Author Topic: 2012-2020: Future of SBU Football - Conference Affiliation, FBS Football, etc  (Read 25750 times)

VA_Seawolf

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I think the MAC with Buffalo, Massachusetts, and Stony Brook would bring some interest for the Stony Brook fan. The problem with UMass is that I'm not sure they want to leave the A10 for MAC Basketball. If we could find a fourth school in the Northeast area to join the MAC that would work well. Hey... who knows... can they add Army?

Umass turned down an all sports invite to the MAC. A move that may come back to bite them in the rear end now that their football is struggling as an independent and the A10 only got two bids last year. If anymore A10 realignment occurs, say VCU to The American or Dayton and St. Louis to the Big East, Umass will look like a bunch of fools for turning down the MAC and will come back begging with their tail between their legs.

I think Army will stay as an independent. If they wanted to they could join and G5 conference they want and have not done so. The American would add them and Air Force/BYU in a heartbeat.

VA_Seawolf

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That's because they are fighting to get the a share of the extremely small pie of attention that College football gathers in this region. The NFL dominates this part of the country like no other (there are historical reasons for that. NFL was centered in the NE from early on and the fall of the Ivy destroyed all College Football traditions). Even at the highest level, College Football is an afterthought for most people in this part of the country. Look at BC/Syracuse/Rutgers - the highest level of Power 5 CFB and it barely draws 30-40k fans per game.


Life is rough in this region. Whatever we do we have to think smart in financially... adding 20 more scholarships and leaving the playoffs behind needs to be justified first - either we seriously need an sustainable attendance bump or a conference that will bring in extra $$$

Two of the three schools you mentioned are private schools and Rutgers is a perennial doormat. We'd probably beat them if we played them this year. Penn St. I'd consider in the northeast and they're near the top of all college football in attendance. I don't think getting 25k out to games against regional opponents out here is an unrealistic goal some day soon.

The 44 scholarships (have to keep the numbers for men and women equal) is chump change compared to our budget. Our athletic budget is already top 5 among FCS public schools and higher than several FBS schools in G5 conferences. In 2015 we outspent San Jose St. and Nevada and they play in the Mountain West.

I'm convinced once we go on a deep playoff run in either football or basketball, Heilbron's phone will be ringing off the hook for conference invites. Mac, A10, CAA, etc.
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ibosbu

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That's because they are fighting to get the a share of the extremely small pie of attention that College football gathers in this region. The NFL dominates this part of the country like no other (there are historical reasons for that. NFL was centered in the NE from early on and the fall of the Ivy destroyed all College Football traditions). Even at the highest level, College Football is an afterthought for most people in this part of the country. Look at BC/Syracuse/Rutgers - the highest level of Power 5 CFB and it barely draws 30-40k fans per game.


Life is rough in this region. Whatever we do we have to think smart in financially... adding 20 more scholarships and leaving the playoffs behind needs to be justified first - either we seriously need an sustainable attendance bump or a conference that will bring in extra $$$

Two of the three schools you mentioned are private schools and Rutgers is a perennial doormat. We'd probably beat them if we played them this year. Penn St. I'd consider in the northeast and they're near the top of all college football in attendance. I don't think getting 25k out to games against regional opponents out here is an unrealistic goal some day soon.

The 44 scholarships (have to keep the numbers for men and women equal) is chump change compared to our budget. Our athletic budget is already top 5 among FCS public schools and higher than several FBS schools in G5 conferences. In 2015 we outspent San Jose St. and Nevada and they play in the Mountain West.

I'm convinced once we go on a deep playoff run in either football or basketball, Heilbron's phone will be ringing off the hook for conference invites. Mac, A10, CAA, etc.
Me too!

ecasadoSBU

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Yeah BC and Syracuse are private schools. But those are schools with long football traditions. Syracuse gets a lot of fan support from the city not just alumni, but they still can't draw fans to their football games. BC is also private in a large New England town but their fan base is more alumni based.

Rutgers sucks, we all know. But it's still B1G football! No matter how bad they may be Big Ten is a high-level of football.

Connecticut was drawing 40k for most of the 2000s but after downgrading to the AAC has seen their attendance collapse to the 20,000s. Guys, lets not underestimate how hard is going to be to climb the ladder. I'm not saying we shouldn't try it. We should aim that high but lets also be realistic of the CFB atmosphere in the Northeast.
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I like the 4 home-home games scheduled with Fordham next 4 year’s. May be they can provide a new NYC/LI rivalry spark. May be lol.

