than information but I voted a couple of days ago and my vote has not registered as of the time of this post, thicks. Just an FYI ......

While I might agree that 49th overall is kind of nice, let's put it into the context of "percentage of seats filled." I don't have the time to revert back to all the schools listed, but I would offer that the figures for Cincy and Dayton, if put into my context, would show that their attendance is somewhere in the upper 90's for percentage of total seats filledversus total seats available. Same for Louisville. What does Savvis hold? Over 20K. So our figures pale in my mind when you figure that over 50% of the building is empty. My main argument for a smaller, on-campus arena. Secondly, how many times did we meet an over to make up an under? The figure quoted is the average. I am sure that the Louisville, Marquette and Cincy games drew more than the stated average. So if these drew 3K or 4K more than the average (over), there were those other games of 3K or 4K less (under) that had to be made up and accounted for to get to the average. So the average is less than 50% and we all know there were games lower than that so for the most part, we are playing to well over a half empty building. Creature comforts for fans be damned. Finally, as many have pointed out, the question is how do you count what's there? By tickets sold or turnstiles clicked? I don't want that philosphical debate but I am willing to bet based on some comments about the crowds and fans last year, that it points more to the downside than to the upside. I've got to believe that baseball is on to something. No longer do you see the cookie-cutter ballparks of the late 60's early 70's with the seamless dimensions, no personality and 60K seats. No more Busch, Three Rivers, the Vet, Riverfront, etc. You see them getting downsized to a little over 47K seats or so. That way, the supply cannot keep up with the demand (if you're good enough). In the pro sense, they're even selling the atmosphere that comes with going to the game as opposed to the crappy product on the field (i.e. see "Orioles, Baltimore"). The game becomes more and more of an event and the crowds reflect that enthusiasm and excitement. That's what I want to see from Anita Court at the King Billiken Roy Dome. Heck even if you count all the seats in the Carrier Dome, Syracuse probably had a better percentage of total seats filled than we did. Great home court advantage once again.

I appreciate the thought Thicks .... what's the statistical margin for error? In reality, this is a biased poll. I am surprised the Bills aren't ahead .... a similar poll would be to go on the Tiger Board and ask the populace there something about the Tigers. Ditto for the Cincy board. But I will admit that seeing the Bills in a distant second is surprising a little and then not at all. My rationale is that Warner can't take a hit, Quenneville appears (from a distance) to not have a clue, what's an NBA and when do they play and LaRussa's won before. You already know my thoughts on the Bills and the Sweet Sixteen. But thanks for thinking about me!!!! If the new expanded Big East goes as Wetzel says, I'm sitting with the Sign Kid here on the East Coast!

I am not espousing doom and gloom here. I like the way the last team responded to Brad after that initial "adjustment" period. The stretch run was one of the most exciting times I can remember having with Billiken basketball. I am looking forward to the coming year. But I look forward with caution as opposed to unbridled enthusiam. Some might call it Liliputian and if that is the case so be it. There is one, maybe two, starters returning to what even Brad has called a "limited" team. I count Sloan and a half of Fisher added to a half of Drejaj. As far as I can tell, all three are also what might be defined as "limited" as well. Not a good sign. I know roy sometimes asked if a certain poster has ever played a team sport and I for one can say that I have. So I am expecting another early season adjustment period that one can easily expect with six (Bryant, Clark, Morris, Frericks, Husak and Voyoukas) new roster additions coming in. The measuring stick will be how they react to that adversity. Next season notwithstanding, I am looking down the line to where I would like the team to be. My expectations are to go to the NCAA more often than not so as our appearances become more of an expected occurrence as opposed to a freaking, once-a-decade celebration of a one-and-out game. If the road to that involves recruiting classes like the current one, so be it. I don't mind a bunch of role players if they are consistent, grow on the court, win twice as many games as they lose, and take the program upward. I for one believe we have more upwards to go; because if this is our plateau its mediocre at best. While some may chastise me for being doom and gloom, I find it ludicrous that some are talking about records and who's starting and other stuff like that. I also find it absurd with the talk about some of the proposed conferences coming out of all the ACC-generated league raiding. There are way too many unresolved issues out there out of my/our control that I'll defer my unbased opinions until more solid footing comes along. As usual, I look forward to the coming year. I always do. I thank david and threestar for their responses as well as roy's and thicks'. This program is at a crucial juncture. I think with Brad and a new arena and the potential for a slam-bang local recruiting class, this is a little more crucial than what I have been associated with in the past. But I am getting real tired of crucial junctures that are well below my stated goal .... NCAAs more years than not. Waiting to be shown .......

