DI Task Force Report

[tony]

Can any of you answer these questions based on the task force's report?

1. What's the best guess as to how much expenses will increase per year if UND goes DI?

2. What sources of revenue will cover the increased expense (assuming the report didn't conclude that DI costs less money than DII)?

[CDog]

Can any of you answer these questions based on the task force's report?

1. What's the best guess as to how expenses will increase per year if UND goes DI?

2. What sources of revenue will cover the increased expense (assuming the report didn't conclude that DI costs less money than DII)?

Tony, you're going to wear yourself out! Giggling like school girls on bisonville concering the report and then racing back here to ask questions.

[The Sicatoka]

Come on tony, you've downloaded and read that report more times than I have by now.

Your answers are on pages 7-9 of the Final Report.

[DamStrait]

Come on tony, you've downloaded and read that report more times than I have by now.

Your answers are on pages 7-9 of the Final Report.

DO NOT FEED THE TROLL!

[Woden]

Can any of you answer these questions based on the task force's report?

1. What's the best guess as to how much expenses will increase per year if UND goes DI?

2. What sources of revenue will cover the increased expense (assuming the report didn't conclude that DI costs less money than DII)?

I can't give you any concrete answers to your questions, but I can tell you this. As of right now, the UND athletic budget is around $17 million, 7 of which is for hockey. That leaves around $10 million for the other sports. I don't know if UND spends more money on it's sports in D2 than NDSU did before the move up, but if I remember correctly, SU's D2 budget was around $7 million and they wanted it to be around $10 when they became a full fledged D1 institution. So, given these numbers, we can either surmise that UND will have to raise its overall budget to around $20 million, or find better ways to use their current budget and stay at around $10 million for all sports besides hockey, which is what NDSU is using for its budget.

Not sure where the extra money would come from if we did indeed decide to increase the budget, but I can say this, the school just got the second largest contribution ever for the business department. And after listening to Bollinger speak about some other alumni, I believe some very large contributions are in the works. Don't think that UND hasn't been planning this move for some time. I think UND's goal was to have every base covered before moving up, and they have been working for the move up the last couple of years. That is why every position that has opened up (don't mention basketball, tough subject) in the last year or two has been filled with people with D1 knowledge (Buning, Ralston). The Bison-Sioux rivalry will continue shortly, just wait.

[andtheHomeoftheSIOUX!!]

The Bison-Sioux rivalry will continue shortly, just wait.

I am looking forward to it It would be great if we could beat them the first time we play them in football again. But I digress.

[UND-1]

It would be nice to get a large contribution from donors early on to ease the strain so we don't have to resort to radio ads, like our friends from down south. Those ads must run every 30 minutes on 1280. It is getting old listening to Big Pat and Bohl begging for people to join Teammakers 20 times a day.

[SiouxMD]

DO NOT FEED THE TROLL!

tony is NO TROLL...he is (probably) UND's biggest fan in Amsterdam. In fact...he once dedicated a whole section to UND on his website.

[The Sicatoka]

DO NOT FEED THE TROLL!

I didn't feed him. Knowing he knows how to, I told him where to fish.

[bincitysioux]

tony is NO TROLL...he is (probably) UND's biggest fan in Amsterdam. In fact...he once dedicated a whole section to UND on his website.

He still does. It's called "News about other Schools".

[tony]

Teehehe! (figure I better giggle like a school girl).

Oh well, I'm sure you want to do what is best for UND. However, in the long run, the task force would serve themselves and the UND-loving public better if they had fessed up to the true cost of going DI instead of trying to pass off that unsupportable $1 million per year figure.

Admittedly, I was trying to bait somebody into saying, "Hey, stupid head, the report says it's going to cost $1 million. So there." Then I could really do some seriously mocking. Alackaday, either you can't figure out what the report is saying -or- you can figure it out and don't want to admit it.

The task force told the media on several occasions that going DI would cost $1 million per year.

NDSU, four years ago, said moving to DI would cost $2.3 million. I guess DI got cheaper?

To arrive at the $1 million figure, the task force compared UND's budget to the average budget for a DI-AA school and decided that the difference would be what UND needs to go DI. BTW, HAHAHAHAHA!

However, UND's budget for the year they picked as a benchmark just happened to include over $3 million in one-time expenses. That's like me going for a home loan and saying I have a yearly income of $99,000 when I really make $67,000 but happened to get an inheritance of $32k during the year.

