Kennesaw State FB Update

[TexasTerror]

Big vote this week...


A student vote this week at Kennesaw State University on whether to approve a fee increase to pay for the sport could lead to the Owls taking the gridiron four years from now.

KSU officials say they're interested launching a football program because it would add value to the school’s degrees, enhance fund-raising and could increase enrollment.

Georgia State University picked up 1,000 additional students when it launched its football program this fall, KSU President Dan Papp said. Attendance at GSU’s six football games this season has averaged 17,094 people, according to school officials.

http://www.ajc.com/news/cobb/ksu-football-faces-student-731324.html

[superman7515]

Obviously the guys from Georgia would be better positioned to answer this, but how many teams could the state of Georgia support? Especially the Atlanta area. Eventually, the market becomes too saturated.

[chattanoogamocs]

Obviously the guys from Georgia would be better positioned to answer this, but how many teams could the state of Georgia support? Especially the Atlanta area. Eventually, the market becomes too saturated.

State of Georgia has almost 10,000,000 people (6,000,000 in the Atlanta MSA) and only 5 DI football schools (UT, UGA, GSU, GSU, SSU).

Conversely, Tennessee only has 6,300,000 people and 9 DI football schools (4 FBS, 5 FCS)

So yes, imo, there is plenty of room for KSU to join DI football in Georgia.

[glsjunior]

State of Georgia has almost 10,000,000 people (6,000,000 in the Atlanta MSA) and only 5 DI football schools (UT, UGA, GSU, GSU, SSU).

Conversely, Tennessee only has 6,300,000 people and 9 DI football schools (4 FBS, 5 FCS)

So yes, imo, there is plenty of room for KSU to join DI football in Georgia.

Hell Alabama has 5 FBS schools once you count S. Alabama in 2013, and another 4 FCS schools.

[superman7515]

That's kind of my point. Tennessee Tech's average attendance was 5500 last year, UT Martin was 4700, Alabama A&M 4400, Alabama St. 6000, Samford 5500. That's not meant to knock on them, they have their fans and their alumni, students, and fans are certainly entitled to a team if they continue to support them. The problem is eventually you have more teams than people who care. That's why I was asking if they could support the team. It wasn't meant as a knock or to find out census numbers for the area, just to gauge the level of support in the area for Kennesaw State athletics.

[JSU02]

If Kennesaw's team puts out a good product, people will want to care about it and they will fill that little soccer stadium across the street from campus up. If they were playing games by now, this would have been a good year to pick up fans with both UGA and Tech having a so-so year.

[gophoenix]

Obviously the guys from Georgia would be better positioned to answer this, but how many teams could the state of Georgia support? Especially the Atlanta area. Eventually, the market becomes too saturated.

North Carolina has the same population with no area the size of Atlanta.

Charlotte has Gardner-Webb, Davidson and soon to be UNCC
Triad has Wake Forest, NC A&T, Elon and App to an extent
Asheville has Western Carolina
Raleigh has NC State, UNC, Duke, Campbell and NC Central
Then there is ECU

South Carolina is even smaller and they have The Citadel, Charleston South, Presbyterian, South Carolina, Clemson, Coastal Carolina, Wofford, Furman and SC State

I think Georgia is sitting pretty..... even with adding Kennesaw and more.

[adamsputnik]

Obviously the guys from Georgia would be better positioned to answer this, but how many teams could the state of Georgia support? Especially the Atlanta area. Eventually, the market becomes too saturated.

Between Cobb and Cherokee counties, which are KSU's primary catchment areas, there are about a million people (excuse my lazy mathematics) who are not really represented by a colleger program. Sure, many of these will have allegiances to UGA and Tech, but KSU will provide that local option that is currently only provided by HS football. I think that the sheer number of people living in close proximity to KSU, as well as the number of students these counties provide, will ensure a pretty decent level of support.

[chattanoogamocs]

That's kind of my point. Tennessee Tech's average attendance was 5500 last year, UT Martin was 4700, Alabama A&M 4400, Alabama St. 6000, Samford 5500. That's not meant to knock on them, they have their fans and their alumni, students, and fans are certainly entitled to a team if they continue to support them. The problem is eventually you have more teams than people who care. That's why I was asking if they could support the team. It wasn't meant as a knock or to find out census numbers for the area, just to gauge the level of support in the area for Kennesaw State athletics.

Vandy, MTSU and TSU are all within 45 minutes of each other in Nashville and they all draw well...there is no reason to think GT, the non-SoCon GSU and KSU can't all draw well in Atlanta. KSU has a large enrollment (17K?) and their students enthusiastically voted to approve the fees to help field the team...I think it would be safe to say they could average 10K (which would put them in the top 20% of FCS attendance).

One of out regular posters on Mocfans is currently an undergrad there he said everyone was stoked about the idea of adding football.

I guess the question for you is, what do you consider good support?

[glsjunior]

They would have fit better as a top line Div II program since schools like Morehouse and Clark are never consistent winners in the SIAC. Trust me, I have lived in Atlanta my entire life and folks in Marietta, Kennesaw, Cherokee, Woodstock, etc., could care less about KSU. That school is basically a community college that blew up because they brought in students that couldn't get into Tech, UGA or GSU. Wait in 5 years you will hear about Gwinnett College fielding a football team. http://www.ggc.edu/about-ggc/ggc-news-room/1531-georgia-gwinnett-college-to-explore-intercollegiate-athletics

[adamsputnik]

According to KSU Radio, the results from the student vote over the last week or so came out 55% in favour of starting football.

Time to move onto the fundraising part of the plan.

Exciting times for KSU folks after defeating GA Tech on home court in the basketball last night.

[GSUhooligan]

They would have fit better as a top line Div II program since schools like Morehouse and Clark are never consistent winners in the SIAC. Trust me, I have lived in Atlanta my entire life and folks in Marietta, Kennesaw, Cherokee, Woodstock, Fulton, DeKalb, Gwinnett etc., could care less about Georgia State. That school is basically a community college that blew up because they brought in students that couldn't get into Tech, UGA or Emory. Wait in 5 years you will hear about Kennesaw State fielding a football team.

With the bolded edits, sounds like a post from a few years ago when Ga St was making their announcement.