Administration and Athletics

[BearDownMU]

We had our Mercer Athletic Foundation board meeting last weekend. Every year at the Fall board meeting the President gives us a "State of the Union"ish presentation. He shared a fascinating stat with us. From 1950-2006 Mercer won a total of 13 conference championships (across multiple conferences). From 2006-2023 Mercer has won (including at least this share of the SoCon football title) 43 conference championships (Mostly ASUN at the beginning and the SoCon since 2014). Bill Underwood took his post as President of Mercer in 2006. He's the most pro-athletics President I've ever seen. Our last President had great vision for the academic mission of the university, but didn't care too much about sports. President Underwood believes in both. I see him at just about every game and he's honestly one of the most competitive people I've ever met. I've also never been in a meeting with him where he hasn't said "If we aren't trying to compete for a conference title, why even have the sport."

All of this is evident from the massive investment Mercer has made in athletics (including resurrecting football in 2013) and the success of our sports teams has also rendered ever increasing enrollment and awareness.

All that said, my only experience is really with Bill and the former President when I was a baseball player at Mercer in 90's. I have to imagine that alignment with the President and Athletics is a massive predictor of success. I've heard horror stories of anti-athletics presidents and it seems that those programs struggle, or succeed in spite of it.

What is y'all experience with your programs and the support of the Administration and how that affects success? Just curious.

[Outsider1]

We have a President that believes in the power of sports as well. He is at most sporting events. He has hired passionate AD personnel. It has made a tremendous difference in our investments into sports. It's not just about the money, but personnel, time, programs, etc... I wish there was better communication to fans, but that is a side issue.

[JALMOND]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fBLCKBVNm4

[caribbeanhen]

We had our Mercer Athletic Foundation board meeting last weekend. Every year at the Fall board meeting the President gives us a "State of the Union"ish presentation. He shared a fascinating stat with us. From 1950-2006 Mercer won a total of 13 conference championships (across multiple conferences). From 2006-2023 Mercer has won (including at least this share of the SoCon football title) 43 conference championships (Mostly ASUN at the beginning and the SoCon since 2014). Bill Underwood took his post as President of Mercer in 2006. He's the most pro-athletics President I've ever seen. Our last President had great vision for the academic mission of the university, but didn't care too much about sports. President Underwood believes in both. I see him at just about every game and he's honestly one of the most competitive people I've ever met. I've also never been in a meeting with him where he hasn't said "If we aren't trying to compete for a conference title, why even have the sport."

All of this is evident from the massive investment Mercer has made in athletics (including resurrecting football in 2013) and the success of our sports teams has also rendered ever increasing enrollment and awareness.

All that said, my only experience is really with Bill and the former President when I was a baseball player at Mercer in 90's. I have to imagine that alignment with the President and Athletics is a massive predictor of success. I've heard horror stories of anti-athletics presidents and it seems that those programs struggle, or succeed in spite of it.

What is y'all experience with your programs and the support of the Administration and how that affects success? Just curious.

Patrick Harker at the University of Delaware was the example of a horrible President

He ran KC Keeler off to Texas basically because KC and the football program we’re getting a little bit bigger than Patrick at Delaware and Harker was not gonna have that

The football program went into a 10 year mini dark age once KC left

[Reign of Terrier]

It’s very popular for folks at Wofford to think the President of the College (Dr. Samhat) hates athletics (and Greek Life), when in the last 10 years we’ve built a new basketball arena, a practice field or two with artificial turf, brought women’s lacrosse and softball to campus with a new stadium, increased funding for baseball (and created a new Greek row and other buildings).

My retort is simple: Wofford cares about athletics (for giving people an education), it’s just that the money sports like football/basketball got a lot of investment in the 2000s and early 2010s, and for the health of the overall athletic program, more investment in other areas was necessary

Wofford has had our struggles in athletics, but it’s not due to facilities. It’s due to hiring total assholes and not firing total assholes. Our previous athletic director was a little bit of a maniac (A Citadel grad, so expressing his culture, you could say). He once invaded the locker room of the basketball team at half time to get a player to move his car out of a parking spot reserved for an alumnus. He let Jay McAuley basically bully his players and overwork them through multiple cycles (McAuley is disgraced and coaching at the high school level because he may never coach college again). He let Josh Conklin go full MAGA chud in the middle of the pandemic (I understand that there are disagreements about what happened back then, but keep in mind Wofford didn’t cancel its season and Wofford is in South Carolina), running off multiple players (some in the middle of the season) and assistants, including our OC of 30 years who is rumored to say he made football no longer fun, posting the longest losing streak in like 30 years, winning only 4 games in 3 years and ultimately resigned for some innocuous reason that was never made public

Thank God he is gone. Anyway, people think of administrations nowadays as some kabal of people who hate fun and sports and running a good college. The reality is that they are both politicians and bureaucrats, and their constituency is usually various groups of contradictory interest and questionable degrees of sanity. They hate people bitching, but they know it’s part of the job. I know that’s true of Wofford’s president, because he has to tolerate people whining about things that are measurably not true.

