The Official Big East is Poverty Thread | Page 4 | The Boneyard

The Official Big East is Poverty Thread

Hoophound said:
I’m not sure the math will prove worthwhile for them to downgrade. They are very popular and sell a lot of tickets and merchandise. Add in the Big East revenue and the marketing the basketball program provides for recruiting students and I bet it doesn’t look better on paper.
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Xavier is in deep, deep, deep shit.
 
Exit 4 said:
That WSJ on St Michaels last week was very candid and mirrors the current situation for hundreds of colleges...enrollment declines have started and the snowball is difficult to stop. Meanwhile Northeastern, Vanderbilt and perhaps others will acquire a few of these that have good real estate for satellite campuses. But few will get that outcome, most will disappear.

St Peters in Jersey City has just a $36MM endowment. I expect them to go first in the MAAC. Maybe they merge with Seton.

As for the subject at hand, I think BB and Football will get split off into an official for profit league which will allow the system to unionize the players and then set salary caps...... The power 4 and a handful of others will make the cut. I think only UConn makes the grade....Nova will be close.
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St. Peter’s is relatively stable.

The issues are at Rider (very bad) and Siena (bad.)
 
Rufus said:
Plenty of schools will be hurt before the MAC schools. The many small, unranked private institutions are at the top of the list. And then there are public universities that are not D1 football schools that would be next in line, such as Wright State in Ohio.

Buffalo is AAU. Not going anywhere.

Ohio, Kent State, Toledo, and UMass are R1 universities. Not going anywhere.

Miami is a Public Ivy. Not going anywhere.
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Akron and Kent State are seeing declines in enrollment that will only get worse. They have to merge or both will fail. Same with Toledo and Bowling Green. The schools in this band that are seeing increases in applications are spending huge on marketing and heavily discounting. There is no way to make that work long term.

SUNY is in trouble too, and they are talking about increasing enrollment, which is only possible if they let everyone in, which will crush Buffalo and Stony Brook. That program needs to right-size, turn a few of the campuses into satellites or shut them down completely, and merge with UConn. I am only half-kidding about the merge with UConn part.
 
nelsonmuntz said:
Xavier has the simplest path out of their problems of just about any university in trouble, and they appear to be ignoring it.
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I don’t think they have many options for a merger - nor do I think it would work.

They’re either gonna make it or they won’t.
 
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Fishy said:
I don’t think they have many options for a merger - nor do I think it would work.

They’re either gonna make it or they won’t.
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When an industry has overcapacity, it consolidates. The ones that don’t generally don’t make it.
 
If there was a merger prospect down the street, maybe - but there’s not.

They’re not going to merge with Dayton which is 70 miles away and become Dayton South. That does not solve their issues.
 
Rufus said:
Xavier is opening a brand-new medical school.

www.xavier.edu

Xavier reaches halfway point of med school project

www.xavier.edu www.xavier.edu
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Good luck with that though. Getting payoff on investments like that are long term. In fact, I would bet that is a net negative cash wise. Pricing tuition for a never cherry popped med school when you are already out of market on undergrad rates isn't going to be pleasant. Ohio State and Cincy have long well established and well regarded medical programs. Who and how many you get in that pickle is anybody's guess, but even getting instructors won't be cheap or simple. What's interesting is that during Xavier's slide, Osu and Cincy have grown their enrollment fairly significantly while making a lot of campus improvements unrelated to academic programs. Nowadays with social media, et. al the bigger schools I think are at an advantage just from a social standpoint. Kids want to be were the action is.
 
That said, I am using Claude today to build a case for Siena University and Union College to merge. That one might actually work. Will send you a free Uniena Univeristy tee shirt for inspiring me when it closes.
 
Fishy said:
If there was a merger prospect down the street, maybe - but there’s not.

They’re not going to merge with Dayton which is 70 miles away and become Dayton South. That does not solve their issues.
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It solves their issues. Slashes a bunch of overhead, enables them to offer more majors, probably brings in more research dollars, makes them more attractive to employers. There is a lot that works.

It works for UConn too.
 
Fishy said:
That said, I am using Claude today to build a case for Siena University and Union College to merge. That one might actually work. Will send you a free Uniena Univeristy tee shirt for inspiring me when it closes.
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Go Chaints!
 
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Rufus said:
Xavier is opening a brand-new medical school.
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With Xavier’s shrinking undergrad enrollment, related financial challenges, and the demographic cliff, a likely lowly ranked osteopathic college of medicine may obtain accreditation, attract applicants currently pursuing medical degrees outside of the US, yet will it generate sufficient net revenues to help undergrad-challenged Xavier survive?

Initial bottom fishing Quinnipiac medicine appears to be making some headway. However, the school’s benefitted from some relatively affluent alumni support and location midway between the City and Boston. Still, many Quinnipiac medical school residencies aren’t in exactly highly respected teaching hospitals and many are in rural hospitals nationally. Maybe rapidly aging America and nearby highly respected teaching hospitals enable both Quinnipiac and Xavier medicine endeavors to succeed. Undergrad Xavier, TBD?
 
Fishy said:
That said, I am using Claude today to build a case for Siena University and Union College to merge. That one might actually work. Will send you a free Uniena Univeristy tee shirt for inspiring me when it closes.
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Sienion?
 
Fishy said:
Xavier is in deep, deep, deep shit.
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I understand they are in trouble as an institution, but my response was to them downgrading from the Big East. Given their fan base, seating and Big East revenue, I’d be real curious how the math looks dropping to a mid major. I’d bet it’s Big East or bust.
 
