(04-18-2024 12:47 PM)johnbragg Wrote:  

(04-18-2024 11:12 AM)esayem Wrote:  ^ why would they have to trade it?

Theoretically if they could wave a magic wand. They can't.

But the point is that there's only so much money, administration attention, donor support, political support etc.

They probably could have started a football program. It would have been a financial drain, but plenty of schools do it.

They focused on leveraging their NoVa location, and going against the ideological grain of most of academia. It worked. I'm sure there's a Louisiana or Texas or Oklahoma state school that's mediocre overall but has an amazing petrochemical engineering program for similar reasons.

People look at Old Dominion and James MAdison and ask "why not George Mason", when it's just as relevant to look at Stony Brook or Albany or Towson, from the FCS ranks, or UMKC or UNO or SIU-Edwardsville or Missouri-St Louis or UT-Dallas or UT-ARlington, in terms of "4 year state commuter college in or adjacent to a major city"

I doubt adding football is going to damage a institution's law school. The basketball program for sure but not the law school. VA schools aren't allowed to use institutional funds towards their athletic programs anyway.

(04-16-2024 12:46 PM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  

(04-16-2024 12:36 PM)johnbragg Wrote:  

(04-16-2024 12:17 PM)CitrusUCF Wrote:  At this point, what is holding them back from launching football and heading to FBS as quickly as possible? Institutionally, they resemble academically superior versions of recent and pending FBS startups and move-ups (e.g., Kennesaw, Ga State, UTSA, etc.). I'd wager decently that VCU would be in the AAC now if they had started football even just 10 years ago.

And despite all the impending doom for the G5, we are still seeing schools move up from FCS - even long-term, committed FCS members like Delaware, who moved up to the least stable conference.

So, why are they sticking with non-football status? Strategically? Financially? Legally?

Football is expensive, and not cost-effective for them. George Mason invests in their riught wing law school and economics department. Not saying that as a slam--they realized that they were within commuting distance of Capitol Hill, that there was a pool of right-leaning law types and economics types that they could chase and build a brand with. "Come teach here on Tuesdays Wednesdays Thurdsays, talk to Congressmen and CSPAN and CNN on Mondays and Fridays." That let them build a top 50 law school and an economics department with a couple of Economics Nobel PRize winners on the back of a (25 years ago when I went there) completely nondescript regional commuter school.

That gets them more attention and more prestige than William and Mary's FCS team, or James MAdison's or East Carolina's FBS teams.

VCU, the bang-for-the-buck is in their basketball program.

Yes - exactly. GMU and VCU are two examples of non-flagship public universities that are doing quite well enrollment-wise, which has been an issue for a lot of other non-flagships.

Tangentially, I have always liked the Virginia public university model where they each generally have different focus areas and types of student profiles compared to most other states where there’s often a flagship, maybe a #2 school, and then a lot of regional/directional schools. I think this has allowed the Virginia public universities beyond just UVA to do pretty well in an increasingly competitive enrollment environment. GMU is strong in the public policy/law/economics areas befitting its close proximity to DC while VCU is strong in health sciences and the arts. William & Mary is essentially public version of an East Coast liberal arts college while Virginia Tech concentrates on STEM. The non-flagship schools in Virginia aren’t just regional versions of the same institutional template as they are in so many other states.

That's slowly starting to.happen in the state of Alabama, IMO. The University of Montevallo is like the more traditional Southern liberal arts college, Auburn focuses on STEM, AAMU focuses on agriculture, USA focuses on music & medicine, UAB focuses on medicine, Troy focuses on business, Jax State focuses on nursing, and I guess 'Bama focuses on law and economics. AllTiedUp, if I'm wrong, please feel free to correct me. UAH focuses on engineering, and AUM focuses on education and pharmacy. All of this is IMO. I'm not sure what UNA's specialty is, but I believe ASU is the party school in the state.