Anyway, if that is the methodology task force settled upon for determining the cost of going DI, the only good-faith estimate they could have given to the media was $4 million per year.

[legend334]

Interesting.

My source was me sitting in a room with 60 other people, including a football, a basketball, and a hockey coach, all from UND, listening to Tom Buning.

He talked about how UM-Crookston wants a $4000 guarantee to come to GF and play basketball and how that's a 'bargain' considering Bemidji State wants $6000 to come to GF. He talked about how that money (any paid guarantee) is gone from UND and instead is building someone else's programs. He (rhetorically) asked if UND was getting the most possible value from that money. (He clearly wanted UND's money to build UND's programs. Who can blame him.)

It was rather interesting to listen to. Many of those issues hadn't been put out there that plainly before. I'm glad I was there to hear it. I still don't know if I'm convinced one way or another, but it did add to the total dialog on the issue.

So rather than paying Bemidji to come to GF and play, it would be more cost efficent to pay Wisco or U of M 90,000 to come to GF....or here is a crazy idea, play those schools in a home and away...then its a wash, and it wont cost you 6 grand to play Bemidji.....Many of the NCC schools asked for this when the NCC took advantage of the Mayville States, Jamestowns, Minot St. etc...smaller schools, and pounded these teams and was arrogant and would not go to their town to play....so these schools got together and decided two years ago....were going to stick it to the NCC schools and make them pay us to play them...its that simple.

[aff]

I can't give you any concrete answers to your questions, but I can tell you this. As of right now, the UND athletic budget is around $17 million, 7 of which is for hockey. That leaves around $10 million for the other sports. I don't know if UND spends more money on it's sports in D2 than NDSU did before the move up, but if I remember correctly, SU's D2 budget was around $7 million and they wanted it to be around $10 when they became a full fledged D1 institution. So, given these numbers, we can either surmise that UND will have to raise its overall budget to around $20 million, or find better ways to use their current budget and stay at around $10 million for all sports besides hockey, which is what NDSU is using for its budget.

Not sure where the extra money would come from if we did indeed decide to increase the budget, but I can say this, the school just got the second largest contribution ever for the business department. And after listening to Bollinger speak about some other alumni, I believe some very large contributions are in the works. Don't think that UND hasn't been planning this move for some time. I think UND's goal was to have every base covered before moving up, and they have been working for the move up the last couple of years. That is why every position that has opened up (don't mention basketball, tough subject) in the last year or two has been filled with people with D1 knowledge (Buning, Ralston). The Bison-Sioux rivalry will continue shortly, just wait.

Do you seriously believe what you just posted. It's more like UND's budget is around 10 million, with 7 going for hockey. You don't have a 17 million dollar budget and still have to have tuition waivers for womens hockey.

And 1 million for a move up is a joke. SDSU and NDSU have both already added over twice that. 1 million is probably the cost to balance UND's budget for D-II.

[star2city]

And 1 million for a move up is a joke. SDSU and NDSU have both already added over twice that. 1 million is probably the cost to balance UND's budget for D-II.

I would agree with that 1 million is way too low, but with a couple of caveats: (a) go really, really slow on expanding scholarships, pay assistant coaches and trainers poverty wages, and get a bunch of guarantee games (all like SDSU did), or (b) drop enough sports so we're down to 6 men's and 8 women's.

[Woden]

Do you seriously believe what you just posted. It's more like UND's budget is around 10 million, with 7 going for hockey. You don't have a 17 million dollar budget and still have to have tuition waivers for womens hockey.

And 1 million for a move up is a joke. SDSU and NDSU have both already added over twice that. 1 million is probably the cost to balance UND's budget for D-II.

Yes, I do believe what I posted, because it is what Rob Bollinger said when he discussed the current affairs of the athletic department. If you would read the report, it says the same thing. 6.9 million plus 3.1 million in one time expenditures. Hockey does not fall into this category, and has a budget of $7 million to itself. Why is this so unreasonable to you? NDSU's pre-D1 budget was around $7 million for all sports, which is basically what UND's is, with the exception of the one time expenditures, which I have no idea what that is talking about. If you want me to come over and read the report to you, I can. Or you can keep being ignorant and believe anything not Bison is worthless. Although now that I think about it, I'm sure you have a way better idea on the current state of UND athletics than Rob Bollinger or the commision put together to study the move. Sorry, I apologize. Hail mighty Aff!

