The fact that USM here in la. is dropping down after a long period at trying their hand in D1aa. should tell us something .Not to mention this....
Tuesday, October 1, 2002
Selling Division I-AA college football is tough
Whether you?re 4-0 or 0-4 right now, selling the show of Division I-AA college football is a tough job for any athletic director these days and it?s not getting any easier.
Mike Trocchi
Staff Sports Writer
Five years after Boston University cut its football program, the questions of what a low-tier program contributes to, and takes from, a school are still being debated. Some say the indirect public relations and recruiting rewards are enough, but everyone agrees there is no financial reward or expectation of one.
That?s why changes in the way I-AA playoff football is played could make that level of gridiron action a whole lot more fun and somewhat more profitable. In its present form, I-AA football stands alone as a macabre college sports investment.
It is one of the only sports where winning won?t cure the financial ills involved. Northeastern is 4-0 and ranked in the top 10 in the ESPN/USA Today poll this week. Still, with the field and location of the school, last week?s 42-17 win over UMass last Saturday drew a mere 6,651 fans.
Former Northeastern athletic director, now the head man at UMass, Ian McCaw said the challenge of promoting Division I-AA football is presently a three-pronged task.
"The challenge is primarily marketing visibility," McCaw said. "Then, you?re going against games on a Saturday afternoon on TV like Florida-Florida State and Division I-A games like that. The third thing is, that it?s very hard to generate revenue at the I-AA level."
You can look to Maine as a hot program over the last few years with little competition, but it hasn?t changed the financial situation there. Maine interim athletic director Paul Bubb said that a school holding financial concerns too highly when it comes to I-AA football is missing the point. Maine had 6,600 in attendance for its first home game, but even an 11-1 or 10-2 season will only draw about $100,000 more in revenue for the Black Bears than would a losing campaign.
"The universities have to understand what they?re involved in when they?re invested in I-AA football," he said. "It simply doesn?t have the financial rewards." McCaw estimates that an average I-AA program in New England spends between $2 and $3 million each year.
Since cutting football, BU has built a new hockey rink and increased its competitiveness in a host of women?s sports. It cost the school $3 million a year to fund football and it received about $40,000 a year in revenues, along with $50,000 of contributions from friends and alumni, according to numbers in the school?s faculty newspaper published in 1997.
That was a $2.9 million bath the Terriers took each year. The job of AD becomes a whole lot easier and the budget becomes a little looser when you don?t have to invest so many scholarships into one program. I-AA football is a tough sell to fans. It doesn?t matter if you?re 10-2 or if you?re 3-8.
"It?s fairly expensive," said Bubb, whose Black Bears are currently ranked No. 3 in the nation. "You have a stadium that seats 10,000, not 100,000." Bubb noted that the University of Montana, which has a stadium that seats 19,000 might be one of only two I-AA schools in the country that profits or comes close to breaking even.
But instead of accepting this hopeless status, I-AA football could be tweaked to increase exposure, according to McCaw. "There are a lot of questions about the playoff system and how it works," he said. Going to places in Alabama or Louisiana for a playoff provides little in the way of marketing and promotional opportunities.
Bubb has a novel idea that?s been talked about to move the Division I-AA game right smack into the middle of the I-A bowl season between Christmas and the first week in January. "I think it?s a mistake to play the I-AA championship game before Christmas," he said. "The games that matter are after Christmas. The ones that occur before Christmas are considered less important."
Another idea is to move the game from places like Tennessee to a resort area in Florida or on the West Coast. That could bring more money to all I-AA schools and close that yawning gap between revenues and returns.
Bubb tries not to look at the current situation as a negative. "Does cross country make money?" Bubb asked. "Does volleyball? I?ve never been told we have to have an athletics department that makes money."
And even if you?re 3-0 and on the way to a winning season in the 8-3 range or 0-3 and struggling to finish 4-7, promoting Division I-AA football, five years after BU dropped its program, has got to be one of the most challenging jobs an athletic director faces today.
"You have to understand you?re not going to make money," Bubb said. "It?s beneficial to have good public relations by having a football program. If you?re successful ? and we?re up in the polls right now ? people are now talking Maine football."
Still, there may be no task tougher as an AD these days than squeezing off-the-field rewards out of Division I-AA football.
I guess this just went over some of our heads
