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Susan Herbst, UConn’s president, understands the importance of the Huskies to the state and believes in sports as an important component of university life. But the state of Connecticut is facing a $900 million budget deficit, and there is a real question about how long Herbst will be able to subsidize the athletic department out of the university’s general budget. It won’t be forever.

One solution — indeed, the most practical solution — would be for UConn to de-emphasize or drop football and rejoin the Big East, which has been reconstituted as a basketball league and includes old Huskies rivals like Georgetown and St. John’s. When it was reformulated, the Big East signed a 12-year, $500 million television contract with Fox. Without the expense of football, UConn athletics could well be back in the black.

But UConn officials resist that idea. The state and a handful of donors have spent a lot of money on football, and they fear angering important constituencies. And they still believe they have a chance of getting into a Power 5 conference, which is what their fans yearn for. In truth, so do they.


http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/03/14/sp ... .html?_r=1

Wow, this article totally trashes the AAAAAC.

Shhhh, don't tell Stever

Boston.com article saying it might be time to dump football and head back to the big east this week as well.

Countdown to Stevers rebuttal...3....2...1

Until someone actually drops football in today's age, this is something that you'll believe it when you see it.

No guarantee at all that the Big 12 expands. And if they don't, UConn has no where to go- same with everyone else in the AAC. And the AAC will start to improve bit by bit. It's already started.

this year 89-48 OOC vs #13 OOC SOS
last year 80-49 OOC vs #28 OOC SOS

But... but... but... the AAC has ESPN! They have exposure over money! They're all in big markets! They have endless potential for big-time football!

Somehow, someway, this is all the Big East's fault (mostly the C7)....

stever20 wrote:Until someone actually drops football in today's age, this is something that you'll believe it when you see it.

No guarantee at all that the Big 12 expands. And if they don't, UConn has no where to go- same with everyone else in the AAC. And the AAC will start to improve bit by bit. It's already started.

this year 89-48 OOC vs #13 OOC SOS
last year 80-49 OOC vs #28 OOC SOS

Thats great and all but thats not going to get them the money they desperately need. The AAC even in the best case scenario isn't going to get anywhere close to P5 money in their next TV deal. It might not be up to the athletic department but the state legislator telling them they can't just take millions from the general budget when sports are LOSING 20 MILLION a year! How the hell can they justify that to the tax payers of Connecticut, most of whom didn't attend UConn? Thats the problem you don't see. The people of CT being in a real financial situation where they can't justify funding UConn FB for eternity and the fact that they have a legit option to both get back into the black and improve the BBall program by playing better/closer programs and limiting travel. These articles are the smoke. The people of CT read the papers from NYC and Boston and both of them are saying how much money UConn sports are losing. When the time comes for cuts UConn athletics will be on the chopping block. This isn't Texas where they will gladly cut everything else before FB.

the article also is full of crap...

They say the AAC distributes 1.5 million dollars.

NO chance in hell that's right.. They get that JUST from the TV. That would be like 16 million dollars...

then tourney units...
UConn will be having 16 just themselves
Cincy has 9
USF has 3
Memphis has 2
SMU has 1
WVU still has 9
Syr still has 17
Pitt still has 9
Lou still has 19
so the conference will be getting paid for 69 units this year- or about 17.3 million

then all the football money

So to say they're only getting 1.5 million distro is complete bunk.

stever20 wrote:the article also is full of crap...

They say the AAC distributes 1.5 million dollars.

NO chance in hell that's right.. They get that JUST from the TV. That would be like 16 million dollars...

then tourney units...
UConn will be having 16 just themselves
Cincy has 9
USF has 3
WVU still has 9
Syr still has 17
Pitt still has 9
Lou still has 19
so the conference will be getting paid for 66 units this year- or about 16.5 million

then all the football money

So to say they're only getting 1.5 million distro is complete bunk.

So you're saying the athletic department is in the black? Even if you are 100% correct thats still not enough to fully fund all of their athletics without pulling out millions from the general fund. Once again, the state is still putting in millions of tax payer dollars into UConn FB. In this day and age how much longer can the state put that burden on it's citizens and how much patience do the people of CT have to wait for an invite that might never come? To me it's P5 in the next 5 years or just deemphisize FB. I know you LOVE the AAC but it's not fiscally responsible to fund your program off the back of tax payers who have no connection to your school while cutting other programs in the state.

I'm not saying it's in the black, but that MAJOR inaccuracy in the money is a major red flag about the article.

Just in tv and basketball money the AAC gets 38 million dollars. Then add in 20 million plus for football and you're up to around 60 million dollars. So instead of 1.5 million dollars, it's a lot closer to at least 5.5 or 6 million dollars.