[star2city]

Yes, I do believe what I posted, because it is what Rob Bollinger said when he discussed the current affairs of the athletic department. If you would read the report, it says the same thing. 6.9 million plus 3.1 million in one time expenditures. Hockey does not fall into this category, and has a budget of $7 million to itself. Why is this so unreasonable to you? NDSU's pre-D1 budget was around $7 million for all sports, which is basically what UND's is, with the exception of the one time expenditures, which I have no idea what that is talking about. If you want me to come over and read the report to you, I can. Or you can keep being ignorant and believe anything not Bison is worthless. Although now that I think about it, I'm sure you have a way better idea on the current state of UND athletics than Rob Bollinger or the commision put together to study the move. Sorry, I apologize. Hail mighty Aff!

Woden:

Just browsed the report, but does anyone know the nature of the 3.1 million in one-time expenditures? Payment on the Betty?

Also, in the past, the REA budget and UND athletic budget normally haven't been "mixed together", although they should be, as long as the transfer payments from the REA to the athletic budget don't get double counted. The REA budget issues make UND's financial picture much harder for the average fan to grasp, relative to other schools.

[aff]

Thats fine, but you're precious report also had this to say:

"Over time, UND Athletics has periodically been provided an institutional subsidy at year end to balance

revenue and expense in addition to base institutional funding already provided. In the most recently completed fiscal year 2005, Athletics Department expenditures were greater than revenues resulting in the need for a year end subsidy of about $250,000. The Athletics Department entered fiscal year 2005-06 with projected expenditures exceeding projected revenues by almost $700,000. Since that time, changes have occurred to narrow the projected shortfall, although this is still a moving target."

A $700,000 deficit. And you're going d-I? And somehow, I'm the ignorant one? Whatever, I'll enjoy watching what happens to UND in coming years. You guys are getting led down a dark road right now. You're administration is blatantly lieing to you. I ask anyone of you to call your AD right now and ask him why SDSU and NDSU have already increase their budgets by twice the total amount that UND will have to do. See what he says.

P.S. I know your budget is approximately 10 million. I will find the source if you really need it. You heard Rob Bollinger wrong.

[RD17]

Thats fine, but you're precious report also had this to say:

A $700,000 deficit. And you're going d-I? And somehow, I'm the ignorant one? Whatever, I'll enjoy watching what happens to UND in coming years. You guys are getting led down a dark road right now. You're administration is blatantly lieing to you. I ask anyone of you to call your AD right now and ask him why SDSU and NDSU have already increase their budgets by twice the total amount that UND will have to do. See what he says.

P.S. I know your budget is approximately 10 million. I will find the source if you really need it. You heard Rob Bollinger wrong.

As usual, you have no clue what you're talking about. The $1 million figure in the report is merely the difference between UND's current budget and an average I-AA budget. The charge of the study group was not to come up with a detailed financial plan but to make some comparisons to help weigh the pros and cons. Tom Buning has told several people off the record that it will take a budget increase of $2.5 to $3 million per year to maintain a competitive D-I athletics program so I think the people running the show at UND have a better grasp on things than you would like to believe.

And please, go back and reread Woden's post... maybe you will finally get how the whole situation with the REA complicates (and indirectly increases) UND's overall athletic budget.

[aff]

As usual, you have no clue what you're talking about. The $1 million figure in the report is merely the difference between UND's current budget and an average I-AA budget. The charge of the study group was not to come up with a detailed financial plan but to make some comparisons to help weigh the pros and cons. Tom Buning has told several people off the record that it will take a budget increase of $2.5 to $3 million per year to maintain a competitive D-I athletics program so I think the people running the show at UND have a better grasp on things than you would like to believe.

And please, go back and reread Woden's post... maybe you will finally get how the whole situation with the REA complicates (and indirectly increases) UND's overall athletic budget.

Ohhh... I see. Thanks for explaining it to me. The report that is supposed to be a recommendation for a move to D-I wasn't supposed to have a detailed financial plan for a move to D-I. Makes perfect sense. I mean how else would you decide if you wanted to go D-I? God knows you wouldn't want to have detailed financial information. So when is this detailed financial information going to come foward? After a decision has been made? Seems kind of late to me I guess.

Give me a break, that whole paragraph is the biggest spin I have ever read. The reccommendation for D-I doesn't have the actual financial information in it? Thats really your defense? By your own admission the school will go D-I either 1) Blind to the financial consequences or 2) Using incorrect assumptions.

