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Bring football back to SLU


usf87

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IF we are going to bring back football at least start at the club level first...

SLU Football is one of those ideas that SOUNDS cool, but then you realize the monumental amount of work, $$$, and detail it would take to actually pull off; so your head just explodes and your wife or girlfriend has to clean up the giblets with crappy napkins from a Chinese restaurant that tear really easily.

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The only difference is that Fr. Biondi is on his way out. A new president will be announced in mid 2014 who is hopefully open to the idea of bringing back football, unlike Biondi. Yes, hopefully. If the new president approves of at least creating a committee to research the possibility of bringing the sport back, then I'm all for it. If the committee says "no" then so be it. We'll drop the subject and nothing more will be said about SLU football. In the meantime, this is a tremendous opportunity for the proponents of SLU football to grab a hold of and pin their hopes on. Yes, it's a lot of "Ifs" but what do we have to lose? Is that too much to ask?

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... (Personal opinion; I'd be glad to hear how, for example Fordham, has advanced the school's image through its football program.) ...

Fordham Football is bigger than Fordham Basketball, easily outdraws Fordham Basketball. Fordham Football is the biggest spectator sport at the school. At Fordham, Homecoming includes a Homecoming Football game.

Fordham Football plays on campus at Jack Coffey Field (next to Rose Hill Gym), which in its current setup has bleachers holding 7,500 on only the West side of the field. The team played before several overflow SRO home crowds this season.

This year the team was 10-0, which included a road win over FBS Temple, and ranked as high as 5th in the FCS until the star QB, Mike Nebrich (a FBS UConn transfer) was injured. Fordham finished 12-2, won its first round NCAA Playoff game before losing in Round 2. The team finished ranked 9th and 10th in 2 polls. The past Fordham QB, John Skelton, was drafted by the Football Cardinals and is in his 4th year in the NFL, now with the Tennessee Titans.

Re if Football has helped Fordham's image, one would think that defeating Yale at the Yale Bowl helps with Fordham alumni relations. The school is the 4th highest ranked Catholic University per the US News & World Report College Rankings.

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The only difference is that Fr. Biondi is on his way out. A new president will be announced in mid 2014 who is hopefully open to the idea of bringing back football, unlike Biondi. Yes, hopefully. If the new president approves of at least creating a committee to research the possibility of bringing the sport back, then I'm all for it. If the committee says "no" then so be it. We'll drop the subject and nothing more will be said about SLU football. In the meantime, this is a tremendous opportunity for the proponents of SLU football to grab a hold of and pin their hopes on. Yes, it's a lot of "Ifs" but what do we have to lose? Is that too much to ask?

No, not at all. A very rational approach. I'm of the opinion that such a committee's research will show that starting up a football program will not pass, SLU football pun intended, any reasonable cost/benefit analysis, but if a volunteer committee is willing to take on the task and the research doesn't cost an arm and a leg, there's certainly no harm in looking at the possibility.

BTW, where is kwyjibo when we need him? :)

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The only difference is that Fr. Biondi is on his way out. A new president will be announced in mid 2014 who is hopefully open to the idea of bringing back football, unlike Biondi. Yes, hopefully. If the new president approves of at least creating a committee to research the possibility of bringing the sport back, then I'm all for it. If the committee says "no" then so be it. We'll drop the subject and nothing more will be said about SLU football. In the meantime, this is a tremendous opportunity for the proponents of SLU football to grab a hold of and pin their hopes on. Yes, it's a lot of "Ifs" but what do we have to lose? Is that too much to ask?

Not as long as he runs the search committee.

Also we had club football before: it was hard to get a hundred people to come out on a nice Saturday afternoon.

Someday the Rams will be gone and take their thugs out of town and the city will demand Saint Louis University supply a D 1 team

Or more likely SIUE will play their home games there as the State of Illinois is broke

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I was there for the club football days. First year a lot of excitement good student crowds. Second year nothing,maybe a few girlfriends. Hey we don't draw that well for a very good basketball program what makes anybody think we would support mediocre football.

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I was there for the club football days. First year a lot of excitement good student crowds. Second year nothing,maybe a few girlfriends. Hey we don't draw that well for a very good basketball program what makes anybody think we would support mediocre football.

