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Watch your mouth. I told you people before the week of the SMU game that Wood and his team missed a GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY to host AAC Commissioner Mike Aresco and other AAC officials and SMU offiicials out at Squire Creek in the week leading up to the SMU game. As usual, people on this board were in a coma, and nobody gave a crap, including you. I did say I was GIVING HIM A CHANCE, and I did. Times up.Originally Posted by dawg80
We now know that he didn't approach Aresco on purpose.
Maybe. But, I honestly believe he was simply clueless, and never thought of it.
Tech fans need to realize that we have NO SALESMANSHIP talent in our athletic office. NONE! That's how we end up with stupid rules about Tailgating, Baseball ticket distribution and other dumb rules that result in declining sports attendance. In this case, we literally had an office full of athletic department employees, but not a single one of them thought to invite AAC Commissioner Mike Aresco and his associates --including SMU's leadership-- to Squire Creek for a a round of Golf, a nice dinner, a short prezo and an overnight stay. Nobody even thought of it.
Sounds like he was told what they wanted. And Ruston wasn’t what they wanted.
The easiest thing to do when in a tough spot is wait until it’s all over and then make up the best excuse you can think of. It saves in a lot of effort and puts aside the time wasted when trying to something you don’t know how to do.
So my theory is SMU was okay with UNT/Rice/UTSA because they aren’t staying in the AAC for long.
I went to school at SMU. I met the President. He’s not one to stay put. They want more, bigger. He wants to restore what was lost with the death penalty.
The goal of SMU is the Big12, and I doubt they stay put in the C-USA 2.0 which is all the American has become. I don’t think the deck chairs are done rearranging yet, but damn our administration has to stop being reactive and become proactive in this. Other schools are making their intentions known through their actions and work. We are playing dumb.
Yeah SMU and Memphis are not long for that conference. They'll go to the Big 12. SMU adds more legitimacy to the conference than Boise State does. Big 12 needs as many ties as it can have to the SWC and Big 8 to be considered a power conference.
Good post. (At least for an SMU grad.) I particularly agree with your statement I bolded above. I just cited on another thread how this is a classic case of LA Tech officials not have the necessary business relationships to get this done. Tech officials have known for years that some day the AAC would come calling to poach some schools from CUSA. And yet, nobody at LA Tech ever bothered to cultivate a business relationship with AAC Commissioner Mike Aresco or any of his associates. For a school that knew it had shortcomings to begin with, this was business suicide. Tech got shut out this week, because that's exactly what we cultivated with the AAC over the last 5 years. Just like Skip Holtz in El Paso, we were not prepared.
We can’t blame our “leaders” if we made contact and were told, “you don’t bring a big enough market area with you so you will not be considered.”
We can blame them going back years of we have been told our budget was too small, other leaders don’t want to work with them because of burned bridges, or that we had no real plan for future development.
To me, it has to be more than market size. If that’s all it was, then every AD going back to Oakes would have told us this every time a conference shuffle happened that we were left out of.
More? Bigger? Sorry, I'm from La Tech, I'm not familiar with these words.
Current C-USA Board of Presidents Leadership?
Sounds like it's time for a re-mount and re-load of the Executive Committee.
From their June meeting minutes:
DALLAS – The Conference USA Board of Directors conducted its annual summer meeting Monday, June 7, focusing on important national issues and conference activities.
"Our summer Board meeting was highly productive as we considered initiatives to support the success of our institutions and student-athletes," Commissioner Judy MacLeod said. "Our Board's commitment to the strategic development of our league and its members is unwavering. I would like to thank Louisiana Tech President Dr. Les Guice for his outstanding leadership as Board Chair over the past two years and thank the entire Executive Committee for their tireless work and guidance throughout this challenging year."
...
"A new slate of leadership was approved with North Texas President Dr. Neal Smatresk appointed Chair and WKU President Dr. Tim Caboni appointed Vice Chair of the Conference USA Board of Directors.
As his term on the Executive Committee comes to a close, the group acknowledged Southern Mississippi President Dr. Rodney Bennett's leadership, including serving as the Board Chair for two years (2017-18 and 2018-19). Charlotte Chancellor Dr. Sharon Gaber was appointed to fill the spot vacated by Dr. Bennett and Marshall President Dr. Jerry Gilbert's term was extended.
In addition, Old Dominion President-Elect Dr.Brian Hemphill was selected to represent Conference USA on the NCAA Presidential Forum beginning August 31, 2021.
Louisiana Tech University
Flagship of the University of Louisiana System
And, as HD posted, you've borrowed to build your facilities, most of which you have no dedicated revenue stream within athletics to use to pay it back. Track/Soccer, football, baseball (partial) - all built with borrowed money. And you might have $70 to $90 million in debt just a few years from now with a relatively limited stream within athletics to pay it back. Even a million a year from a local hospital is only going to scratch the surface.
Then there is the subject of auxiliary services money. You've padded your budget with money from food services and parking to the extent that a person within the ULS told me a few years ago that it could easily cripple your campus in a decade or less. You're robbing your ability to renovate, fund, and borrow for your basic campus needs down the road.
But hey, it helped you get into the Big 12............Oh, wait!!!!
CUSA did NOT get raided because they were the stronger conference, they got raided because the schools they took were in bigger markets. Regardless of what you think you know about UL’s finances, we are about to give Cajun Field a major$75,000,000 renovation, remain in an expanded and stronger SunBelt and Tech is……………..???
And, as HD posted, you've borrowed to build your facilities, most of which you have no dedicated revenue stream within athletics to use to pay it back. Track/Soccer, football, baseball (partial) - all built with borrowed money. And you might have $70 to $90 million in debt just a few years from now with a relatively limited stream within athletics to pay it back. Even a million a year from a local hospital is only going to scratch the surface.
Then there is the subject of auxiliary services money. You've padded your budget with money from food services and parking to the extent that a person within the ULS told me a few years ago that it could easily cripple your campus in a decade or less. You're robbing your ability to renovate, fund, and borrow for your basic campus needs down the road.
But hey, it helped you get into the Big 12............Oh, wait!!!!
FYI, Dr. Savoie had already almost totally renovated all the buildings on UL’s campus. And you are right, it did not get us into the BIG 12, but it also did not leave us hanging out to dry with virtually a non-existant conference affiliation!
And, as HD posted, you've borrowed to build your facilities, most of which you have no dedicated revenue stream within athletics to use to pay it back. Track/Soccer, football, baseball (partial) - all built with borrowed money. And you might have $70 to $90 million in debt just a few years from now with a relatively limited stream within athletics to pay it back. Even a million a year from a local hospital is only going to scratch the surface.
Then there is the subject of auxiliary services money. You've padded your budget with money from food services and parking to the extent that a person within the ULS told me a few years ago that it could easily cripple your campus in a decade or less. You're robbing your ability to renovate, fund, and borrow for your basic campus needs down the road.
But hey, it helped you get into the Big 12............Oh, wait!!!!
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