(Rest of post unquoted for brevity's sake.)
I agree with much of your post, though I do think the times are changing. When I was there, from 2000-2005, a kid I knew in the Comp Sci program was the valedictorian of his school. Smart kid. I went to school with a lot of very smart UConn students in the School of Eng.
These are kids who grew up and couldn't afford schools like Northeastern or Wesleyan, but could afford UConn. And they have good jobs, but they're only in their mid-30's. They have money, but not "buy out a football contract" money.
I do think, however, some of them are bound to make it big. And UConn is only getting harder to get into. While also remaining a very realistic choice for kids who are suddenly thinking about the student debt they're going to be saddled with.
Does this help us now? No. But I think in 20ish years, it may well be that UConn has a lot more big money donors than it used to. Or maybe that's just wishful thinking and we'll all be mildly successful computer engineers tailgating at sad football games. I'm not Nostradamus.