Remember when we played Georgetown. 5000 fans

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I was there for the club football days. First year a lot of excitement good student crowds. Second year nothing,maybe a few girlfriends. Hey we don't draw that well for a very good basketball program what makes anybody think we would support mediocre football.

Remember when we played Georgetown. 5000 fans

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1) The option of club football is a joke.

2) We will never, ever get the kind of financial support necessary to start a D-1 football program. We struggle with what we've had for the last 50+ years, suddenly we are going to get the commitment and funding to play competitive D-1 football? No way.

3) If we did football, forget the foo-foo Title IX formulas, essentially Title IX will then require that the 75 football scholarships be "neutralized", and SLU would have to take 75 scholarships from other men' s sports. That is what it comes to. Title IX is sports socialism, a law that goes against the free market.

4) To get 75 competitive football players we'd have to dramatically dummy up our curriculum, like Missouri U's famous "Biology for non Science Majors". Add lots of phony dumb jock classes. Not going to happen.

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3) If we did football, forget the foo-foo Title IX formulas, essentially Title IX will then require that the 75 football scholarships be "neutralized", and SLU would have to take 75 scholarships from other men' s sports. That is what it comes to. Title IX is sports socialism, a law that goes against the free market.

In fairness, the real issue is that the NCAA is a monopoly, which obviates any argument for a "free market" in college sports. Title IX is merely a weak excuse for the left to say that it's stood up to the market power of said monopoly.

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No, not at all. A very rational approach. I'm of the opinion that such a committee's research will show that starting up a football program will not pass, SLU football pun intended, any reasonable cost/benefit analysis, but if a volunteer committee is willing to take on the task and the research doesn't cost an arm and a leg, there's certainly no harm in looking at the possibility.

BTW, where is kwyjibo when we need him? :)

I saw the thread and thought you and others did a nice job of mentioning that football is not an option for the obvious cost reason. Lots of revenue is generated in some places but the costs (when not hidden or disbursed throughout the university) are way too high. It is possible if you put together the wrong sort of committee you could get a mixed view of the benefits (but properly accounted for you cannot get the benefits anywhere near the costs--particularly for a program starting out). The biggest thing missing from this discussion is that expanding football at the college level is through and a lot of programs are going to regret their playing football fairly soon as the costs are going to go up from liability for injuries (if they are student athletes then universities have a moral and legal obligation to protect them). There are a bunch of lawsuits in court now and the NCAA will try to limit the damage but it is pretty inevitable that insurance and liability costs will go up significantly.

The solution is for colleges to sponsor or "form" teams without "student-athletes" (athletes playing in the name of the college but not necessarily as students--this is actually done in soccer in a few countries).

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4) To get 75 competitive football players we'd have to dramatically dummy up our curriculum, like Missouri U's famous "Biology for non Science Majors". Add lots of phony dumb jock classes. Not going to happen.

SLU does (did?) have "biology for non-science majors". My english education major sister-in-law took it.

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Be very careful. Football can backfire in many ways. Because of football, my other school (Temple) fled the A-10 to get into the Big East. Then that conference turned into the AAC and, because of football, all the programs found themselves with lots of games against such traditional rivals as SMU, Houston, Tulane, etc. It will only get worse when UConn & Cincinnati find a way to get to the ACC or Big 12.

But the worst is - even though football did bring in some revenue from TV - this spread-out, mis-matched league has such a daunting travel schedule for all other sports that Temple just cut over a half dozen programs - Baseball, softball, both Crews, gymnastics, etc., to save money. They then had the gall to blame it on Title IX. They did this with a straight face while cutting two women's programs.

Club football - OK Anything else - big problems.

My answer is to fully professionalize D1 football. Its a football program "sponsored" by the Univ. of Missouri, Alabama, Michigan, etc. Players are employees, not students. They can go to the NFL if they want (and can) or they can have a 12 year career at their "school." Spread the money from the coaches (whose alaries will be cut by 2/3 probably) to the people playing. Players make money, if they want to go to classes in the spring semester, fine.

D-2 remains for scholarships for real students. D-3 is for non-scholarship programs.

