Could the budget shortfall affect athletics?

[Slick]

The rest of our entire athletic budget could be supported by the Big East revenue by simply dumping the $30M per year football program. What’s hard about that?

Kind of a stupid comment

 

[John]

So your answer is to go even further into debt every year with the football team. Tell me how that makes any sense? Who enjoys watching a non competitive bottom feeder every game for years upon years. You really think we have any big time college atmosphere playing in East Hartford. I’ve lived in Michigan and Wisconsin and those schools don’t play on land that used to be an aircraft strip. They play home games on campus.

So you're a fair weather UConn fan. Hope the basketball program doesn't run into another rough patch, they'll lose your support.

 

[huskymedic]

So your answer is to go even further into debt every year with the football team. Tell me how that makes any sense?

There was no answer there - I just pointed out that you are making numbers up as you go along to try to make your point. Current BE media contract revenue is less than $4m per school.

There is no easy answer but they are navigating the challenging financial environment as best as they currently can while the college sports world spins off its axis.

 

[superjohn]

So you're a fair weather UConn fan. Hope the basketball program doesn't run into another rough patch, they'll lose your support.

You can disagree with him but how does it make him a fair weather fan?

Our football program blows and our basketball program in the best in the country. I watch both programs but I get an incredible amount of enjoyment watching our basketball program and it feels like a chore watching the football program.

 

[87Xfer]

So you're a fair weather UConn fan. Hope the basketball program doesn't run into another rough patch, they'll lose your support.

This is a ridiculous take. The football program has never been and will never be a national level program. It's a cost center that delivers nothing meaningful for the university. What are you talking about?

 

[UConnJim]

The deficit at UConn is caused by the elimination of the COVID dollars that juiced the revenues that was supposed to make up for lost tuition revenues and one time COVID mitigation projects. They were always known to be a one time juice to revenues, but UConn spent the money as if it was a continuous revenue stream. In other words, mismanagement.

 

[cellocgg]

Ask the UConn athletes if they signed up for travel miles at the sake of revenue dollars. Perhaps it is lost on you that No one, absolutely no one from a power conference wants our football team. Ask Syracuse, BC, Pitt, WV, and whomever I forgot that left for greener pastures. How many national championships? It’s not always about the money if we jettison a failing football program that sucks up our athletic budget and returns nothing. Do you enjoy being a midget level football team when we play Tennessee, Michigan, hell even Duke? Great recruiting tool. I am no glutton for punishment.

All we need is an OK football team, nobody is saying UConn has to be a juggernaut. Conveniently for us, the B12 is also arguably the worst football conference and the commissioner is trying to rebrand it into a basketball powerhouse

Also UConn actually wins championships with less. I don't see Syracuse or BC doing much over there

 

[JohnFSilver]

So your answer is to go even further into debt every year with the football team. Tell me how that makes any sense? Who enjoys watching a non competitive bottom feeder every game for years upon years. You really think we have any big time college atmosphere playing in East Hartford. I’ve lived in Michigan and Wisconsin and those schools don’t play on land that used to be an aircraft strip. They play home games on campus.

Football team is not in debt. They are not borrowing money.

 

[OkaForPrez]

OP a Kentucky fan trying to gauge if they can get Hurley.

 

[FearThePups]

So you're a fair weather UConn fan. Hope the basketball program doesn't run into another rough patch, they'll lose your support.

Fair weather fan? I’m a realist. If your definition of that is supporting football through thick and thin in perpetuity, been there, done that. Fifty-five years of futility is enough for me. The school has show no plan or real results to improve its football program over decades. If that’s a fair weather fan, I’m never going to convince anyone here.

 

[FearThePups]

You can disagree with him but how does it make him a fair weather fan?

Our football program blows and our basketball program in the best in the country. I watch both programs but I get an incredible amount of enjoyment watching our basketball program and it feels like a chore watching the football program.

Thank you for expressing my sentiments better than I have. I’d be all in for football but all the program does is flounder with no get well plan except find another home conference for salvation. That’s myopic to me and ignores the elephant in the room, which is that we always have sucked at football.

 

[John]

This is a ridiculous take. The football program has never been and will never be a national level program. It's a cost center that delivers nothing meaningful for the university. What are you talking about?

New to UConn athletics?

 

[John]

Thank you for expressing my sentiments better than I have. I’d be all in for football but all the program does is flounder with no get well plan except find another home conference for salvation. That’s myopic to me and ignores the elephant in the room, which is that we always have sucked at football.

Except we haven't always sucked.

 

[John]

You can disagree with him but how does it make him a fair weather fan?

Our football program blows and our basketball program in the best in the country. I watch both programs but I get an incredible amount of enjoyment watching our basketball program and it feels like a chore watching the football program.

it's conditional fandom, which is the definition of a fair weather fan - if the program is good, he supports it. If not, eliminate the program.

 

[superjohn]

it's conditional fandom, which is the definition of a fair weather fan - if the program is good, he supports it. If not, eliminate the program.

He thinks the football program blows, it does. He thinks the football program is a money loser, it is.

We're a basketball school and a joke in football. Of course many people are going to love UConn basketball and not UConn football. This shouldn't be so difficult for you.

 

[John]

He thinks the football program blows, it does. He thinks the football program is a money loser, it is.

We're a basketball school and a joke in football. Of course many people are going to love UConn basketball and not UConn football. This shouldn't be so difficult for you.

Sounds like you're a fair weather fan too.

 

[superjohn]

Sounds like you're a fair weather fan too.

Keep digging, it's a great look.

 

[John]

Keep digging, it's a great look.

I guess we can maybe expect your support when UConn Football turns it around. I'll save a seat for you.

 

[superjohn]

I guess we can maybe expect your support when UConn Football turns it around. I'll save a seat for you.

Reading comprehension, brother.

 

[John]

Reading comprehension, brother.

if you were a fan you'd stick up for the football program with all the misinformation being thrown around in this thread.

 

[The Yakk]

The football program has never been and will never be a national level program.

Not with that attitude, it won't.

 

[FearThePups]

it's conditional fandom, which is the definition of a fair weather fan - if the program is good, he supports it. If not, eliminate the program.

Wow. You don’t hold the university administrators, athletic director accountable? It’s supporters like me who failed the program? Yes there were a few winning seasons, infrequent at best. Show me the get well plan.

 

[TheShot1990]

I'd like to think we're gonna join a P4 someday and maybe claw our way to being a North Carolina with a .500 record.
The reality is, we're probably going to either:
A) flounder around like we have been all these years playing the likes of UMass and Holy Cross
B) eventually get an invite to a P4 and be the next Rutgers of football

 

[John]

Wow. You don’t hold the university administrators, athletic director accountable? It’s supporters like me who failed the program? Yes there were a few winning seasons, infrequent at best. Show me the get well plan.

Supporters like you who'd be happy to cut the football program loose or downgrade it in favor of a secondary sport (in the grand scheme of college athletic conferences) certainly don't help the athletic department as a whole.