And don't worry, I get what wooden is saying. I think what I read was that UND had a 17 million budget, 10 of which goes to sports and 7 of which goes to hockey. Since 10 million is already what NDSU is at, they don't need to change anything. Seems like he might have forgot about the REA in that.

In either case it doesn't matter. Here are the FACTS, even from your own report:

1. UND is currently running a 700,000 deficit.

2. UND is currently considering D-I.

Can anybody see why I'm having trouble understanding the situation right now? You can't maintain your budget in D-II, and yet your admin is telling you that there will be minimal costs to going to D-I, and that somehow you're going to make it.

Look at it this way. To get to that extra million that you apparently need (from the idiotic comparison to D-IAA schools with no hockey program) you would have to increase your budget almost 2 million to overcome your deficit. Seems like your putting the cart before the horse to consider D-I before your even balanced in D-II, doesn't it? Oh, wait, just tell me I'm ignorant for thinking that having a deficit isn't the best way to go into D-I. Thats easier than realizing the truth.

[RD17]

Ohhh... I see. Thanks for explaining it to me. The report that is supposed to be a recommendation for a move to D-I wasn't supposed to have a detailed financial plan for a move to D-I. Makes perfect sense. I mean how else would you decide if you wanted to go D-I? God knows you wouldn't want to have detailed financial information. So when is this detailed financial information going to come foward? After a decision has been made? Seems kind of late to me I guess.

Give me a break, that whole paragraph is the biggest spin I have ever read. The reccommendation for D-I doesn't have the actual financial information in it? Thats really your defense? By your own admission the school will go D-I either 1) Blind to the financial consequences or 2) Using incorrect assumptions.

And don't worry, I get what wooden is saying. I think what I read was that UND had a 17 million budget, 10 of which goes to sports and 7 of which goes to hockey. Since 10 million is already what NDSU is at, they don't need to change anything. Seems like he might have forgot about the REA in that.

In either case it doesn't matter. Here are the FACTS, even from your own report:

1. UND is currently running a 700,000 deficit.

2. UND is currently considering D-I.

Can anybody see why I'm having trouble understanding the situation right now? You can't maintain your budget in D-II, and yet your admin is telling you that there will be minimal costs to going to D-I, and that somehow you're going to make it.

Look at it this way. To get to that extra million that you apparently need (from the idiotic comparison to D-IAA schools with no hockey program) you would have to increase your budget almost 2 million to overcome your deficit. Seems like your putting the cart before the horse to consider D-I before your even balanced in D-II, doesn't it? Oh, wait, just tell me I'm ignorant for thinking that having a deficit isn't the best way to go into D-I. Thats easier than realizing the truth.

You still have no clue. The report was never designed to be a Division I study. Here are a couple of exerpts from an email conversation I had with UND's faculty athletic rep. (and former interim AD) in March. This should help clear up what the report was all about and also show that people in the administration have an idea of what is going on:

The commmittee is actually a "Classification Study Committee" - - it is not as President Kupchella directed a "D I" Study Committee - Charge to committee is to respond to the President if UND is "properly" classified

There will be no "recommendations" to the President - -merely "findings"

Our AD seems to be operating under the assumption that some configuration of a DI program could be delivered with an approximate increase of $2-$3 million annually - -he has also talked about a $35 million facilities enhancement

As far as the deficit goes, who knows? It could be that the school decided to cut back on institutional support for athletics this year, thus creating a larger deficit. (It was in the report that UND doesn't use nearly as much money from the general fund to subsidize athletics as other DII/IAA schools). That is something that would likely have to change in a move to D-I (thus mitigating any deficit problem). It could also be that the debt service on the Betty is figured into the overall athletic budget and that issue would likely be resolved with some facilities fund raising (which is going to happen regardless of division). Without being able to see the specifics, I don't think any of us are in a position to say exactly what is going on.

I'm not one of those people that believe everyone at UND is infallible, in fact I have some major reservations about how the new AD has handled some issues that have come up so far (like the hiring of the new basketball coach). But I do know this: I would much rather take my chances on Buning leading my school through the transition than a guy that is tipping the bottle every night and then taking it out on his wife.

