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Intercollegiate Forum

Schools Outside Power Five Conferences Look For New Ways To Stay Competitive

While the financial gap between the athletic departments in the Power Five conferences and the Group of Five continues to grow, those smaller schools have become even more nimble at finding ways to keep up with the field, said a group of four athletic directors on Day 1 of the '16 Learfield Intercollegiate Athletics Forum. Coastal Carolina AD Matt Hogue reflected on the school’s baseball team and its Cinderella run to win the College World Series in its first appearance this past summer. It was the school’s first national title in any sport. “We’ve been one of the fastest growing institutions over the last decade, so this was always a set goal,” he said. “There were moments of crazy pinch hitting, clutch pitching, our rally monkey -- but there was also an institutional belief that it could be accomplished.” Hogue noted that has been fueled by continually looking and finding external sources for funding, as the investment in the athletic department through the university is not as significant as at other schools. For Villanova and AD Mark Jackson, the school’s continued success on the basketball court in the Big East has aided the funding of all the school’s 24 sports, but it also creates an interesting dynamic. “It would be great to have the additional revenue coming from a big-time football program, but that’s not who we are,” he said. “We can’t be dependent on a subsidiary, but at the same time there is an expectation for us to generate revenue.” For Jackson, there is an opportunity now to maximize that, as the school is in the process of renovating its basketball arena on campus.

MOVING FORWARD: Northern Illinois AD & Associate VP Sean Frazier said the resource gap between the different conferences means one thing for his school -- “to compete in this day and age, there is no such thing as standing still -- you’re either moving forward or backwards.” Frazier said that motivates him and his staff to work harder, but also to focus on things that help to move their agenda ahead, such as staying in close contact with the school’s alumni base. The school has had several successful football seasons in recent years, and he said that has helped to create a groundswell of donor support. He said funding is also heavily driven by student fees, with 33% of their budget coming from that source. Just a few months ago, the Univ. of Memphis was in consideration to move to the Big 12 if that conference chose to expand. UM AD Tom Bowen said it was a great opportunity for his department to do a self-analyzation and see what it could be doing better. UM school in the past had not looked at the dynamics it faces as a smaller school as a restriction, but rather as an opportunity to be nimbler. While the Big 12 ultimately decided not to expand, Bowen said that he would not have done anything differently. “The great thing about our business is change, and the great challenge that is change -- the more you do to prepare for that, the better,” he said.

QUICK HITS:
On time-mangement:
* Frazier: “We need to be doing a better job communicating some of the time expectations right when these student-athletes come through the door. I wouldn’t be here today if I didn’t have the access and opportunity offered to me as a student-athlete, but I had no idea when I stepped on campus that we played football in the spring -- I thought it was over when the games ended.”
* Hogue: “We should look at the 24-hour rule and see if there are ways to make it more of a template to fit how the sports work.”
* Bowen: “We need to create more consistency in the day for the athletes, as we’re putting all the stress on them to manage all of this dead time in their schedules.”
* Jackson: “I had assumed we had a priority class registration for our athletes, and we didn’t. Over the course of the last year we had to do a lot of convincing to explain what the demands on student athletes are, and why this makes sense, and I’m glad to say we’ve launched a program to help them.”

On stories they are watching:
* Bowen: Division 1 in general. “I think all 351 of us have to come together and re-calibrate this business.”
* Jackson: Consumption of live sports, and opportunities on the digital side.
* Hogue: Player and student-athlete welfare.
* Frazier: The gap between the Power Five and Group of Five. “It’s not sustainable to compete at that level.”

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