DoctorB Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 By the way -- I hope this does not rock anyone's world; and, I do not think we should make too much out of this, but then again i am a wordsmith, and these little word choices sometimes speak volumes: regarding the on-campus Arena project, here is what Fr. Biondi's says about it in the January version of the President's Monthly Message: "Construction has begun on our new biomedical Research Building, and we hope to break ground on our new on-campus Arena this year." Is it just my paranoid and delusional skepticism, or does that have an inauspicious ring to it?? Talk to me, Billiken nation!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tonka Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 agreed. 2 words I don't like in that statement "hope" and "this". I would have liked to have read "will" and "early" before this year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kappy96 Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 Biondi could care less when the arena project gets started. All he is concerned about is his precious research facility that will bring "recognition" and "respect" to the university. He doesn't and has never understood how a successful athletic program can do more for a schools reputation and stature than anything else. He is stubborn like Brad!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
courtside Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 Pretty good Kappy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Billikan Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 What is your source for your totally uninformed statements about Father Biondi? Have you ever spoken to him? I seriously doubt that you know anything about the subject and you are posting like you acutally have some actual knowledge about the situation which you do not. I assume you are very young and just like to spout off on message boards. Here are the facts--and I have spoken many times to Father Biondi about the arena: 1. He would absolutely love to build the new arena and the only issue is the financing. He has to answer to a board and a faculty that have priorities that necessarily involve a lot of issues other than a basketball arena and he has to try to satisfy all of the consituancies. 2. The faculty and others have put huge pressure on him to make sure the research facility is built and it is well on the way. That now frees him up to try to be as creative as possible to try to raise the funds for the arena and he is trying to do just that. 3. I believe him when he says that the arena will be built and the timing of contributions has a lot to do with the timing of the construction. He would start tomorrow if he had the money in hand but it is not yet there. 4. I wonder how many people who read this board have made major contributions to the arena project. I have made such a major commitment and I challenge the rest of you who are always complaining to do the same and go out and help the University raise the money for the project. To you Mr. Kappy I would suggest that you try not to be an ignorant jerk! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TEE Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 Love him or hate him, Larry has done wonderful things, but you will never convince him that a successful athletic program can benefit the university as a whole. take B.C. as an example: when flutie had the miracle win over miami and won the heisman, B.C. went from being a commuter school to a national school. recently USC, the year the Trojans won the Orange Bowl, the football team had a profit of $29 MILLION. I not saying that you sell your soul, but you can do so much more. I know that when Larry gives the ok ground will be broken. I can tell you all this, that if ground isn't broken by December of 2006 some pledges might be recinded. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billikenmetz Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 You can't spell "Biomedical Research Building FN " without Fr. Biondi Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Band Legend Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 I would hope that every SLU basketball geek like myself who posts on this board has given money to the Arena fund. I've given $20 for the last three years because it's all I can afford. Billikan, I appreciate your passion and your donation, and I believe that people have a tendency to make stuff up, but you have to admit that it would be easy to believe that Father Biondi doesn't exactly have the arena high on his priority list. For SLU fans it's been like we have been wandering around in the desert for 40 years. Hell, it's been longer than 40 years. West Pine gym hasn't been suitable for the Billikens since long before our NIT championship. Like last nights game it is just really frustrating. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schasz Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 I still believe that the Arena will be built. Perhaps, Fr. Biondi will have time to lead the final fund raising push, as I like so many Billiken fans would like to see ground breaking sometime in 2006. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Basketbill Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 Iam sure Biondi understnads. Winning the NCAA tournament would be so much more important than say oh develping an Avian Flu vaccine, like Infectious disease researches are doing at SLU....... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kappy96 Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 Listen here Billikan, I graduated from SLU in '96 and I struggle to think of anything that the University has done since I arrived on campus nearly 15 years ago that would lead me to believe that they or Fr. Biondi feel that the Basketball program is more important than the pretty fountain that replaced the Mercantile Bank at Grand and Lindell. I am VERY proud that SLU now looks like a REAL campus and I thank Fr. Biondi for all he has done on that front. But you cannont sit there and tell me that if Fr. Biondi wanted to make Billiken athletics and more specifically the Basketball program and arena project a priority we would be arguing about the mediocrity of our team and where we play our home games. When he wants something done, it gets done! So in my eyes that translates into him NOT making it a priority. Get your personal feelings out of the way and look at the big picture. If you were an outsider looking at SLU's athletic program today you would be shocked to learn that we are D-1! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 while i agree that father biondi has never fulfilled his vision of a top 25 basketball program, anyone that was around the decade prior to father biondi should know that he has done miracles to what we were basketballwise prior to father biondi. whenever i get into one of those moods i just drift back to ekkerball and thank the lord for father biondi. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bonwich Posted January 28, 2006 Share Posted January 28, 2006 Your devotion to the U. prez is admirable, Billikan, but the fact remains: He stood up there more than two years ago and said that we'd have an arena to coincide with our entrance into the A-10. He got a little carried away. We already had a tenuous relationship with the operators of the Savvis Center, but you have to figure that any rational businessperson would have started to plan for a Billiken phase-out on the basis of that claim. As for kappy, however: I'd note that Wash. U. seems to have achieved pretty decent national status without benefit of a good season of D-1 football or basketball. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kappy96 Posted January 28, 2006 Share Posted January 28, 2006 On the contrary, Wash U has one of the top performing athletic programs in the country for D-3. If I am not mistaken, just a few years ago, both their men's and women's bball teams were ranked #1. And their women's volleyball program? I seem to recall a national championship or two? And even men's football is more than respectable for their level. So I would have to disagree that athletics has played no part in their national prominance. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bonwich Posted January 28, 2006 Share Posted January 28, 2006 Yes. Yes, of course. Everyone can tell you who won the D-3 basketball championship last year. And it contributes to WashU's $4B endowment. Or are you saying that SLU should drop to D-3, where they no doubt would be much more competitive and would receive much higher "recognition"? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlumniFan Posted January 28, 2006 Share Posted January 28, 2006 You are hilarious...unless of course you are serious. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlumniFan Posted January 28, 2006 Share Posted January 28, 2006 Why would a guy who is not serious about the athletic program announce a new arena in the first place? Especially when we are in the midst of a HUGE capital campaign AND are raising money for a new research center? Where is the logic there? The FACT is that Father Biondi very much wants to break ground on the arena, but he isn't stupid either. When the money is raised (by the way, we have raised around $27 million which is nothing to sneeze at), the arena will begin. If we were at $6 million I would be able to understand the complaints. If we weren't trying to raise $328 million in the capital campaign I would understand not coming up with the $35 million quickly. If we hadn't put the priority on the research building, which is appropriate, I would understand. Put all of this into LOGICAL perspective. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slufanskip Posted January 28, 2006 Share Posted January 28, 2006 You may be right in some instances ... but any outsider who would be "shocked" to find out we are D1 is either misinformed obout D1 basketball or a complete idiot Official Billikens.com sponsor of H. Waldman Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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