I think administrations suck when they don’t have transparent policies or procedures - which is basically Wofford. But otherwise, they’re listening to incentives. They aren’t going to nuke a program unless it’s absolutely unviable for the entire athletic program. By the same token, they aren’t going to lift them to the SEC either because at this level, athletics are usually not in the top 3 pressing issues of an administration. But an AD has a lot of power.

TL;DR: An AD is probably more important than a president for lots of these things.

[JacksFan40]

Barry Dunn has done a great job at SDSU with both academics and athletics. Campus has changed quite a bit since I graduated almost 15 years ago and for the better. Athletics have received a complete make over as well, though that has more to do with Justin Sell.

President Dunn is pushing for SDSU to reach R1 status which would be huge. Can’t quite remember what the time-frame was but I think they’re getting close.

[RahRahRabbits]

Barry Dunn has done a great job at SDSU with both academics and athletics. Campus has changed quite a bit since I graduated almost 15 years ago and for the better. Athletics have received a complete make over as well, though that has more to do with Justin Sell.

President Dunn is pushing for SDSU to reach R1 status which would be huge. Can’t quite remember what the time-frame was but I think they’re getting close.

The R1 status comment made me have to look into this some more. There are 146 "R1" research institutions currently, and 133 "R2". R1's have at least 20 research/scholarship doctoral degrees/year, and spend $50+ million annually in research. R2 universities have 20 research doctoral students and a $5 million minimum research spend. Looks like for 2025, the doctoral degrees increase to 70 and 20, respectively, while research funding remains constant.

Of those 146 current R1 institutions, 119 sponsor football, while 27 do not. 126 are at the D1 level (109 sponsor football at either FBS/FCS), only 4 at D2 (half sponsor football), and 14 at the D3 level (8 football).

Of the D1's that sponsor football, 92 are at the FBS level and 17 at FCS (8 of which are Ivies). The remaining 9 FCS schools are Albany, Georgetown, Maine, Montana, Montana State, New Hampshire, NDSU, Stony Brook, and UC-Davis.

Certainly a pretty exclusive club, with only 17 of the 129 FCS-level schools achieving the designation.

[Go Lehigh TU Owl]

We had our Mercer Athletic Foundation board meeting last weekend. Every year at the Fall board meeting the President gives us a "State of the Union"ish presentation. He shared a fascinating stat with us. From 1950-2006 Mercer won a total of 13 conference championships (across multiple conferences). From 2006-2023 Mercer has won (including at least this share of the SoCon football title) 43 conference championships (Mostly ASUN at the beginning and the SoCon since 2014). Bill Underwood took his post as President of Mercer in 2006. He's the most pro-athletics President I've ever seen. Our last President had great vision for the academic mission of the university, but didn't care too much about sports. President Underwood believes in both. I see him at just about every game and he's honestly one of the most competitive people I've ever met. I've also never been in a meeting with him where he hasn't said "If we aren't trying to compete for a conference title, why even have the sport."

All of this is evident from the massive investment Mercer has made in athletics (including resurrecting football in 2013) and the success of our sports teams has also rendered ever increasing enrollment and awareness.

All that said, my only experience is really with Bill and the former President when I was a baseball player at Mercer in 90's. I have to imagine that alignment with the President and Athletics is a massive predictor of success. I've heard horror stories of anti-athletics presidents and it seems that those programs struggle, or succeed in spite of it.

What is y'all experience with your programs and the support of the Administration and how that affects success? Just curious.

Great post! I wish there were more like this!

I can offer insight into Temple, DePaul and Kansas State but no one wants to hear about these institutions on an FCS board any more than I "work them in" as it is. Besides, I don't have the time nor the energy to get into Temple's issues at this point anyway. The PL alumni feedback to this question figures to be quite....hmm....thought provoking?