Fishy said:
That said, I am using Claude today to build a case for Siena University and Union College to merge. That one might actually work. Will send you a free Uniena Univeristy tee shirt for inspiring me when it closes.
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Tough to merge a Catholic school with a non-Catholic school. How about Union and Skidmore? Who wouldn't want a branch in Saratoga over Schenectady?
 
Hoophound said:
I understand they are in trouble as an institution, but my response was to them downgrading from the Big East. Given their fan base, seating and Big East revenue, I’d be real curious how the math looks dropping to a mid major. I’d bet it’s Big East or bust.
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The concern is that they will not exist.

CL82 said:
Sienion?
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They'd have to do some workshopping on the names.

But it actually might make some sense for them to merge. Both good institutions, both suffering pretty heavily and both are so small that cratering is not far from where their normal is.

Centralize administration, dedicate Union to STEM, the rest to Loudonville,
 
Chuck said:
Tough to merge a Catholic school with a non-Catholic school. How about Union and Skidmore? Who wouldn't want a branch in Saratoga over Schenectady?
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Skidmore is fine. The other two are struggling.
 
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Fishy said:
Skidmore is fine. The other two are struggling.
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I get that, but merging two struggling institutions and thinking they'll get better together is a bit like two drug addicts getting together in rehab. They'll support each other for a while, but chances are one will drag the other down at some point. I think Elon was fine also, and they took on Queens. And Union and Skidmore are more similar institutions.

I'm just making this stuff up though. I don't know that either really helps. I just liked Saratoga a lot when my daughter visited, but didn't love Skidmore (just not for her).
 
ecasadoSBU said:
When its all said and done... the Big East will probably be the fourth of fifth best league in the country next year. Where it has been the past few years. Nothing has changed.
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My bet is 4th ahead of the ACC. Also, I think the Big 12 (#3 league) will be closer to us than top two.
 
uconnyankee said:
I would like to add Dayton and St Louis to Big East now.
We need more depth in the league.
Gonzaga and St Marys was a miss IMO.

Instead of being proactive and going after some key adds, it seems BE leadership is simply laying low and hoping nothing else happens to further weaken league.
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Why would we dilute anything?

Dayton and St. Louis aren't going to keep UConn from leaving.

Nobody else has anywhere to go. There is no reason to expand.

If Xavier really were to fold, we have Dayton's number.
 
Rufus said:
One Hundred Sgn GIF by SomeGoodNews
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Like you have a clue Rufus.
 
Rufus said:
Plenty of schools will be hurt before the MAC schools. The many small, unranked private institutions are at the top of the list. And then there are public universities that are not D1 football schools that would be next in line, such as Wright State in Ohio.

Buffalo is AAU. Not going anywhere.

Ohio, Kent State, Toledo, and UMass are R1 universities. Not going anywhere.

Miami is a Public Ivy. Not going anywhere.
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Some of those Ohio Schools are on borrowed time Roof Dog. The age of redundancy is over. They will merge some and maybe end one of the sadder ones.
 
Chuck said:
I get that, but merging two struggling institutions and thinking they'll get better together is a bit like two drug addicts getting together in rehab. They'll support each other for a while, but chances are one will drag the other down at some point. I think Elon was fine also, and they took on Queens. And Union and Skidmore are more similar institutions.

I'm just making this stuff up though. I don't know that either really helps. I just liked Saratoga a lot when my daughter visited, but didn't love Skidmore (just not for her).
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I think equating them to drug addicts is misunderstanding what their issues are.
 
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NoSpamHere said:
Don't know if this was posted... One Quarter of 4 Year Colleges at risk of closing

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1/4 closing seem accurate.... could uttimately be a tad higher.

I think and overlooked aspect to this entire situation is the fact that in todays highly connected world, you can do so much more than ever with independent learning (hello you tube). The gate keeping power higher ed had on knowledge is eroding.
 
Last edited:
I have mentioned before in other threads that there are to many D1 schools and way to many conferences. All leagues should have a minimum of 16 schools.

But talking about the Big East again I said and agree to the previous poster that said that we should expand. St Louis and Dayton would be welcomed.

As for schools merging here in Connecticut I would suggest that Fairfield and Sacred Heart do that. They are only a handful of miles apart. You would have a school with 20,000 students. And a school that offers countless sports for both men and women.
 
NoSpamHere said:
Don't know if this was posted... One Quarter of 4 Year Colleges at risk of closing

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1/5 of university presidents have had serious discussions about merging.

One thing that is worth noting is that it would not be that hard to turn some of these smaller colleges around through consolidation. There is a minimum overhead a college needs, and it is really hard to cover that on 1,200 or 1,500 students. Across 6,000 or 10,000 grad and undergrads, it becomes a lot more manageable. There is also a lot of fat that can be cut at most of these schools. I would be really pissed if I was a student or faculty at a school like the one in the article, because on some level, the President probably waited too long because he was trying to figure out how to keep his job.

I think there can also be negative scale as schools get really huge because the bureaucracy of running a massive university has to be huge too.
 
nelsonmuntz said:
Akron and Kent State are seeing declines in enrollment that will only get worse. They have to merge or both will fail. Same with Toledo and Bowling Green. The schools in this band that are seeing increases in applications are spending huge on marketing and heavily discounting. There is no way to make that work long term.

SUNY is in trouble too, and they are talking about increasing enrollment, which is only possible if they let everyone in, which will crush Buffalo and Stony Brook. That program needs to right-size, turn a few of the campuses into satellites or shut them down completely, and merge with UConn. I am only half-kidding about the merge with UConn part.
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The problem with state college systems across the country is that they were created by politicians for political reasons (local pride, employment) not educational need.
 
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