The future of the program

[Jimmy Lemke]

This is in response to this topic (http://uwmfreak.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=Games&action=display&thread=6038&page=3).

Football is not the task right now, but the goal.

I think I've demonstrated that I want football as much as anyone in Black and Gold. But I would be wrong if I suggested we need to drop the basketball arena to raise money for football.

The goal, whether we ultimately add football or not, should be this:

- Push forward the department to the point where football is entirely feasible -

That means, take care of the things that need to be taken care of before football can be realistically approached. I'm all in for football, but I think you'd do a major disservice to every other sport, specifically men's basketball, if you come out of your stance before the center snaps the ball.

The way you identify what needs to be done is imagine us with a football stadium on-or-near-campus (location is irrelevant for this exercise) and a football team that is appropriately supported financially. Then, look around at the rest of the program and see what needs to be done.

- Basketball still needs its on-campus arena.
- Most sports need to be competitive enough in coach's salaries and recruiting budget to avoid taking a step back (Moynihan and Nikolic to Northwestern stings immensely)
- Is baseball still viable?
- Track, Tennis, and Baseball all are limited as far as facilities are concerned.

So what's the point of pushing for football, or even hockey, if we're not going to address these concerns?

Were I the Athletic Director, I would strongly consider a "Milwaukee's Going Big Time" athletics fundraising campaign that would raise money for all of these together with the intent to push for eventual inclusion in a high-major conference for all sports. Football stadium, basketball/hockey arena, practice facility for basketball, hockey, as well as an indoor "barn" for football and track-and-field that would be much like YSU's WATTS facility (http://ysusports.com/information/facilities/watts). At that point you'd have to seriously consider whether or not baseball should continue in its current form, since it has become painfully obvious that baseball in the north is dying and we will never be allowed to play our entire schedule inside Miller Park, the university's only realistic option to continuing the program (an unrealistic option would be to construct a domed stadium for a non-revenue sport).

Currently, our donor base is small. But I think you grow it considerably when you make the fundraising campaign an all-encompassing thing. Hockey and lacrosse are niche sports (LAX more than hockey) that open you up to an extremely affluent donor base that doesn't currently have anything to do with the university. Pursuing football opens you up to all of the football fans in the area who find themselves on the outside looking in for season-tickets to the Packers and Badgers, as well as alumni who have always thought of their program as "small time."

The program really has an opportunity right here to make the right decisions. In my mind, this university has made four wrong moves that have hindered our program:

- In 1974, the university dropped football, instead of deciding to pursue making the athletics program a top university; if they continued to play football and increased their financial support of the program, they could be far past where they are now.

- In 1980, the decision was made to drop out of Division-I because of lack of financial stability (as well as a basketball scandal).

- In 1990, the program went D-I despite the wishes of the faculty. It wasn't that the faculty didn't want D-I - they overwhelmingly did - but they wanted to used a move to D-I to push for upgrades in facilities and possible new sports.

- In the early 2000's, the Klotsche Center Pavilion was built and finished in 2006. Instead of razing the entire building, they only made the Pavilion addition, losing a prime chance to build the on-campus basketball and volleyball game and practice facilities.

[IWB]

Great stuff, only one question... you mentioned the goal to be eventual inclusion in a high-major conference for all sports. While none of us know where the conference alignments will be in 10, 5 or even three years, what high major conference do you see as a realistic goal for Milwaukee? If it were now, today, what conference would be the best fit, along with the most legitimate opportunity?

[Jimmy Lemke]

For the exercise, let's assume that Milwaukee has a MAC-football program with a 35k-seat stadium, a basketball arena, and all of its facilities under control.

The Big East would be the conference that would be likeliest, although the Big 12 is a geographical possibility as well. Marquette would block any membership in the Big East, this much is obvious - it's not in the Golden Eagles' best interest. The Big Ten will always have Wisconsin, and unless that conference were to approach 20 members - not an unlikely possibility in the 15-20 year window - I don't see a "completed" Milwaukee program getting in that conference.

10-15-20 years from now, if Milwaukee gets its ducks in a row, I see no reason its football program could not be close, equal, or surpassing the ones at Cincinnati, Louisville, Memphis, Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State, Baylor, Texas Tech, etc. There are a lot of institutional advantages that Milwaukee has that every MAC school and most I-AA and I-AAA teams in the midwest do not.

Milwaukee, as we know, is a city of front-runners, and that's why the program doesn't have support. It's not because it's bad, or it's a commuter school, or anything like that. It's because our university operates in the Horizon League, which is obviously an inferior conference to the Big East and Big Ten, the other local conferences.

I would say that if we get facilities and sports in a row to set us up for inclusion, the Big XII would be the likeliest possibility. But Marquette's time in the Big East will likely end when the football schools tire of sharing revenue with basketball schools. That's when Marquette and the other leftovers will form the "Basketball Catholic Elite" conference of Big East private I-AA and I-AAA schools, along with Xavier/Dayton/Saint Louis/Temple. Then Milwaukee would have an opportunity to latch on to the Big East.

