Next Year's Schedule

[Bizziken]

What is with this fixation with Scott Trade - we waited years so we could get away from having to play off campus and in a half filled or less arena. I would not be in favor of not playing our home games at Chaifetz. This not just about selling tix - by the time you pay for Scott Trade and split the money 8 ways you would not come out any better and perhaps worse financially.

The whole point of this is to entice teams like Illinois and Missouri...I doubt they would want to play in our gym, regardless of how the tickets were split...would you, as a SLU fan, want to play this type of tournament in Champaign...hell no

Chaifetz- 10,600

Scottrade- 19,150...double the capacity

And yes, we have waited years to get an on campus arena, but 3 days at Scottrade Center isn't going to kill us...i would easily trade 3 of our scrub home games that we had this year for a chance to play Illinois or Missouri

Financial considerations is only a part of the equation, and there is no way we would come out less than if we played at Chaifetz (assuming good attendance)

[Bizziken]

Fine but that is not playing at Scott Trade - you could still do this at our place.

Plus, how many relevant Division I teams 'host' a preseason Shootout or Tournament?...the answer is very few, if any

[kappy96]

Despite my defense of this year's non-conference schedule, I think we can all agree that next year's schedule should be tougher. Here is what we already know to be a part of the schedule

We will likely only have 13 non-confernece games as I believe the rule is you can have 10 games plus one tourney (there are occasionaly exceptions so maybe there could be one more). I tried searching the internet to confirm that rule but couldn't find anything.

Home: Georgia (they should be decent)

Home: Bowling Green (nothing special)

Away: MSU (always tough to win there)

Away: SIU (always tough to win there)

3 games in the Cancun tourney. It is a true tournament style and would expect 2 of them to be against name opponents and all of them will be tough. ESPN is sponsoring the tourney so most if not all of the games should be on t.v. over Christmas.

That is 7 games right there, so we only need 6 more. Assuming they still want to charge $450 for season tickets at $25 per game, that implies 18 home games. 8 conference games plus 2 exhibition games means you need 8 non-conference games. As you can see above, only 2 are accounted for. If you had 6 buy games that would get you the 18 games you need.

If you do 4 buy games and start two more home and homes, presumably with good teams, it will significantly improve your schedule strength but we will only have 17 home games. I'm not sure SLU is too anxious to give up $150k in revenue (6,000 x $25 = $150k) by scheduling the extra game away from the Chaifetz and charging only $425 for season tics. Would season ticketholders still be willing to pay $450 for only 17 games this year? So in addition to thinking about whether we can get anyone to actually put us on the schedule, people need to realize there are significant financial ramifications from adding additional home and away series.

All that being said, I expect us to add at least one more home and away and hopefully two which would give us a schedule of 9 non-buy games and 4 buy games.

Do the pre-season/holiday tournaments still only count as "one" game? I know that was a big loophole that allowed teams to get to play more games against stronger opponents on neutral courts w/o sacrificing home "buy" games.

[slu72 fan]

Do the pre-season/holiday tournaments still only count as "one" game? I know that was a big loophole that allowed teams to get to play more games against stronger opponents on neutral courts w/o sacrificing home "buy" games.

Yes, if you are approved as an "exempt tournament" by the NCAA.

[showthebill]

They need to do something about the student "season" tickets. It is a little ridiculous to have students pay 135 for student tickets only to find that they give out free tickets for like 5 games a season to students anyway, so by the end of the season its cheaper to buy on a game by game basis.

With that being said, no student will buy a ticket for every game unless they (or more likely their parents) have already paid for every game that season

[JohnnyJumpUp]

Despite my defense of this year's non-conference schedule, I think we can all agree that next year's schedule should be tougher. Here is what we already know to be a part of the schedule

We will likely only have 13 non-confernece games as I believe the rule is you can have 10 games plus one tourney (there are occasionaly exceptions so maybe there could be one more). I tried searching the internet to confirm that rule but couldn't find anything.

Home: Georgia (they should be decent)

Home: Bowling Green (nothing special)

Away: MSU (always tough to win there)

Away: SIU (always tough to win there)

3 games in the Cancun tourney. It is a true tournament style and would expect 2 of them to be against name opponents and all of them will be tough. ESPN is sponsoring the tourney so most if not all of the games should be on t.v. over Christmas.

That is 7 games right there, so we only need 6 more. Assuming they still want to charge $450 for season tickets at $25 per game, that implies 18 home games. 8 conference games plus 2 exhibition games means you need 8 non-conference games. As you can see above, only 2 are accounted for. If you had 6 buy games that would get you the 18 games you need.

