(05-23-2018 04:37 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  This is why SF will never make a coaching change while he is here. He wants the house to be in order so he can bid on every job that comes up. Seriously, the quicker he is gone, the quicker NIU can start to rebuild. He checked out about a year after he was here.

WELCOME BACK, MY FRIEND!!!!

Wow, have I missed you!

(05-23-2018 04:37 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  This is why SF will never make a coaching change while he is here. He wants the house to be in order so he can bid on every job that comes up. Seriously, the quicker he is gone, the quicker NIU can start to rebuild. He checked out about a year after he was here.

Glad you’re back!

(05-23-2018 04:37 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  This is why SF will never make a coaching change while he is here. He wants the house to be in order so he can bid on every job that comes up. Seriously, the quicker he is gone, the quicker NIU can start to rebuild. He checked out about a year after he was here.

Welcome back bud. Ignore the haters!

Thanks everyone I appreciate it!

I will say one thing about STF, he did bring us the Utah game this year, and that is more than any AD has done here in about 15 years. A low bar yes, but thanks for that! I do not blame him at all for not being able to fulfill the grand facility visions, we are lucky to have a D1 program still with the catastrophic budget issues. My biggest gripe with him is the way he treats every day fans, never have seen an AD have that much disdain for the common fan.

Sad part is we probably need to start fresh with all three of the top positions in our athletic department. We've become stagnant in football, basketball, and our athletic director is getting nowhere with the facility master plan he unveiled 3 years (?) ago now. Yes, some of it is institutional with declining student enrollment but student fees shouldn't be the primary way of paying for $100 million facility renovations. The large sum of that should be coming from fundraising. If you can't generate that money from fundraising then you are failing at one of your biggest job duties as an AD.

(05-23-2018 10:56 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  Thanks everyone I appreciate it!

I will say one thing about STF, he did bring us the Utah game this year, and that is more than any AD has done here in about 15 years. A low bar yes, but thanks for that! I do not blame him at all for not being able to fulfill the grand facility visions, we are lucky to have a D1 program still with the catastrophic budget issues. My biggest gripe with him is the way he treats every day fans, never have seen an AD have that much disdain for the common fan.

Not true with me at least[;
I ran into him one day recently while in town as he was putting gas into his car. Could not have been nicer. Of course, he promoted NIU and talked about football coming up, wanting to make sure fans came to the games...

Do not make such remarks about people unless you have facts to back them up...

(05-23-2018 05:29 PM)niu79 Wrote:  Reviews on STF may be mixed, but congrats to the NIU student athletes on the latest APR results:

http://www.niuhuskies.com/news/2018/5/23...eport.aspx

This link should help remove any remaining wonder why STF would be a candidate for higher AD office.

(05-23-2018 06:25 PM)Dog Fan Wrote:  

(05-23-2018 04:37 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  This is why SF will never make a coaching change while he is here. He wants the house to be in order so he can bid on every job that comes up. Seriously, the quicker he is gone, the quicker NIU can start to rebuild. He checked out about a year after he was here.

WELCOME BACK, MY FRIEND!!!!

Wow, have I missed you!

I’m so happy to hear that you’re back, too. You’re one of our most loyal fans.

(05-23-2018 10:56 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  Thanks everyone I appreciate it!

I will say one thing about STF, he did bring us the Utah game this year, and that is more than any AD has done here in about 15 years. A low bar yes, but thanks for that! I do not blame him at all for not being able to fulfill the grand facility visions, we are lucky to have a D1 program still with the catastrophic budget issues. My biggest gripe with him is the way he treats every day fans, never have seen an AD have that much disdain for the common fan.

Welcome back!

I don't know what to think regarding STF. He did make an effort to get better schools into Huskie stadium which I appreciate. And the Yard was a good idea. The money situation, which is as bad as most MAC schools, doesn't help, and this is why MAC schools stay where they are - in the MAC. I think bumping up West side single-game tickets to $42 was not a good idea - might have been an incentive to get season tickets - but people don't want to buy season tickets since most can't get to the weeknight games.

It's hard for me to judge STF. In my opinion, he has done a pretty god job with scheduling. Rod Carey may be doofus, but he has had one sub .500 year as a head coach. Why fire him when the school has no money to hire anyone worth a damn? Monty on the other hand should have been gone by now. If he hasn't been fired due to money, NIU is in some serious trouble.

I think that STF is probably a great AD, but has not has the support and resources at NIU to really make a difference. My fear is that if he does leave, NIU will need to settle on a less expensive AD and set athletics back for a long time, if not forever.

(05-23-2018 05:29 PM)niu79 Wrote:  Reviews on STF may be mixed, but congrats to the NIU student athletes on the latest APR results:

http://www.niuhuskies.com/news/2018/5/23...eport.aspx

I thought one of the penalties for this was no NCAA Tournament games.
I have yet to see it.
What are the penalties?

(05-24-2018 07:21 AM)OldTtimeNIU Wrote:  

(05-23-2018 10:56 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  Thanks everyone I appreciate it!

I will say one thing about STF, he did bring us the Utah game this year, and that is more than any AD has done here in about 15 years. A low bar yes, but thanks for that! I do not blame him at all for not being able to fulfill the grand facility visions, we are lucky to have a D1 program still with the catastrophic budget issues. My biggest gripe with him is the way he treats every day fans, never have seen an AD have that much disdain for the common fan.

Not true with me at least[;
I ran into him one day recently while in town as he was putting gas into his car. Could not have been nicer. Of course, he promoted NIU and talked about football coming up, wanting to make sure fans came to the games...

Do not make such remarks about people unless you have facts to back them up...