I think Fordham wants to improve but stuck in Patriot League. Patriot League as a whole needs to make a decision. They need to commit to either fully follow their role model Ivy League or be fully competitive. They are in between and it’s not helping them. Either drop scholarships and be like Ivy, or add red-shirting and be like CAA. Most of them have pretty good facilities for FCS standard. Or may be Fordham can get into CAA if JMU ever leaves.

Fordham is a potential add if JMU, or any other programs leave.

Fordham
Monmouth
Howard
Hampton
CCSU
Youngstown St.
Robert Morris
Kennesaw St.

could all be backfills if 1-3 teams leave in no particular order. All could be great additions, but none are worth proactively expanding for.  JMU will be the next team out the door and then we'll see. Delaware is likely to follow if JMU goes. Hopefully by then we're not far from an FBS invite either. A pretty attractive conference of east coast G5 schools could be made if the AAC gets raided by the Big 12 and implodes during the next great realignment shuffle.

that's a good point- the b12 could at any point court houston, SMU, tulsa, cincy, memphis.  maybe even tulane?  noting that houston is the most successful of the lot, memphis/cincy have their years, and we all know the SMU story...
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Campi47

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Even though many FCS Programs have left to go to the FBS it's still very mixed as many of these programs struggle to be a 500 team and the only reason why they draw is because of their locale especially down South so I don't think that at this time it would pay for SBU to consider doing anything like that until they figure out on how to draw fans to LaValle Stadium. I also believe to leave the CAA a team must now pay $1,000,000 exit fee.

I know we lose about 20 players who are graduating plus expect at least a half dozen players who will transfer or get dropped from the squad for a assortment of reasons, however the recruiting classes for 2016, 2017 and now for 2018 have been really solid classes so even though they are young they will be talented plus we do have a big junior class coming back next season

Wolffan

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Either drop scholarships and be like Ivy, or add red-shirting and be like CAA. Most of them have pretty good facilities for FCS standard. Or may be Fordham can get into CAA if JMU ever leaves.

I am pretty certain the PL does have red shirting...for example I know Holy Cross' QB is a 5th year senior and thanks to being redshirted was able to be the rare (or maybe only) 4 year football captain.

PL only allows medical redshirting if I am not mistaken. May be they changed the rule recently.

Medical redshirt only in the Patriot League.

 Ivy League doesn't even allow that - An Ivy  player has to withdraw from school (if they are hurt very early in a season) to maintain eligibility given the rule that they can not play beyond their first four years of college.

Patriot League football is suffering because they cannot generally compete with the Ivies in turns of recruiting. Given the new (last 7 or 8 years) generous financial aid practices at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton the same kid can usually attend cost free at Yale (full financial aid) or (for example) cost free at Lehigh (full athletic scholarship).  Who - given that choice - is picking Lehigh? Patriot League also cannot really compete with CAA in recruiting for a number of reasons. Of course there are exceptions in  matchups with Ivy and CAA but that is the new trend.

ibosbu

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I found an interesting link yesterday... athletic expenses by public institutions. Not sure if it has been discussed on this board previously. I am guessing they couldn't get the info from private institutions, hence only public.. link: http://sports.usatoday.com/ncaa/finances/

Brook.land has some good analysis here: https://brook.land/stony-brook-is-spending-more-than-almost-every-other-fcs-program-a71a2028e857

It's very interesting. We have increased our yearly expense a lot. Now we are one of the leading FCS program in terms of expense. From FCS programs only JMU, Delaware and UC-Davis spends more.

Total expenses comparison (skipping no-football schools from CAA and America east):

JMU $47.4m
UD $34.3m
SBU $30.9m
Towson $29.4m
W&M $26.5 m
UNH $28.9m
URI $26.6m
Albany $20.9m
Maine $20.9m

We spend more than half the MAC teams, more than most of the SunBelt teams, more than one third of the C-USA teams.

It just shows what we already knew. Money$$$ is not the issue. We have got that. Attendance and relevancy is the issue. For both of them, winning is the only cure. We are on the right track!







 
« Last Edit: December 04, 2017, 10:20:27 am by iBOsbu »

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winning might not be enough.  we won this year.  and yet still struggled to fill a somewhat small stadium.
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Seawolf97

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It is a number of things . Student support runs cool for a school of nearly 26k not many students show up for games.  Then we compete against some very good high schools in our area who draw fans on a Saturday from our fan base and of course  the pros .  The Jets and Giants as bad as they have been  still draw.  We also need to advertise locally and throughout at least Suffolk County . I don't understand  why we don't have posters up at LIRR stations with our home schedule as Army and Fordham have on the Metro North .

