The TCU game was not simply a bad performance that one dismisses as the result of a culmination of unfortunate events in a year replete with unending turmoil. Instead, I believe it was a watershed event.
It laid bare the futility of attempting, on a meager budget, to compete in a league which by comparison has unlimited resources. Nine years ago, almost to the day, we lost by seven points to TCU in a very competitive bowl game in California. Just six months later, TCU joined the Big 12 and look what has happened in the intervening time. Moreover, it didn't require eight and a half years to reach this degree of divergence. The separation began almost immediately.
Since the very beginning, our experiment with D1 athletics has depended on sacrificing the pride and safety of our football players to finance the full array of mandated D1 sports. In all of that time, we have made ABSOLUTELY NO PROGRESS in changing that paradigm. The ONLY reason that TCU was added to the schedule on less than two weeks notice was for the money, and that money being a pittance of the "going rate" for sacrificial lamb's.
It's time to stop the sham. It's time to stop the embarrassment. It's time to stop the madness. It's time to either find an IMMEDIATE funding source for our D1 athletic program that does not require the annual sacrifice of our football team, or implement a plan that includes dropping our D1 status until such time that we have the necessary funding secured and then reapplying for D1 status.
I understand the derision that would accompany such a move down in classification, and the uncertainty of conference affiliation when we reapplied, but a large step back could prepare the way for an larger step forward. And, consider what benefits we have derived from our years of being marginal D1 participants. D1 affiliation has not driven a significant increase in student enrollment, and a case can be made that the sports emphasis has contributed to our loss of Tier One academic status.
Whatever the correct answer may be, if the university remains on its current path the prognosis for Tech sports AND Tech academics is a continued descent into irrelevancy.
It laid bare the futility of attempting, on a meager budget, to compete in a league which by comparison has unlimited resources. Nine years ago, almost to the day, we lost by seven points to TCU in a very competitive bowl game in California. Just six months later, TCU joined the Big 12 and look what has happened in the intervening time. Moreover, it didn't require eight and a half years to reach this degree of divergence. The separation began almost immediately.
Since the very beginning, our experiment with D1 athletics has depended on sacrificing the pride and safety of our football players to finance the full array of mandated D1 sports. In all of that time, we have made ABSOLUTELY NO PROGRESS in changing that paradigm. The ONLY reason that TCU was added to the schedule on less than two weeks notice was for the money, and that money being a pittance of the "going rate" for sacrificial lamb's.
It's time to stop the sham. It's time to stop the embarrassment. It's time to stop the madness. It's time to either find an IMMEDIATE funding source for our D1 athletic program that does not require the annual sacrifice of our football team, or implement a plan that includes dropping our D1 status until such time that we have the necessary funding secured and then reapplying for D1 status.
I understand the derision that would accompany such a move down in classification, and the uncertainty of conference affiliation when we reapplied, but a large step back could prepare the way for an larger step forward. And, consider what benefits we have derived from our years of being marginal D1 participants. D1 affiliation has not driven a significant increase in student enrollment, and a case can be made that the sports emphasis has contributed to our loss of Tier One academic status.
Whatever the correct answer may be, if the university remains on its current path the prognosis for Tech sports AND Tech academics is a continued descent into irrelevancy.