Now please go handle N. C. AT & T!

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SLU does (did?) have "biology for non-science majors". My english education major sister-in-law took it.

At Mizzou it is an actual course almost exclusively for football and a few basketball players. I met and discussed this with a grad student who taught the course at one time. Suffice it to say it was very, very, very basic biology, though many struggled. That course and others were there for the football team.

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At least the number of people wanting to see football return to SLU has grown to include:

Me

WestCoastBilliken

USF87

At this rate, we should have a program in 500 years or so.

Add me to the list....

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I would love to spend a September or October Saturday back on campus watching football but only if it is done right. I would not watch club football or non-scholarship football. To start a mid level FCS program you need 50 million plus the land for a stadium. Don't see that happening.

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If football is such a financial drain on an institution why is it that so many schools have added football to their programs? Since 2000 more programs have added football than dropped it. And it's all levels, from NAIA to DIII, D2 and D1. Look at these schools:


Dropped football since 2000:


Massachsetts-Boston - 2000

Swarthmore - 2000

Mt. Senario (dropped all sports) - 2001

Cal State-Northridge (I-AA) - 2001

Canisius (I-AA) - 2002

St. John's (I-AA) - 2002

Fairfield (I-AA) - 2002

Massachusetts-Lowell - 2002

Morris Brown (dropped all sports) - 2002

N.J. City State - 2002

Siena (I-AA) - 2003

E. Tennessee St. (I-AA) (returning in 2015) - 2003

New Haven (returning in 2009) - 2003

St. Mary's (I-AA) - 2003

Si-Tanka (school closed) - 2004

Allen - 2005

St. Peter's (I-AA) - 2006

Paul Quinn - 2007

LaSalle (I-AA) - 2007


Added since 2000:


Mount Ida - 2000

Northern Montana - 2000

Paul Quinn - 2000

East Texas Baptist - 2000

Greensboro - 2000

Mary Hardin-Baylor - 2000

Shenandoah - 2000

Averett - 2001

Louisiana College - 2001

Minnesota-Crookston - 2001

SW Assemblies of God - 2001

Virginia-Wise - 2001

Christopher Newport - 2001

Florida Atlantic (I-A) - 2001

Rockford - 2001

Utica - 2001

Edward Waters - 2001

Florida International (I-A) - 2002

Shaw - 2002

St. Augustine's - 2002

St. Paul's - 2002

Allen - 2003

Briar Cliff - 2003

Charleston - 2003

Coastal Carolina (I-AA) - 2003

Endicott - 2003

Huntingdon - 2003

SE Louisiana (I-AA) - 2003

Waldorf - 2003

Webber International - 2003

North Grenville - 2004

Ohio Dominican - 2004

N.C. Wesleyan - 2004

Seton Hill - 2004

Texas College - 2004

Becker - 2005

Central State (OH) - 2005

Brevard - 2006

Dixie St. - 2006

LaGrange - 2006

U.S. Maritime Academy - 2006

Morrisville St. - 2006

Xavier (club) - 2006

Birmingham Southern - 2007

Faulkner - 2007

Gallaudet - 2007

Marian - 2007

NC-Pembroke - 2007

St. Vincent - 2007

Vermont (club) - 2007

Campbell (I-AA) - 2008

Dordt - 2008

Lake Erie - 2008

Lincoln - 2008

St. Scholastica - 2008

Old Dominion (I-AA) - 2009

Colorado St.-Pueblo - 2008

Kentucky Christian - 2008

Grand View - 2008

Incarnate Word - 2009

New Haven - 2009

South Alabama (I-AA) - 2009

Charlotte (I-AA) - 2012


Programs Launched in 2013:


Alderson Broaddus University

Berry College

Florida Tech

Hendrix College

Houston Baptist University

Mercer University

Oklahoma Baptist University

Reinhardt University

Southwestern University

Stetson University

University of North Carolina at Charlotte

Warner University


Programs Launching in 2014-2016:


College of Idaho

George Fox University

Limestone College

Missouri Baptist University

Paine College

Southeastern University

East Tennessee State University

Kennesaw State University

Lyon College

Finlandia University

University of New Orleans


Source:

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