what do you give, how high will you go?

[ODUwildman]

I've always said this about schools cutting sports, especially Olympic sports -- if you're looking to cut first, you're not trying hard enough to fight for your student athletes.

I truly believe ODU is a different type of school, not one that will cut sports and then claim it was too difficult/expensive to keep them. Every sport we currently have can be afforded to stay. If you're looking to cut first, then you clearly have the wrong leaders in place.

The question is, would C-USA be as much of an eventual money drain where cutting swimming wouldn't matter from a cost perspective anyway? If we can sustain funds at the FBS level, unlike many mid-level FBS schools, then we'll be just fine and all this cutting conjecture can just go.

There are big boosters who were swimmers too. BIG boosters. First option is always to keep everything and use a little elbow grease vs. taking the easy way and saying, "too bad, no one cares about you."

They are students and alums just like the rest of us, but unlike many of us, they donned the blue and silver to represent their school. Few of us ever had the privilege. I will never tell an ODU athlete they didn't matter to our school. Selling them down the river isn't one of my priorities.

Again, I think I'm more old school in my thinking. We should never cut a sport. We're better than that.

There's also no guarantee FBS will bring more revenue to support the athletics dept. Problem with Title IX is, if swimming is the sport that could get the axe, it would only be the men and not the women. Gotta love proportionality.

RR,
Your "C-USA or Swimming" choice is a red herring. It would never happen that way, so even subjecting such a scenario isn't remotely worth discussing.

If I were a rich ODU swimming alum and the sport was cut, no way would ODU get money. That, too, is a business decision. People with money hold the cards, not those of us who want this and want that.

With dozens of friends around all sports who have had their schools cut their programs for being lazy (cough: one example is JMU), none of them donate to their schools and some of them are BIG money people. It's cost some small programs more in the long run (losing donations) than it did in actual savings.

If your a school and it's Swimming of FBS, it's an unfortunately easy choice, but not always the right one.

There's no excuse to ever cut a program at ODU. We are better than that. When you're dealing with money, like running a business, you'd better be careful who you burn bridges with.

[Stanger]

I've always said this about schools cutting sports, especially Olympic sports -- if you're looking to cut first, you're not trying hard enough to fight for your student athletes.

I truly believe ODU is a different type of school, not one that will cut sports and then claim it was too difficult/expensive to keep them. There's no excuse to ever cut a program at ODU. We are better than that. When you're dealing with money, like running a business, you'd better be careful who you burn bridges with.

I don't understand why you keep saying this. Fact of the matter is that around 1989 we cut Men's Cross Country due to Title IX issues. I had friends on that team.

I do agree that we shouldn't sacrifice any current sports, though, to make this happen. Every student athlete that we have has worked hard to get where they are at and deserve to stay.

[Gilesfan]

Gilesfan? You didn't finish your post. You didn't have a stroke did you?

Site jacked my messages up

[ODUwildman]

Stanger, we are better than that now. I know about the cuts in the 80s and the replacement of women's cross country with women's golf when I was a student

Any cuts in our current climate of athletics is based on laziness and lack of imagination and about the easy way, not the right way.

[Razor Ramon 2]

Disagree completely. I think you do what's best for the university. You can't let sports that are financial drains dictate what the sports that make money do.

Nothing in life works that way. The hard decision is to cut a program if it will allow us to move up to fbs. That's not lazy. That's a hard decision to make but one that must be made for the good of the university.

I understand you enjoy non revenue sports as much if not more than the two main sports we field. But that is one man's opinion. We can't sacrifice out future and our schools lifeblood so we can keep sports that the vast majority don't care about and who drain money.

For instance, say we decide we can't afford to go to cusa unless we cut swimming and wrestling (god forbid, I like odu wrestling alot, but i'm just throwing out a potential worse case scenario). So because we don't want to cut those programs, we say no to cusa.

