Could a 3rd D1 HBCU conference thrive?





NO.
1 Tuskegee not on position to do it.
2 Reducing the swac to eight schools would pretty much be detrimental to the whole conference with Valley already teetering and now scuttlebutt talking about uapb.
3 taking two let alone three from the current meac is a death nail for them.
4 As I was told by somebody in a conversation about the meac transition, Delaware state is just holding on and has concerns about their travel cost.
5 it seems that there may be some likelihood to one HBCU conference that has 15 -16 Universities.
 
I'm afraid SCSU has much bigger concerns than what conference we compete in. BCC as well. And I'm sure if we got into the real financial situations off all our HBCU's we'd find that a number of them have much bigger problems than athletics.
 
As football conference goes, this lineup would be very competitive.
Not sure why A&M and bama state are always in the convo for leaving the Swac?
 
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As football conference goes, this lineup would be very competitive.
Not sure why A&M and bama state is always in the convo for leaving the Swac?
ONLY reason I can think of is because we are the furthest away from the rest of the schools....
 
I'm afraid SCSU has much bigger concerns than what conference we compete in. BCC as well. And I'm sure if we got into the real financial situations off all our HBCU's we'd find that a number of them have much bigger problems than athletics.

is the school still in that much debt? I remember reading where the state forgave ten or twelve million in loans and gave it additional time to pay off another loan. All this was awhile back. After all this, the school has not cleaned up the books?
 
is the school still in that much debt? I remember reading where the state forgave ten or twelve million in loans and gave it additional time to pay off another loan. All this was awhile back. After all this, the school has not cleaned up the books?

The school has a declining enrollment, which means less money to generate.
 
What? You have to be kidding me. The last enrollment figures I saw was approximately 2900 when they were going through those problems around five years ago. That low of an enrollment creates a serious problem.

He's not kidding. It is just that low. Probably the smallest school in FCS football.
 



Unless it is getting some good donations or good guarantees for games, maybe it should leave FCS.

I think they should hang in there for a little while longer. They need a massive recruitment effort and do what SU has done by linking up with local community colleges and recruiting out-of-state. I'm sure they could target Georgia and North Carolina. Not only the school gets more determined students, but it would improve its graduation rate. If they move down a division, it would be a lot harder to move back up and more expensive, which is why a lot of HBCUs on the DII level are afraid to make that jump. I think they can manage to turn things around in the next 5 years.
 
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is the school still in that much debt? I remember reading where the state forgave ten or twelve million in loans and gave it additional time to pay off another loan. All this was awhile back. After all this, the school has not cleaned up the books?

I don’t know, but my uncle is still a prof there and said we came real close to shutting the doors. enrollment is under 1000 now, and it was over 5000 back when I was there in the 90s.
 
I don’t know, but my uncle is still a prof there and said we came real close to shutting the doors. enrollment is under 1000 now, and it was over 5000 back when I was there in the 90s.

What you are saying cuts against the grain of reality and challenges the imagination.

A drop in enrollment that drastic happens on purpose. The state of South Carolina has sabotaged your school. There is no good reason a state institution should fall that far, in that short period of time, without an intervention from the state to make improvements.

An 80% drop in enrollment is just surreal.
 
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is the school still in that much debt? I remember reading where the state forgave ten or twelve million in loans and gave it additional time to pay off another loan. All this was awhile back. After all this, the school has not cleaned up the books?

I didn't know they were that bad off until someone told me their enrollment and it's 1/2 the size of Valley (we had a slight drop as well but still over 2000). It's amazing that they are even fielding a competitive football team (their soccer team (independent) was the only team we beat last year)
 
What you are saying cuts against the grain of reality and challenges the imagination.

A drop in enrollment that drastic happens on purpose. The state of South Carolina has sabotaged your school. There is no good reason a state institution should fall that far, in that short period of time, without an intervention from the state to make improvements.

An 80% drop in enrollment is just surreal.

they were trying to change us into USC at Orangeburg back when I was there.
 
Skeege board probably put the feasibility study about moving up to D-1 in Booker T Washington's grave ...

SC State and Bethune-Cookman each need a healthier prognosis before even thinking about this.
 
Unless it is getting some good donations or good guarantees for games, maybe it should leave FCS.

At this point, I hope they have a plan to drop down if it will help keep their doors open. I see no shame in dropping down to DII or DIII to keep the doors open at any of our HBCUs. In instances this critical it is the smart thing to do.
 
As someone that lived in Greenville..I can tell you this.. SC State is just so far behind..
CCU is now the hot school in the Lower State. If the kids are not getting into USC they are heading to CCU, USC-Aiken. FMU, College of Charleston..

In the Upstate its USC Upstate formerly USC Spartanburg. This school is growing like crazy. Already the largest BSN program in the State... just finished building several new buildings and about to start on Phases 2. Which will be a new arena.. Talks are ongoing to separate from the USC System..

Then you have Clemson, Winthrop, Lander.. Even the Private expensive colleges likes Wofford Furman, Presbyterian are doing well.
 
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