But like I said, 1,000,000 things have to happen between now and then. We just need to get off our asses and make it happen.

[Jeremy Lancour]

Not to get off topic but I hate the whole "Milwaukee is a city of frontrunners"

That line goes for every city in America because every city is a frontrunner. Attendance if down everywhere when teams suck with few exceptions such as the Packers.

True fans always go. Casual fans go when "their" team is winning.

[IWB]

A couple pf comments about the Big East. People are wrong when they say that the football schools will tire of sharing revenue with the basketball schools. The football money is not "shared" with the basketball schools, the football schools and the football schools alone, share that cash. The issue that the football schools have is that the commissioner and the commissioner before him were both from "basketball schools", so the belief there is that they are always positioning for the bb schools, and not looking out for the football schools' best interests.

Second, while the basketball only conference is in all likelihood the end result, it won't be the football teams holding the Big East name when all is said and done. The majority of the charter members will hold the rights to the name of the conference, and if that split does occur, the majority of the charter members, Providence, St. John's, Georgetown, UConn, Seton Hall and Villanova(?) would hold the rights. (I question Villanova because they came in about 2 1/2 years later, so not sure they are considered a "charter member").

So, with the expected split, it would be 4-2 basketball majority, so the basketball schools would retain the rights.

[Goose85]

UWM, if it were to get football, would have to play 1a level for a few years.

I think the MAC conference would be the goal. That or the new Conference USA / Mountain West merger would be another.
Need to step up in hoop and start making annual NCAA trips before they would be in position, with football, to get into the MAC.

I'm a MU fan and I'd buy season tickets to UWM football.

[Jimmy Lemke]

Goose - you mean I-AA, that is the "FCS" that plays the tournament at the end of the year and is the lower division. I-A "FBS" is the Bowl subdivision.

That "football money" that you speak of, Jim, is the money divvied up for bowls. That money obviously does not get shared with MU, Seton Hall, etc. The basketball money for the NCAA Tournament does. The money I'm talking about, however, is the lucrative deal with ESPN, which is coming to an end in basketball after this season and for football in 2014.

The football schools are the economic driver behind that television deal - not because the bball schools are worse, but because they only provide November through early March programming; football schools provide August through early March programming. That's what it's all about, and the football schools won't want to share that revenue.

The MAC is a more reachable goal, obviously, but it's hardly the ceiling. Every time somebody says MKE can't do something, they eventually break through and do it.

1988: We'll never be D-I
1990: We'll never be in a conference
1993: We'll never be in a GOOD conference
1999: We'll never average more than a handful of family and friends at games
2001: We'll never string together winning seasons
2002: We'll never go to the NCAA Tournament
2003: We'll never get an at-large berth to a post-season tournament
2004: We'll never go to the Sweet 16
2005: We'll never average more in attendance than Pearl's last season
2006: We'll never be a good program again
2010: We'll never win a conference title again

And the beat goes on. Fifteen years ago, the Milwaukee Panthers played D-I college basketball in front of a gaggle of family and friends every night. Today, there are 2,000 season-ticket holders, they averaged 4,200 in a year in which they were the four seed in the conference tournament, and won 20 games. Again.

I don't understand why we'd have to make annual trips to the NCAA Tournament to get in the MAC. I'm not sure you are aware that the Horizon League has beaten the MAC in non-conference play for several years running now. If you think the MAC is better, I'm not surprised - that's the level of perception that football awards their universities, and that's a perception that can only help the program where it's at right now.

Personally, I'd love to be the team to replace Temple as a football-only member in the MAC. Making annual NCAA trips would be prerequisite for getting into a high-major conference, of course.

[Goose85]

I would love for Milwaukee to be in the MAC. The question is, how much revenue would Milwaukee bring to the MAC?

That is what I don't get when people talk about Louisville going to the Big 12. If each school in the Big 12 gets upward of $17 mil per season, will adding Louisville bring in added revenue of $20 mil to the conference? If not, then why would memeber schools take less money to add a new member?

Same for any conference adding Milwaukee. First, Milwaukee has to have a football team I would think. Then, the football team would need to be in a conference - do you start with FCS and try to get into a conference like the Missouri Valley or just go indy until making the jump FBS? By the time that all happens, who knows, there could be a third tier of college football.

I would really like to see Milwaukee get a football team. Then we could start to speculate where they could go, but until that time the best thing to do is continually upgrade the basketball program.

[IWB]

Jimmy - I hear what you are saying, but the Big East TV money is not divided up equally. The football schools get their allotment, and everyone splits the rest. Marquette isn't pulling in anything from the football side of the TV contract, except for the fact that having the TV contract builds the basketball portion up to a higher number.

Agree with Goo on the Louisville comment which is also what I really don't get about the conference realignment. There is only so much cash out there. For example, if the Big 10 really wanted to raise it to 16 teams, the additional 4 teams would have to bring in about $100 million. What schools, other than ND, Texas, USC and Oklahoma, can bring in $25 million each? No one. Same reason why it doesn't make sense for the Big XII to go beyond 10 teams. The money from a conference championship will only lessen the shares of a bigger pie.