[ngineer]

As Owl alluded in his post, the Patriot League is unique in its approach to athletics, seeing it as an integral part of education--especially in the area of developing leadership and awareness of from where people come from in terms of social strata, diverse viewpoints but working together despite differences. I recommend visiting the Patriot League website and review the mission statement. From my perspective in observing the other PL schools over the years, it is apparent that the President of the University/College can have significant impact on generating interest as well as providing support for athletics. Some schools have longstanding traditional excellence in certain sports and there have been efforts to expand such activities. However, despite the interest shown by the President, each school's Board of Trustees hold the purse strings in terms of operational budget. This leaves the schools' athletic departments engaging in significant fundraising efforts to 'supplement' whatever the Board allocates for Athletics. Indeed, at Lehigh, the traditional title of 'Athletic Director' was jettisoned years ago and replaced with "Dean of Athletics". In essence, the athletic department operates in similar fashion as the academic departments of Engineering, Business, Arts & Science and Health Sciences. There is a School of Education, but that is strictly a graduate degree entity. In my experience as a Lehigh undergrad and alum (54 years), the role of the President is important as he/she can advocate, strongly, to the Board for greater allocation of finances. At the same time, the relationship with the Dean of Athletics is important as to how the Athletic budget is allocated among the different sports offered. Due to Title IX, there must be equitable allocation. Unfortunately, due to the large number of students playing football versus the number playing any other sports, there is a tricky dance to assure equitable allocation. I have noticed a number of the "football factory" schools drop a number of sports rather than increase athletic opportunities. Huge institutions, a number in the south, only have barely more than a dozen intercollegiate programs. Lehigh has 25 intercollegiate programs with almost 900 students participating (out of undergraduate enrollment of 5,600). The Athletic Department has created team "partnerships" wherein alumni can make charitable contributions to individual programs. Our current President Helble, is very visible on campus and at athletic events. He, himself, a Lehigh alum, was on the Cross Country team back in the early 1980's, and today conducts a "Pace the Prez" event several times a week wherein students can join him at the Flagpole on the central green for a 5 mile run around the campus. He attends all home football games, when in town, and travels among the many tailgates pre-game. I see him at the wrestling matches, basketball games, softball, etc. Over the years, the level of involvement of our presidents has varied. Most have been supportive, recognizing how athletics can be a strong supplement to academics, if done properly. Our new football head coach, Cahill, stresses academics as a major selling point to recruits and had involved scores of football alumni into a mentoring program for the team throughout the year, which has been enthusiastically received by the team. The Patriot League has academic requirements for all sports (noting that not all PL schools have football, and two (Army and Navy)who are FBS; which require that the student athletes admitted must "mirror" the student body. There is an agreed upon 'deviation' that schools must adhere to in granting admission and the schools must share their lists of admitted athletes so that the process is 'self policed'. I have found that when a school's major sports are doing well, i.e. regularly "in the hunt" for a League championship, that atmosphere and energy on campus and among alums is enhanced, which yields a higher interest in financially supporting the programs. Having some teams being able to compete for national championships does provide the school with broader recognition resulting in significant spikes in applications due to publicity. When Lehigh upset Duke in basketball in the NCAA's in 2012, the applications to Lehigh soared. There are a host of factors that can impact the ability of a school to grow its athletic program, but not to the expense of lowering its academic reputation. But the role of the President is important. If the President shows that she is interested in various programs, it will consequently draw attention. A President who is lackadaisical in attitude toward athletics will be communicating that they are not important. Hence, no financial support. There are books written on this subject...and I have abused my time. But, as Billy Crystal says, "Don't get me started!...."xsmiley_wix

[Mocs123]

Mercer's Administration does seem to really support athletics.

[Puddin Tane]

Lamar’s newish prez (2021) is a big sports supporter.

[Go Lehigh TU Owl]

Lamar’s newish prez (2021) is a big sports supporter.

I maintain that Lamar Athletics has a high ceiling. The general infrastructure is certainly in place and there is a history of viability. A potential hindrance is location. Given the industrialized nature of Beaumont, it's not going to rank high on the destination list. That said, I was encouraged by multiple people in academia to reach out to Lamar (and North Texas) when I was vetting PhD programs due to their modest costs/excellent outcomes. And it's not like North Philadelphia (home of Temple) is known for its ethereal appeal.

Lamar and Tarleton are both interesting institutions to monitor moving forward.

[mainejeff]

Maine has an administration that fully supports athletics as well. Having recently reached R1 status, $200+ million pumped into athletic facilities and multiple teams on the rise....it's a great time to be a Black Bear fan!