(01-28-2015 02:33 PM)army56mike Wrote:  

(01-27-2015 10:09 PM)GE and MTS Wrote:  Men's basketball should be the #2 sport at the school in order of branding, marketing, and importance. If that isn't the case for Liberty then something needs done.

I humbly disagree. Basketball and football should be viewed as equals. We want to be championship caliber in both. Some top universities are able to pull this off. I use my local teams as an example. Kentucky has always been a basketball first school. Thus they are content with football mediocrity or oblivion. Louisville has made great effort to have championship caliber teams in football and basketball.... well all sports actually. But we are talking football and basketball.

Some schools have basketball first. Carolina, Kentucky, U-Mass, U-Conn, come first to mind. Basketball first tends to be the exception rather than the rule. What would be best for LU? Basketball or Football. Because of the high predominance of football being first in most schools, LU likely will be better positioned with football as the predominate sport. Having said that, basketball should be equally promoted and be a near equal with recognition and interest. When LU has the MBB program on an upward swing, each sport should propel the other to greater acceptance and visibility. We can agree that both should be equally promoted to succeed and it's likely football will be the kingpin simply because it's that way with most other programs.

(01-28-2015 02:33 PM)army56mike Wrote:  

(01-27-2015 10:09 PM)GE and MTS Wrote:  Men's basketball should be the #2 sport at the school in order of branding, marketing, and importance. If that isn't the case for Liberty then something needs done.

I humbly disagree. Basketball and football should be viewed as equals. We want to be championship caliber in both. Some top universities are able to pull this off. I use my local teams as an example. Kentucky has always been a basketball first school. Thus they are content with football mediocrity or oblivion. Louisville has made great effort to have championship caliber teams in football and basketball.... well all sports actually. But we are talking football and basketball.

Basketball and football should both be the main priorities of our resources but they should not be equals. We do want to be championship caliber at both, and in every sport. Realistically, if we could only be championship in one, choose football every time. If you aren't going to be a blue blood basketball school then you better be above average at football. Athletic directors get fired when football has prolonged periods of failure but not so much with basketball.

It may be wise to redirect our efforts into becoming a mid-major basketball power once we go FBS while staying respectable in football since almost every other school is putting basketball on the back-burner. If we can be known for something then we can at least try to use that branding to market ourselves to improve the other sports.

N&A beat writer Chris Lang strongest words yet about men's basketball in Fri, Jan 30 paper:

"Attendance mysteries: I’m not buying 1,939, which was the listed attendance. That number includes tickets sold. A huge portion of the crowd last night was some sort of group that all arrived together and didn’t seem to know or care about basketball. The Vines Center is completely dead. The students don’t care at all. Apathy is worse than anger."