jdub27

This isn't about liking one sport or another. No one wants to cut sports. However people want to be competitive in the sports UND sponsors. Spreading the budget thin across too many sports leads to not excelling in the things you do and that was before the budget was required to be slashed. Look at the numbers, they speak for themselves. Total net cost, net cost per student athlete, etc. One program sticks out way above the others. When trying to find $1.3 million requires either cutting 3-4 programs and 100+ student athlete opportunities or cutting 1 program and 25 opportunities, it should be a simple choice and it has nothing to do with what people like, it is making the common sense business decision.

We also knew this wasn't going to come up again. Your list might be right but it's incorrect to state that everything on there is 100% safe. The situation is different this time with a much larger and specific number that has to be addressed. They've already shown that the change in circumstances has changed some lines of thinking.

The administration also said this wouldn't be revisited again. And yet here we are and with a number that could basically be solved by cutting one program.

That makes a little more sense. I honestly don't know which sports would go, but it would likely be on the men's side if WIH is gone. S&D is about the only realistic choice left because cutting Tennis doesn't even move the needle. Your skepticism on golf is the exact reason they won't go down to 16 immediately, they need to leave a buffer for that scenario.

Unless you include WIH in the 4 you're cutting, you aren't going free up much for more resources to reinvest. Also, if you plan on going right down to 16, you are counting on Men's Golf to hit its fundraising goals or be willing to bring them back into the fold if they don't.

Interesting to see how that plays out if there is anything to it. Unless there is something in the paperwork that specifies UND has promised to come into the conference with X sports, than I can't see how the Summit could enforce it if UND drops it before they join. Men's golf is the most interesting to me since it is technically of the athletic department's budget, yet they would be on the hook for $150K if the team wasn't able to hit their fundraising goals.

Reminder that FCS requires sponsoring 14 sports, however I don't ever see any of the Dakota schools going below 16.

I get where you are going with it now. If the financials were presented properly, this would make sense, though there would still be backlash and you still have the base cost of over $1.4 million. As they are currently done, it would actually make the cost of their program go up on paper because you wouldn't be able to bury their facility cost under MIH.

Of course college athletics is a giant shell game but I'm not sure what you're trying to argue? On paper, the WIH program shows a net cost of $1.4 million but those numbers don't include any facility costs, which is why the cost of the program is actually higher. The entire cost for the REA/BESC (over $2 million) is attributed to MIH, there are no costs attributed to MBB, WBB, VB, WIH or soccer.

The financials that break out each sport separately that are sent to the NCAA for reporting purposes have $0 listed for facility expenses attributed to women's ice hockey. That's why everyone states that the cost of the program is actually higher than reported.

He's shooting 53% from the field this year.

That pizza/pasta bar was a hidden gem.

I was going to include that but M&W Tennis are the only ones listed that actually have any facility cost attributed to them ($22,500 each for M&W). While WIH facility costs are higher, I figured it wasn't fair to single them out on that. Not that it matters, the numbers speak for themselves without it.

Total Operating Revenues: MS&D - $31,458 WS&D - $36,194 MT - $0 WT - $88 WS - $26,279 WIH - $29,239 Total Expenses: MS&D - $358,041 WS&D - $591,646 MT - $99,453 WT - $213,294 WS - $615,150 WIH - $1,429,827 Women's hockey seems like the obvious one to me. See how easy that was. Just for fun: Net Cost and Net Cost/Participant MS&D - ($326,583) - $13,608 WS&D - ($555,452) - $18,515 MT - ($99,453) - $11,050 WT - ($213,206) - $19,382 WS - ($588,871) - $26,767 WIH - ($1,400,588) - $53,869

UM has a junior day camp coming up this weekend. I'd expect a lot of their in-state offers to go out then, in person.

And sense!

What will be nice going forward is the budget will be fixed and balanced on Big Sky travel/revenues, meaning that in a couple years there will be additional savings from lowered travel costs that instead can be reinvested into the programs. Cut what we need now and make everything stronger.

I think they want him to form a committee, they are basically trained to expect that response instead of action at this point.

If the Summit league had allowed UND to join as an affiliate member 4-5 years ago, story might have been different.

He is absolutely deadly playing the high post with his short to mid range game.

So cut 4-5 sports that are in UND's future conference and over 100 opportunities or just cut one sport and a quarter of the amount of opportunities and save roughly the same amount of money....?

Big Sky reffing at its best, need the crowd to know they are there.

Administration taking huge cuts along with everyone else. Wow, didn't think I'd see the day. There is hope! Now only if there was a way to clear up the athletic cuts with a single swoop and effect a minimal amount of programs/student athletes...

I don't think you guys are too far off...

Hockey has little to no bearing on the TV contract/revenues that the B1G schools get from the B1G Network, but that is where any money that UND gets would have to come from. There are 8 schools who don't play hockey and plus I really don't think UND is going to bring a huge amount of fans to Penn State, Michigan, Michigan State or Ohio State. I'm not saying its not possible and the original post even states it is an uphill battle, but you're going to have to convince over half the conference to give up some of their money regardless of how small of the amount is, relatively speaking. They very well may, and it needs to benefit both sides. I just see it as a hard sell to 8 out of 14 schools that it doesn't benefit at all plus a few more that will see minimal benefit. It is broken out separately from NCAA distributions, which also shows money directly attributed to men's hockey.