Sacked For A Loss: I-AA La Salle Univ. Drops Football Program

La Salle Univ. (LU) announced yesterday that it is discontinuing its football program, effective immediately, according to Bob Cooney of the PHILADELPHIA DAILY NEWS. LU AD Tom Brennan said, “When we added the program [in ‘97], we were looking to be aligned with other non-scholarship schools. But many of those schools no longer have football programs. When we took a look at the landscape change, we realized it was very difficult.” The school joined the Division I-AA Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference in ’99, when the conference contained ten teams. However, Georgetown Univ. has since changed conferences and “five other schools dropped their football programs.” The school finished the '07 season last Saturday with an 0-10 record (PHILADELPHIA DAILY NEWS, 11/20). In Philadelphia, Joe Juliano reports Brennan “considered several options” to ending the program, including playing an independent schedule, becoming a scholarship program and joining the eight-team non-scholarship Pioneer Football League. Brennan said that moving to Division III for football “was not a possibility because NCAA rules prohibit a school that plays Division I sports from having a program below Division I.” He added that it was not a financial decision, but admitted cutting football would mean “‘a few hundred thousand dollars’ will be reinvested in other athletic programs.” Brennan: “We tried to decide [on] a viable alternative for the football program, but the motivation never was to save money” (PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER, 11/20).