If you do 4 buy games and start two more home and homes, presumably with good teams, it will significantly improve your schedule strength but we will only have 17 home games. I'm not sure SLU is too anxious to give up $150k in revenue (6,000 x $25 = $150k) by scheduling the extra game away from the Chaifetz and charging only $425 for season tics. Would season ticketholders still be willing to pay $450 for only 17 games this year? So in addition to thinking about whether we can get anyone to actually put us on the schedule, people need to realize there are significant financial ramifications from adding additional home and away series.

All that being said, I expect us to add at least one more home and away and hopefully two which would give us a schedule of 9 non-buy games and 4 buy games.

What are buy games? Never heard of them.

[billiken_roy]

Despite my defense of this year's non-conference schedule, I think we can all agree that next year's schedule should be tougher. Here is what we already know to be a part of the schedule

We will likely only have 13 non-confernece games as I believe the rule is you can have 10 games plus one tourney (there are occasionaly exceptions so maybe there could be one more). I tried searching the internet to confirm that rule but couldn't find anything.

Home: Georgia (they should be decent)

Home: Bowling Green (nothing special)

Away: MSU (always tough to win there)

Away: SIU (always tough to win there)

3 games in the Cancun tourney. It is a true tournament style and would expect 2 of them to be against name opponents and all of them will be tough. ESPN is sponsoring the tourney so most if not all of the games should be on t.v. over Christmas.

That is 7 games right there, so we only need 6 more. Assuming they still want to charge $450 for season tickets at $25 per game, that implies 18 home games. 8 conference games plus 2 exhibition games means you need 8 non-conference games. As you can see above, only 2 are accounted for. If you had 6 buy games that would get you the 18 games you need.

If you do 4 buy games and start two more home and homes, presumably with good teams, it will significantly improve your schedule strength but we will only have 17 home games. I'm not sure SLU is too anxious to give up $150k in revenue (6,000 x $25 = $150k) by scheduling the extra game away from the Chaifetz and charging only $425 for season tics. Would season ticketholders still be willing to pay $450 for only 17 games this year? So in addition to thinking about whether we can get anyone to actually put us on the schedule, people need to realize there are significant financial ramifications from adding additional home and away series.

All that being said, I expect us to add at least one more home and away and hopefully two which would give us a schedule of 9 non-buy games and 4 buy games.

kshoe, it is my understanding that buy games are going to cost slu at least $75k plus expenses to bring a team in to sacrifice. so your revenue lost figure isnt as high as you represent, plus add in the overhead of "turning on the lights", i wouldnt be surprised if we lose money on buy games.

[Box and Won]

I never want to watch the Bills at Scottrade again. Watching the Valley tournament on TV made me realize how little I miss playing there.

[drkelsey55]

I never want to watch the Bills at Scottrade again. Watching the Valley tournament on TV made me realize how little I miss playing there.

I agree if we get a game that needs more room lets make sure we need to use the ED because of the crowd size!

[kshoe]

kshoe, it is my understanding that buy games are going to cost slu at least $75k plus expenses to bring a team in to sacrifice. so your revenue lost figure isnt as high as you represent, plus add in the overhead of "turning on the lights", i wouldnt be surprised if we lose money on buy games.

Don't forget to factor in concession sales and parking in your revenue pile.

I would be shocked if we lost money on buy games or it even got close to break-even. If that were the case, nobody would schedule buy games but as we all know teams schedule a ton of them. Factor in that when we travel it costs money (a lot of money if we fly charter) and the $75k you believe we have to play for a lamb isn't bad at all.

[billiken_roy]

Don't forget to factor in concession sales and parking in your revenue pile.

I would be shocked if we lost money on buy games or it even got close to break-even. If that were the case, nobody would schedule buy games but as we all know teams schedule a ton of them. Factor in that when we travel it costs money (a lot of money if we fly charter) and the $75k you believe we have to play for a lamb isn't bad at all.

teams schedule buy games imo for two reasons: w's and fill out the dance card so season tix holders get more games for their buck and thus make it attractive to buy season tickets for the less than diehards.

btw, pretty sure it is $75k plus expenses.

[Quality Is Job 1]

What are buy games? Never heard of them.

Some people refer to guarantee games as "buy games," but I don't really like that because it sounds like "bye games." A guarantee game happens when a school pays another school a guaranteed amount to come in to play one game without playing a return game at their place. It's one type of contract.