[SiouxMeNow]

GO HOME BISON!!...GO HOME!!!!*

(amazing how Bunings' "GO DI" comments generated more than 50 posts in less than 24 hours on an...ahem...unnamed "BIG TIME" di-aa board that "doesn't care" about UND... )

[NanoBison]

I was pretty much disappointed with the report. It basically read like a biased advertisement for UND. I'm not quite sure it would be a wise decision, based upon this report, to decide to make the move. I would seriously suggest getting an outside firm or another 3rd party to do a better analysis and then finally make the decision from there.

If you were to make the move, and then decide to move back to DII after an exploratory year or two, I'm not sure fans/administration/Kupchella/Bunning would be able to withstand the backlash that would create (which is why Kupchella is very iffy on the issue). It's best to have a thorough study of the issue from an organization not associated with UND. Then go from there.

[Shawn-O]

I was pretty much disappointed with the report. It basically read like a biased advertisement for UND. I'm not quite sure it would be a wise decision, based upon this report, to decide to make the move. I would seriously suggest getting an outside firm or another 3rd party to do a better analysis and then finally make the decision from there.

If you were to make the move, and then decide to move back to DII after an exploratory year or two, I'm not sure fans/administration/Kupchella/Bunning would be able to withstand the backlash that would create (which is why Kupchella is very iffy on the issue). It's best to have a thorough study of the issue from an organization not associated with UND. Then go from there.

How many of the Carr Report recommendations did NDSU implement before announcing their move?

[Woden]

Aff-

I'd like for you to go back to my first post and show me where I said UND does not need to increase their budget. I did state they are at $10 millioni, which is what NDSU was targeting (not sure if they are there yet), but never once said they would not need to raise the current budget. I did say they could either raise it or keep it at the same level and start using their money more wisely, but I never said which one they should do and realize that an increase is the most likely scenario.

And let me try to clear this whole thing up for you. This study was not a plan for UND to go D1. It was a study to find which universities UND is most like. Whether UND is similiar to D2 schools or D1 schools, and the averages that schools in these brackets have. With the information found, Buning has determined that UND is more like a D1 school, and UND should look that route. If Kupchella agrees, a plan of action will be laid out that will get UND to D1.

BTW- I'm still looking for your source that the budget is $10 million. As others have posted, the REA adds an additional $7 million. If you think UND operates its entire athletic department which includes football, hockey, basketball, the Ralph, the Betty, paying for the Alerus, and the other sports at $10 million, I want what you are smoking. Shoot, from what I've heard, one away trip for the hockey team costs UND about 80 G's.

[tony]

GOOD LORD! HUGE MISTAKE ON MY PART! Since the report kept referring to UND having a $10 million budget, I assumed that they were using that figure to compare to the average DI-AA budget, but I think they were using the $6.9 million figure as their benchmark. That's not nearly as dubious as I thought.

While NDSU's method for making an estimate is much better (they had the coaches prepare DI budgets), UND's method is OK as far as it goes - but it does include a bunch of low-scholarship football schools in the pool, ignores the huge effect that hockey has on UND's athletic budget, and also assumes that UND is willing to go from being the biggest fish left in DII to a small fry in DI and only a middling-sized fish in DI-AA.

While no excuse for my screw up, the $1 million per year estimate is very low and UND should be a little more up front about the true cost of going DI as well as what their actual budget is. Among all those newspaper stories about this issue, every one listed $1 million as the cost except the one in which Buning, to his credit, was gave a good-faith estimate of $2-3 million (which is the true cost of going DI and having a fully-funded football team).

BTW, UND's athletic budget *is* 6.9 million including hockey - not $10 million or $17 million. Football takes up 1.6 million of that; BB needs $800k, and all other sports (including hockey) take up $4 million. That's directly from the report's supporting documents.

You really have to dig to find the one-time expenses. You have to compare Exhibit 19C to 19D... er, ok, so maybe that's not that much digging. The one-time charges are for:

1. $2 million in for "Contract Services", 90% on the men's side. That's a huge number - it's $1 million more than the average DI-A program pays.

2. $600k on "Sports Camps" - no idea. Double what the average DI-A program pays - and it's all a one-time deal.

3. $500k in a one-time bump to men's coaching salaries. All I can think of is that maybe UND had to pay the salary of two hockey coaches for 2005. Still, that seems extreme.

That's really kind of interesting. At first I thought contract services might have something to do with coach's contracts, but I'm kind of thinking it has something to one-time facility rentals. Maybe it has to do with hosting part of the NCAA hockey tournament.