[Mark Miller]

Where in the world would Milwaukee get money to play DI football? Not saying it isn't possible, but the chances of that happening, I would guess, are slim.

[Jimmy Lemke]

The pressure on Rick Costello (Milwaukee's AD) to bring football to campus is heavier than any type of pressure on any athletic director we've had in any situation. Rick is our fourth AD in the past three years (Bud retired June '09, George April '09-April '10, Dave Gilbert April '10-February '11, Costello February '11-present).

The rules for starting a football program and going to I-A are as such: you start in I-AA as an independent for two years. After those two years, if you have an invitation from a I-A conference, you can move up. You cannot move to I-A without an invitation from a conference. UMass could not have moved up to I-A without an invite from the MAC. UConn, as you may be aware, played as an independent from 2000-2003, but had an invitation from the Big East to move up so they were able to do so.

So, any road to the Football Big East or Big 12 would have to go through the MAC. What I know is that the mix of market, enrollment, endowment, and academic standing put Milwaukee at the head of the pack should they join the MAC. One or two schools have bigger enrollments, a couple have bigger endowments and thus higher academic standing, but no team in the MAC can match the Milwaukee market and no team is near the top of the MAC in each of those categories. So you see that Milwaukee has a lot to offer the MAC, as well as down the road to a BCS program.

The Big 12 does not have a presence in the Milwaukee media market, which is the 35th largest media market in the country and would be the fourth-largest media market in the Big 12 after #5 Dallas/Ft. Worth (TCU, many B12 fan bases), #23 Pittsburgh (WVU's market), and #31 Kansas City (KU/KSU). It's an enviable market to have - which, as you know, media market is the driving force behind adding any program. MU got into the Big East partly because of the media market.

[Goose85]

I do know Milwaukee may be in better shape from a schollie standpoint to address football than MU is at this point, that is not my question.

It does appear that this is something on the thought process of those in charge at UWM. Do you know if there is any discussion on where they would even play?

For MU, that is the big issue as revenue from the expected next Big East football contact would likely double tuition costs of athletes, but the expense of a stadium could be significant and that could be a hold up.

Not sure that Milwaukee would be an option for a conference such as the Big 12 for a long time. At this point, even if they had football, would Milwaukee actually generate an additional $20 million in revenue for the Big 12? I doubt they would bring even half that amount.

[Jimmy Lemke]

Football teams in the Big East get a bigger portion of the TV money, but if they split off on their own to create a "Football Big East," their next TV deal wouldn't be significantly less than the current one. It would be less - but enough to keep them floating. The remnants, which would be the basketball schools, would easily be the largest TV contract ever signed by a non-football conference - however, it won't come near the deal they'd get if they had football schools to latch onto that provide three more months of programming. That would be offset by the fact that everyone gets a bigger piece of the pie, and it's still better than any other option. Take the basketball-only schools, snap up some good Jesuit schools in Xavier, Dayton, Creighton and Saint Louis, then strike out on your own.


I do know Milwaukee may be in better shape from a schollie standpoint to address football than MU is at this point, that is not my question.

It does appear that this is something on the thought process of those in charge at UWM. Do you know if there is any discussion on where they would even play?

For MU, that is the big issue as revenue from the expected next Big East football contact would likely double tuition costs of athletes, but the expense of a stadium could be significant and that could be a hold up.

Not sure that Milwaukee would be an option for a conference such as the Big 12 for a long time. At this point, even if they had football, would Milwaukee actually generate an additional $20 million in revenue for the Big 12? I doubt they would bring even half that amount.

The discussion is obviously there as far as location. The preference, as it would be for any school, would be to play in the campus neighborhood. However, about 30% of all I-A FBS schools play two or more miles off of campus. On-or-near campus, there are few options, the best of which is that same Wisconsin Paperboard Corporation space that the neighborhood association wants to turn into an arboretum. That space, as I've illustrated elsewhere, could be re-appropriated to house a basketball/volleyball/hockey arena, a practice barn like YSU's WATTS, and a football stadium. Surprisingly, that's with considerable space to spare. If they committed to buying up more land in the area, they could even add other facilities or additional parking. Let's say that doesn't work. In the 11 miles from Hawaii's campus to Aloha Stadium, the university could find...what, 15-20 spaces where they could build a stadium? On-campus is preferable, but football at all is the goal.

You say that MKE likely would not be an option for the Big 12 for a long time. You're right. My expectation is that 2030 is the earliest a Milwaukee football program could find itself in a BCS conference. That is if the BCS exists then. That time is 18 years from now; 18 years ago, Milwaukee joined the Midwestern Collegiate Conference, actually averaged about 100 fans, and was the lowest of low-majors. Now look where we are. The idea that another 18 years will mean only marginal advancement is...unlikely.