What makes you think we are not already getting the best players we can get? No tradition + limited recent success + a potential loss of conference + no appearances on national television + a coach who seems to be stressing the "wrong" side of the game (defense) = great reasons to go elsewhere. Let me play devil's advocate. Maybe the Husaks and Frericks and Kenny Browns of the world are what we can best hope for. Hey, no great basketball players growing in Pennsylvania ever say "I'm going to Penn State for the basketball." Why? Maybe the very same reasons kids growing up in St. Louis don't talk about us the very same way. Here's another concern of mine ..... Israel and Greece. Why is it that we are all of a sudden a great importer of Meditteranean talent? I hear all the great stuff about Izik but the juryis still out on him as far as I'm concerned. This year will be a great indicator of him as far as I'm concerned. And Voyoukas is still an unknown. I remember when we signed a seven-footer named Daivd King way way back. Kevin Williams (a player on that team) said he "ran the floor better than any 7-footer" he knew of. In hindsight, I'm guessing Kevin didn't know any 7-footers at all. King lasted maybe one year and was gone. Is Husak King all over again. I hope not but after almost 30 years of this program, one starts his expectations a little lower than what I would consider normal. I'm not saying the local kids are the answer. Hughes was. So was Gray and Douglas and Claggett and Highmark. But we also had Caswell, Parker, Baniak, Tatum, Jones, Hudson, Trice and some others that were not. I'm just asking if we are realizing the full potential that we actually have. If not, what takes it higher? The steps are there. I like Brad and he seems on a good track. The new arena might improve things. Only time will tell. And if we are doomed to repeat history, the last 30 or so years (sans Gray/Douglas/ Bonner era; the Clagg/Highmark era and one year of Larry Hughes) don't bode well to me. Sadly, my glass is half empty. To steal a certain phrase ..... show me.

We lost Hughes and regenerated how many years later? I would argue that we still haven't. One or two extraordinary players ... a bunch of role players ... look at what Marquette did. Right, but that's Marquette. Okay, okay .. maybe I get more excited when some of Polk's local friends join him and enroll at SLU. We shall see. I might also point out, roy, that a few posts ago you yourself said you weren't impressed or excited about Brad's recruiting class. Does that mean you are waiting for that big basket of local talent to load up with Polk? In today's age of watered-down college basketball (with the big talents lasting one or two years tops), it is extremely possible to take the road you described and drive into the Sixteen, Eight or even Four. But the fact remains that we are still Saint Louis University ..... little to no tradition, no history of NCAA consistency, no super-dee-doopeer recruits (sans one) and other things Liliputian. I'll keep the lights on but without some sort of progress soon, it gets really tough. When we get to that promised land, I fully expect thicks to remind me of my less-than-stellar beliefs.

Tim Kempton, Mark McNamara, Marc Ivaroni, Bryant Reeves, Danny Ferry, Jim McIlvane, Steve Stipanovich, Chuck Nevitt, Tom Burleson, Jim McMillan, Connie Dietrich, Kurt Rambis. All big. All white. All NBA stiffs. Its not like Chris Braun would be setting a precedent or anything. You can't teach height and if all you're looking for is another six fouls to beat on Shaq with ... there you go.

Okay .. one vote for me. Anyone else care to weigh in? I reread it ..... and I still think that subtly, we are being called a "mom and pop" organization that hasn't done much more than squat for the last 50 years or so. It's like that old George Carlin argument "how come Curt Gowdy can say 'the batter has two balls on him' but he can't say "oooohhhhhh, that pitch hit him in the balls!"? My argument is that you can't run with the big dogs when you still pee like a puppy. And this "bit" seems to suggest (albeit to me) that the local media (and I know its only one guy here) considers us as such. If that is the sentiment on the local level, then you can kiss the national level good bye. And when conferences are joining up to achieve things on a national scale, can anyone think they're going to take a second look at us? Is this fatalistic? Maybe .... I still believe that I won't see SLU in a Sweet Sixteen, much less a Final Four, in my lifetime. And I'm still figuring on being around another 40 or so years. Brad has a huge challenge in front of him ... maybe this stokes the local fires for the talent staying home. I hope so. I still think, based on the flavor of this "bit", that we'd be better off left alone than being mentioned in this such a vein.

Is it me or does anyone else find Bernie's latest "bit" to be somewhat condescending? The first part I'll address last but the second part ... to talk about an event and then say Soderberg's wife, kids and mommy are coming to help just seems to reinforce the "small time" image in my mind. We all talk about getting print space in the PD but I for one would argue that this type of print is not good. Was this posted out of context or what? Secondly, for the first part, "EASY ED?" This program has so little tradition that we have to step back almost a half century to get any name recognition whatsoever? No offense to Mr. McCauley but c'mon .... EASY ED? I'm in my mid-forties and I barely know who EASY ED is. This just reaffirms my stance and opinion that we have nothing to show for almost 50 years of basketball experience. This is what I see when I see all of us talking about the new conferences, why in heavens name would anyone want to take us straight up at face value? Because all we can offer is "EASY ED!" Brad has a lot of baggage to exorcise with this demon.