From one of the new guys on the board, welcome back MD! Your comments are always thought provoking. Gotta agree with Old Time, though. I've met Frazier on multiple occasions and have had a couple of lengthy conversations with him. He was respectful, enthusiastic, seemed interested in what I had to say, never in a hurry to cut me off, overall a pleasure to talk with. Maybe he could have cared less about talking with me, but it wasn't evident in any way. I think his record of success is a mixed bag, but as many on this discussion thread have been saying, there are a lot of reasons to factor in--many beyond his control.

Thanks for diving right in and stirring the pot a bit.

(05-24-2018 11:13 AM)timxlydon Wrote:  It's hard for me to judge STF. In my opinion, he has done a pretty god job with scheduling. Rod Carey may be doofus, but he has had one sub .500 year as a head coach. Why fire him when the school has no money to hire anyone worth a damn? Monty on the other hand should have been gone by now. If he hasn't been fired due to money, NIU is in some serious trouble.

I think that STF is probably a great AD, but has not has the support and resources at NIU to really make a difference. My fear is that if he does leave, NIU will need to settle on a less expensive AD and set athletics back for a long time, if not forever.

+1
Really hard to judge him under the circumstances.
I still like Groth, Phillips better.

(05-24-2018 11:13 AM)timxlydon Wrote:  It's hard for me to judge STF. In my opinion, he has done a pretty god job with scheduling. Rod Carey may be doofus, but he has had one sub .500 year as a head coach. Why fire him when the school has no money to hire anyone worth a damn? Monty on the other hand should have been gone by now. If he hasn't been fired due to money, NIU is in some serious trouble.

I think that STF is probably a great AD, but has not has the support and resources at NIU to really make a difference. My fear is that if he does leave, NIU will need to settle on a less expensive AD and set athletics back for a long time, if not forever.

+1000

(05-24-2018 12:04 PM)HuskiePride12 Wrote:  

(05-24-2018 11:13 AM)timxlydon Wrote:  It's hard for me to judge STF. In my opinion, he has done a pretty god job with scheduling. Rod Carey may be doofus, but he has had one sub .500 year as a head coach. Why fire him when the school has no money to hire anyone worth a damn? Monty on the other hand should have been gone by now. If he hasn't been fired due to money, NIU is in some serious trouble.

I think that STF is probably a great AD, but has not has the support and resources at NIU to really make a difference. My fear is that if he does leave, NIU will need to settle on a less expensive AD and set athletics back for a long time, if not forever.

+1000

+1001

I think there's very few AD's of the caliber we could draw that could do much better with the hand STF has been dealt.

I'm surprised there's that many here that don't see that.

Chessick, Barsama and Yordon there is the list of big donors. Some of you think million dollar plus donors grow on trees. Unless some tech guy who likes NIU athletics sells their idea to google or some other tech company, seed money is in short supply

(05-23-2018 04:37 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  This is why SF will never make a coaching change while he is here. He wants the house to be in order so he can bid on every job that comes up. Seriously, the quicker he is gone, the quicker NIU can start to rebuild. He checked out about a year after he was here.

Welcome back MD, nice to see you posting again!

Can someone get a listing of corporate donations and sponsorship agreements with Athletics? Some of these go from a couple thousand on up and, depending on the nature of the agreement, can be for many thousands of dollars. Plus, these can really add up and provide a major boost to Athletics. It should not be too hard to get these sponsorship agreements, as many corporations donate to universities throughout the local area or nation. If these corporate donations/sponsorships have not increased each year (or at least stayed the same), then this is a negative mark on the STF administration.

(05-23-2018 10:56 PM)MaddDawgz02 Wrote:  Thanks everyone I appreciate it!

I will say one thing about STF, he did bring us the Utah game this year, and that is more than any AD has done here in about 15 years. A low bar yes, but thanks for that! I do not blame him at all for not being able to fulfill the grand facility visions, we are lucky to have a D1 program still with the catastrophic budget issues. My biggest gripe with him is the way he treats every day fans, never have seen an AD have that much disdain for the common fan.

MD—-first welcome back. Good to hear from you.

I guess I agree and disagree with you. When you have 4,000 butts in the seats for football games and 750 for basketball there is no “common” fan. They are gone. It’s just us that seem to care about the program.

I only get to a handful of games, but I see very, very little interaction between STF and what I think you are naming the common fan.

I have been near him, introduced to him over a dozen of times. He certainly has no idea what my name is and I highly doubt he ever remembers any interaction we have had.

Admittedly I don’t have the opportunity to see him at a gas station, school, bank or anywhere around town, but I just get the a “feel” much, much different than that of Groth or Phillips. They were #1 people persons no matter who you were.....Phillips also excelled at the business side of it, I think Groth had a very keen athletic side to it.

I personally think since STF is so hindered by the state, the budget, all of that, he needs to be over the top on the people person side and he’s just not that to me. He has to be a good negotiator to improve the football schedule as he has.

Plain and simple—-the common fan has left because we aren’t winning. Or, in Carey’s case, not winning enough to create or re-create the buzz of the Orange Bowl. We’re not 11-1, 12-0 in football. We’re not anywhere near .500 in basketball.

I think he is benefitting from two things——a) obviously the state issues that have ruined any of his grand visions (but the state issues were there when he proposed them) and b) I think there are enough out there that were glad he replaced Jiff and is measured to that more than he should be.

I go to all the Saturday home games (admittedly not many) and an occasional early season weeknight game. Every game, my group sits and eats in the HAF tent. I always see STF there. Never once has he stopped by our table to say hello and introduce himself. All of the donors in that tent donate over $1,000. If it were me, you'd better believe I'd be at every table pounding the flesh.