I have very little faith in our ability to be ready. I think Guice will be able to take the necessary steps but I'm not so sure about TMac. In fact, I'm fairly certain that he does not have the ability to move us forward.
Guice is the boss and I'm certain he's very interested in us moving up. I know y'all don't trust TMac but if Guice does then so do I. For now at least.
None of us truly know what's going on behind the scenes, anyway
What "behind the scenes"? We don't have any real BIG donors or otherwise we wouldn't have to be begging for just $30,000 to replace an old worn out sign.
I think what he's referring to is the relationship building between Dr. Guice and his counterparts in other conferences as well as between Tommy and his counterparts in other conferences.
There is also the quiet use of third parties that have connections that could help at some point down the line.
Finally, our administration will have to line up internal constituencies. Some of you would be surprised how many administrators on campus, including some athletic council members, believe that staying one step ahead of ULM should be good enough for Tech.
Last edited by The Historian; 07-08-2017 at 06:44 PM.
I understand your point, but the truth is we've had individual donors give millions to the last two major projects, which total more than $34 million in construction.
Every major donor to those projects is going to be approached at some point in the future for the next major project. If you were LG the next time you ask them to pull out their wallets would you ask each for $30,000 or $3 million plus?
It held us back for years. Had we been in position to move up at the appropriate time, we may be in the ACC right now. We spun our wheels for at least 10 years while Dan Reneau was in charge. Thankfully, we have leadership in place who will help us to keep moving forward...other than our AD.
Most of all we need a bigger budget and that is the hardest to get done. If I remember correctly, that is why our current AD was hired. As much I read from posts on here with consternation about his doings, I wonder if we have looked at his actions through that very lens. It might explain a few things. But then again, if it doesn't, we need the right person to fix that very problem doing it right now!
WWDog
La Tech
Region and hyphen free since 1894!
Flagship of the University of Louisiana System
No doubt about it, our budget will be our biggest limiting factor when conference realignment resumes. If we're not super aggressive in finding a way to increase that budget, things will not go well for us when the next big shuffle happens.
I believe that student athletic fees are the only way we'll ever be able to increase our budget in any appreciable way. Right now, I'm pretty sure that we're very limited with what we can do with student fees. It may literally take an act of congress to change this situation. Tech and ULL would support allowing student fees without affecting state general funding, but would UNO, ULM, SLU, NSU, MSU, Nichols, Southern, and GSU? Probably not, so it'll be an uphill battle in Baton Rouge to get it done. It's going to take some very good salesmanship. We'll see if TMAC is up to the task.
Last edited by brtransplant; 07-10-2017 at 05:41 PM.