Why don't you announce it before Joe Fluegel does ...... ANITA COURT AT THE KING BILLIKEN ROY DOME!!!!

Article on ESPN ..... http://espn.go.com/ncaa/news/2003/0528/1560261.html Seems that the senators from West Virginia, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Virginia have all weighed in and sent a letter to Miami, Syracuse and BC telling them not to go to the ACC because it will destroy the ideals and values instilled by the Big East as a conference into its student athletes. Money, baby. Money. Again, another hypocritical voice of reason has joined the fray. I doubt these are the same guys who advised LeBron on Nike over addidas.

Spoke to Doug McIlhagga onthis one ..... Doug believes the post to be essentially an error in fact and says that he and his staff are trying to get NDA to delete it from their news board. In any case, it is of course NOT true.

david's right. The yes schools all seem to be going in a direction I would want to go. Okay, okay, Notre Dame is a little off kilter from that list but all have either moved out of pro facilities or built newer, updated campus haunts in which to play. The Apollo at Temple is another faclity I can think of. Despite two "Spectrums" down at Broad and Patterson, Temple folks built another one in Philly. And I did mention Villanova. The no schools have not. And I think they have suffered for it. And will continue to suffer for it. My opinion, that is all. Some others have on-campus sites where they play the bulk of their games that need upgrades ..... St. Joes, Boston College, St. John's Duquesne and others .... but they don't seem to be in the movement that we are. St. John's only plays its "large" games at MSG ... others are in an antiquated gym on campus. DePaul did some games like that. So did/does Georgetown. I am certainly not advocating that for SLU if that is the old West Pine Gym. I saw us play William Penn there years ago. Zip. Nada. Zilch. I said in a very old post that there are only a certain few things a school can control as far as its destiny is concerned. One of the keys one, again my opinion, is the atmosphere in which one plays. Home court advantages are usually worth four points on a betting line (not that I'm advocating that). There has to be a reason and I want that as well. Four to five wins last year would have put us in the NCAAs, yes?

Conference affiliation SHOULD have NOTHING to do with the future of a new arena in my opinion. We've been playing in some rather large arena's ... even in the darkest days of the program. Old Kiel, the Arena, the Checkerdome, New Kiel, Savvis ... call them what you want but we've found ourselves in those places ever since I can remember. We're still going to be in there no matter the conference or if we're and independent. What does conference affiliation matter at that point? Even if, heaven forbid, we went down in conference stature, which, frankly we will because we don't play football and football rules the NCAA roost, how are we going to play in a 20,000 seat Savvis? Again, to me Savvis is sterile .... its a pro place where the emphasis is on the high-spending fan who has tons of discretionary dollars to throw away. Pass his ass. Have some scantily clad waitress bring him water-down, over-priced drinks to his seat so he doesn't have to get up. Watch the dance team with their thongs hanging out. All to cloud the fact that the product on the floor or field sucks. Cheapest seat for the Wiz at the MCI center .... $40. They year 2003-2004 .. no Jordan ... about the only reason to go to see the Wiz to begin with. Think the prices will come down now? I don't believe an arena is tied to conference ... my opinion is that a home court arena is tied to sruvival. A home court advantage gives you maybe four to five wins a year. When the program is basektball-dependent, and making the NCAA means a huge cut of CBS' billion dollar NCAA payout, four to five wins are essential. Gonzaga. Xavier. Dayton. Villanova. Notre Dame. Yes. Depaul. Saint Louis. Seton Hall. Georgetown. St. John's. No.

.... Miami, Syracuse and Boston College. Looks like the first domino has fallen. This is the school presidents' vote as I understand it. Heard it was 7 to 2 with Duke and UNC as the odd men out. Looks like the conference startupis planned for the 04-05 school year. Ought to be interesting to see how all the speculation and things work out form here. I just want to voice the opinion that I believe billiken roy called this one a couple of years ago. Finally, its nice to be back at "home." In my attempt to find other avenues for debate, I wandered over to the UC board on CUSA talk. Its amazing what you find out when you wander around .... for example, I did not know that Huggins recruits second chance kids (Whaley, Wingfield, Bobbitt) at UC because he believes the the "total person" concept. And I also did not know that UC heads the list of little engines that could because Huggins has been doing more with less every year he ahs been at UC. My eyes have dutifully been opened to all I was missing over these years. If you ever run into the guys with "Cal1362" as a signature, he'll set you straight. I was stunned to learn how persecuted UC and Huggs really are. Of ocurse, now gruehls and UCTom have found me again so its "beer on" at the CUSA next year in Cincy. Wow ... won't that be a wake if we all know the fate of these teams come March 04. It might be like Dayton all over again when they found out we were ditching them and the torunament was at their house. Slightly different if UC is a catalyst in the break up. While I never am in favor of a downgrade of the program, I think we might be fooling ourselves trying to compete with football driven schools in any conference. Something here has got to work out for the best.