Another type of contract is when a school agrees to play one home game and one away game with another school. I don't know how the finances are handled.

[Cowboy]

-from pomeroy as of today (not sure if post season tourneys influence this), by conference this is the bottom 25% of d1 by non conf sos and some of the members making up the number

0 SWAC

0 West Coast

0 SEC

1 Big West

1 Big Sky

1 Southern

1 A10 GW

1 Atlantic Sun

1 Horizon

1 PAc10 Wash St

2 Big12 missouri, nebraska

2 CUSA

2 Colonial

2 Mtn West

2 WAC

2 Big South

2 MAC

2 Summit

2 Sun Belt

3 Big East Notre Dame, S Hall, Rutgers

3 Big 10 Ind, PennSt, Nwstrn

3 ACC Miami, BC, VA Tech

3 MEAC

4 Ivy

4 Ohio Valley

4 America East

4 MAAC

4 Great West

5 MVC Drake, MOSU, S Ill, Ill St, Evans

6 Northeast

6 Southland

6 Independents

7 Patriot

-i was surprised some of these conferences had so many teams on the list as i would have thought they were buy games in Nov and Dec

-only Patriot team not in the bottom 25% was Holy Cross

-5 from the Valley????

[xfactor9600]

The whole point of this is to entice teams like Illinois and Missouri...I doubt they would want to play in our gym, regardless of how the tickets were split...would you, as a SLU fan, want to play this type of tournament in Champaign...hell no

Chaifetz- 10,600

Scottrade- 19,150...double the capacity

And yes, we have waited years to get an on campus arena, but 3 days at Scottrade Center isn't going to kill us...i would easily trade 3 of our scrub home games that we had this year for a chance to play Illinois or Missouri

Financial considerations is only a part of the equation, and there is no way we would come out less than if we played at Chaifetz (assuming good attendance)

Illinois for whatever reason always wanted to play in the United Center when they scheduled with X. I don't recall ever playing at Assembly Hall. I don't believe they ever agreed to a return game at Cintas either (the may have played us once at US Bank Arena or something). I'd think playing the Illini in Chicago would be a better recruiting strategy than playing them on their campus though.

It looks like SLU is putting together a decent non-con for next season. I know the going has been slow, but from an outsider the program is being built the right way (good recruiting, commitment to facilities, and increasing non-con exposure). I would think you guys would be one of the top contenders for the league title next season.

[STLfan]

I'd love to see a home and home series with Memphis. It would be an easy road trip for both fan bases since the two cities are only about 4 hours apart. With so many of our conference games far away this would be a fun drivable road trip for our fans. Maybe even organize something to bus some of the student section down there. Provide the students with a group rate package deal that includes bus, hotel room, and game tickets. Beale St., BBQ Ribs, and Billiken Basketball. It could be a good time.

[FromDaEastSide]

Illinois for whatever reason always wanted to play in the United Center when they scheduled with X. I don't recall ever playing at Assembly Hall. I don't believe they ever agreed to a return game at Cintas either (the may have played us once at US Bank Arena or something). I'd think playing the Illini in Chicago would be a better recruiting strategy than playing them on their campus though.

Illinois had a return game in Dec 2006 at US Bank Arena

[SShoe]

Timmerman mentioned in his blog today that we're scheduled for a home and home against Portland next year. Said Majerus tried to get Oregon or Oregon State so that Conklin could play close to home, but neither would do it, so Portland it is.

[Chicago Billiken]

Timmerman mentioned in his blog today that we're scheduled for a home and home against Portland next year. Said Majerus tried to get Oregon or Oregon State so that Conklin could play close to home, but neither would do it, so Portland it is.

Maybe Conklin will get his homecoming this year after all. If 14-17 Oregon State can put together a run, maybe we could match up with them in the CBI finals.

Official Billikens.com sponsor of Kevin Shortal

[billiken_roy]

while i am sure for conklin's benefit coach was trying to get the marque game for brent, but all in all portland is exactly the type of game we should be searching out to replace 2-3 of these buy games we have been scheduling more of the last few years. go for the 79 rpi of a portland over a 300+ of some of these stiffs. we do that 3 more times each year with the same overall success on the floor we had this year and we wont find ourselves on the outside looking in anymore.

after that a few seasons, the likes of oregon or washington or wisconsin might not be so apprehensive about playing us once we have an xavier or gonzaga like reputation. it is all relative.

i dont want to hear about the top 20 schools that wont play us. play the mid majors home and away.