Then vcu and gmu go to the a10. We are immediately in a 1 bid bball league. Jmu decides to go to the mac, w&m wants out to the patriot league. We no longer have a single va rival. Travel costs in all sports soar.

We are eventually forced to cut programs anyways because we can't afford them in a crappy bball league and by playing fcs football.

Just a horrible scenario right? It's not that far fetched. That's why I think you have to do whatever it takes to get into cusa, including cutting programs.

Does anyone care that we cut cross country anymore? Anyone miss it? Nope. No one would miss swimming in 15-20 years either. Hell, quite a few of us wouldn't miss it tomorrow.

Besides, if we make enough money in cusa, maybe we could bring them back down the road once we can afford them.

Just saying, it's not a "lazy choice".....it's really the tough one in my opinion.

[ODUwildman]

Disagree completely. I think you do what's best for the university. You can't let sports that are financial drains dictate what the sports that make money do.

What happens when, god forbid, FBS fooball becomes a financial drain and affects the entire department? Then you're going to leave ODU as one of those also-ran programs with the minimum 6 men's sports and 8 women's sports and basically make us "another one of those" schools.

Athletics Mission
"In support of the Old Dominion University mission, the Department of Athletics recruits and develops a diverse population of highly skilled student-athletes that compete at the NCAA Division I level. Our commitment is to enable student-athletes to reach their full potential academically, athletically, and as citizens. We enrich the campus experience and serve as a gateway to the University by enhancing its visibility and reputation."

Diverse population of highly skilled student-athletes ... not "make money and move to two-three bid leagues"

What's best for the university includes not alienating generations of donors/potential donors who actually competed at Old Dominion. If money's the worry, cutting off revenue streams from alumni from programs in existence for decades is also a dangerous play.

Cutting programs for the sake of another's travel/expenses is irresponsible money management and yes, LAZY.

So you're comfortable with ODU being just another school, doing the bare minimum for other sports and dumping money into what COULD be a sinkhole of dollars. There's no guarantee this will make the school money, and if it ends up costing the school programs, its legacy and makes us just another school, then that's not good business either.

Don't alienate your alumni because you've got a shiny new toy in football. Your opinion is yours, my opinion is mine. Neither of us speak for any large group of alums. I know a lot of big money people who will pull their seven-figure donations to ODU if some sports get cut. They weren't football or basketball players, either.

[Mountainman Monarch]

I know a lot of big money people who will pull their seven-figure donations to ODU if some sports get cut. They weren't football or basketball players, either.

Horsecrap. There could at most be a dozen "seven-figure" donors mathematically, few/none of which were sports players, and I doubt you know "a lot" of them.

I'm going to recycle my anology from another thread; if we stay FCS, the disappointment will erode fan support like a tampon in a septic tank.

[EverRespect]

Horsecrap. There could at most be a dozen "seven-figure" donors mathematically, few/none of which were sports players, and I doubt you know "a lot" of them.

I'm going to recycle my anology from another thread; if we stay FCS, the disappointment will erode fan support like a tampon in a septic tank.

If they donate a chunk of that to the ODUAF instead of ODU, problem solved. If they aredonating 7 figures, they can single handedly save wrestling or whatever other sport and probably get their name put on the new football stadium, practice facility, or whatever.

[ODU Commish]

Horsecrap. There could at most be a dozen "seven-figure" donors mathematically, few/none of which were sports players, and I doubt you know "a lot" of them.

I'm going to recycle my anology from another thread; if we stay FCS, the disappointment will erode fan support like a tampon in a septic tank.

I know plenty of "seven-figure" donors myself. Their donations look like this: $1,000.000. Never could figure why they felt the need to have that third zero after the decimal point. HAHA

Sorry, couldn't resist. I must be happy that it is Friday and I get the feeling we will be playing East Carolina and Marshall at Foreman Field in a few years.

[87BigBlue04]

I give $500 a year and I would double that if we go CUSA.