Campi47

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There are a lot of HS teams in Nassau/Suffolk and many play on Fridays we need to give price breaks to HS so we draw the whole team in on Saturday all it takes is for someone from the football department to put a plan out and get it to the HS coaches/AD's

Hammertime

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There are a lot of HS teams in Nassau/Suffolk and many play on Fridays we need to give price breaks to HS so we draw the whole team in on Saturday all it takes is for someone from the football department to put a plan out and get it to the HS coaches/AD's
I agree. But this school his horrible with getting the brand name out there for the island to see. Not everybody listens to 94.3 the Shark. Even tho I do!!!

VA_Seawolf

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I found an interesting link yesterday... athletic expenses by public institutions. Not sure if it has been discussed on this board previously. I am guessing they couldn't get the info from private institutions, hence only public.. link: http://sports.usatoday.com/ncaa/finances/

Brook.land has some good analysis here: https://brook.land/stony-brook-is-spending-more-than-almost-every-other-fcs-program-a71a2028e857

It's very interesting. We have increased our yearly expense a lot. Now we are one of the leading FCS program in terms of expense. From FCS programs only JMU, Delaware and UC-Davis spends more.

Total expenses comparison (skipping no-football schools from CAA and America east):

JMU $47.4m
UD $34.3m
SBU $30.9m
Towson $29.4m
W&M $26.5 m
UNH $28.9m
URI $26.6m
Albany $20.9m
Maine $20.9m

We spend more than half the MAC teams, more than most of the SunBelt teams, more than one third of the C-USA teams.

It just shows what we already knew. Money$$$ is not the issue. We have got that. Attendance and relevancy is the issue. For both of them, winning is the only cure. We are on the right track!

I posted this back in July. We're definitely on the right track as far as spending and all the new facilities, IPF, stadium expansion, etc. prove that.

It is a number of things . Student support runs cool for a school of nearly 26k not many students show up for games.  Then we compete against some very good high schools in our area who draw fans on a Saturday from our fan base and of course  the pros .  The Jets and Giants as bad as they have been  still draw.  We also need to advertise locally and throughout at least Suffolk County . I don't understand  why we don't have posters up at LIRR stations with our home schedule as Army and Fordham have on the Metro North .

I wholeheartedly agree. I don't know WTF we're doing in this regard. As mentioned we should do something to draw local HS students, parents, etc. to games. Arranging free tickets for a local HS team to attend a home game would be good. Things like that.

I think we can position ourselves well as a local, cheaper alternative to the Giants and Jets when we're good. But that would be easier if we were FBS. There's lots we can still do though.
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ibosbu

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I totally missed your thread from July. Agree with you all.. we should be advertising the hell out of every LIRR station and on public buses. Fee tickets to HS is a great idea too. We have the best football product on LI and we need to let everyone know. Now is the time to spend money on advertising.

ecasadoSBU

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Start out by conquering your own house first and then expand the marketing efforts to the rest of Long Island. You know why I go to games? Because I did while I was a student and I became a fan of College Football thanks to the Seawolves (Adam Peck, Chris Creamer, myself... we were the kids that used to facepaint or paint letters into our chest). That's why I'm willing to make that drive east every Saturday. But for me (alum) to follow now I had to cultivate the following before graduating. If you don't grab the attention of the students and turn them into fans before they graduate... Those alums will never come back for game

We have to build the next generation of Seawolves fanatics... and that starts ON CAMPUS. Nothing else will work as good as cultivating a good student and then alumni fandom. Those alumni will draw their parents, cousins, friends, and next thing you know you are packing the house and need further expansion.

It's not that difficult. Its just lack of effort. Plain and simple. There should be a USG-Athletics committe of student and administrators with the sole purpose of fostering student following and spirit.

Forget about the suitcase campus... forget about the lack of parties. Those are secondary issues. The primary and sole issue remains lack of marketing and unified effort between the Athletics department and other areas of the University.

The only marketing you see on campus right now is "Home of the Stony Brook Seawolves" banners in every other light pole. What the heck does that do for it if the students don't feel it?

Heck. Make a student club of promoters...

Or you know what. Make it college-credit course MKT101 and make the final project: Draw 1000 students to every game. LOL
« Last Edit: December 04, 2017, 11:18:43 pm by ecasadoSBU »
Everything a Stony Brook Fan Needs:

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