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Message: [QUOTE="BfromCT, post: 3571195, member: 10542"] The subject of budget cuts is a complicated one and the University of Connecticut needs to take a close look at all its programs, not just athletics. We can divide costs into four main categories - administration, facilities, faculty salaries, and athletics. The Board of Trustees needs to take some courage pills and confront systematic waste throughout the UConn system. Facilities costs need to be maintained because deferment of maintenance always leads to far greater costs down the line. Like most modern universities, administrative bloat has gotten out of control with numerous highly compensated deans, assistant deans, chairs of specialized programs, etc. and these costs for many universities exceed those of faculty compensations. These excessive costs could be cut by a large percentage, probably at least by one-third, and the university needs to get beyond the paradigm articulated by eebmg that the cardinal rule of administrations is that services are cut and not administrative expenses. With regard to faculty salaries, a number of people are highly, of not excessively paid. As topogigio pointed out, a good place to start is exorbitant golden handshake that the Board of Trustees gave to former president Herbst. In addition, such highly paid faculty members as Geno Auriemma should take a haircut. The athletic budget is always a tempting target of budget cutters and the huge deficit of the football program cannot be justified. Despite, however, the “losses” generated by big-time football, basketball, etc., no academic program or graduate school makes any money for the university. Has the history department ever generated $1.00 to the university? Successful sports programs can generate funds for the university through donations of support. UConn made a huge mistake in believing that its football program could ever grow and be competitive enough to generate the income that the major powers accrue. Except for a relatively small number of schools from the power conferences, no football program from whatever division makes any money. They are justified and supported for other reasons. The university should recognized that it made a mistake and scale it back the football program and trying to compete at, say, the Mid-American Conference level. With regard to basketball, the second mistake university administrators made was to desert the Big East and go to the AAC to pursue its football dream. The new conference afforded the Huskies no traditional rivalries and made for humungous travel costs with trips to FL and TX among other places, not to mention NC, OK, LA, and TN. With the return to the Big East and playing teams that are much better known to UConn fans, gate income should increase substantially (COVID-19 permitting), particularly for men’s basketball. Moreover, significant savings can be made in travel expenses. It should be easily possible for the teams to bus to PC, St. John’s, Seton Hall, Villanova, and Georgetown, especially if road games are batched, as the Ivy League has done for many years. Such a strategy will not work in playing Creighton (Omaha, Butler (Indianapolis), and Xavier (Cincinnati), but it should be possible to play DePaul (Chicago) and Marquette (Milwaukee) on the same trip, as the two cities are in relatively close proximity to one another. No chance exists for any other sport to hope to become close to revenue neutral, although hockey (Hockey East) and soccer do have popular followings and all athletic teams should benefit by the renewal of membership in the Big East. For far too long, UConn athletics has been a victim of the big football mentality and it needs to end. UConn can continue to be a national power in basketball without membership in a Power Five conference. Villanova’s two NCAA basketball championships in the past decade are not chopped liver and the success of many such mid-major male basketball programs demonstrates that you do not have to be Alabama, Michigan, or Texas to achieve athletic distinction. I do wonder, however, how the Big East’s TV contract with Fox Sports compares to that of the AAC with ESPN. The SNY contract should be much more attractive at renewal time with a Big East affiliation. [/QUOTE]

Verification: First name of men's bb coach

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