New AD Jon Fagg is dreaming big at UT-Arlington. Will football fit into his vision?

Quote:ARLINGTON — Front and center in the black-and-white photo, Chuck Curtis stands underneath his trademark cowboy hat, hands jammed into his jacket pockets. He doesn’t look happy, and he had no reason to be. Only a couple weeks earlier, his own administration sacked his football team.

A rally in protest of the decision turned out one of Maverick Stadium’s biggest crowds in Curtis’ two years as head coach. Behind him in the photo hangs a banner:

“UT Arlington football will return.”

Nearly 37 years later, a lot is going on at UTA, but football is still as dead as Chuck Curtis.

Meaning that, with no imminent signs of resurrection, UTA will remain the largest university in the nation without a major in blocking and tackling.

Here in Texas, where football ranks as the state religion, it almost seems like a sin.

On Monday at College Park Center, UTA’s new president, Jennifer Cowley, hired in April, introduced UTA’s new athletic director, Jon Fagg, at a press conference in which they jointly celebrated the athletic department’s pending move from the Sun Belt Conference to the more neighborly WAC. Cowley, an Arlington native, boasted of two dozen conference titles at UTA over the last decade and clamored for more.

Backing up Cowley’s motto to “dream big,” Fagg, getting his first shot as an AD after two decades in college athletic offices, said he wants to make “the impossible possible.”

Apparently some dreams are too far beyond the pale.

“I didn’t come here to start football,” Fagg told me after the presser. “I came here to handle the sports that we have and we’ll cross other bridges later.”

For the record, at least twice this century the university has undertaken feasibility studies to determine the cost of restoring football. Chuck Neinas, the interim AD who would bail out the Big 12, headed the first in 2004. Neinas reported that it would have been less difficult to maintain the UTA football program over the previous 19 years than to start up a new one.

Cowley has seen that study. Her take on a restart?

“It’s expensive.”

Here’s how big the tab would be: Another feasibility study, revealed after an open records request by The Dallas Morning News in 2018, concluded that adding football as well as women’s soccer and beach volleyball to satisfy Title IX requirements would run $146.7 million over 10 years. Pretty steep for an athletic department that reported $503,000 in donations the previous year and a $14.1 million overall operating budget.

The cost was so prohibitive, Jim Baker, Fagg’s predecessor, stipulated that football would have to be funded exclusively by boosters or other private resources, not student fees.

Considering the expense, it’s no wonder UTA officials aren’t football crazy. Given the landscape of college football these days, what with NIL making millionaires out of teenagers and big-name coaches driven to distraction as a result, there’s a lot to unpack. And then there’s the economy. Frankly, I wouldn’t start a hot dog stand in this climate. Assuming I knew how to run a hot dog stand.

But here’s the PR problem for UTA: If it’s too costly to put on a football program when you’re the fourth-biggest university in the state, with an enrollment of more than 40,000, how come Texas at Rio Grande Valley is doing it?

In November, the 30,000 students at UTRGV — a regional merger of the former UT Brownsville and UT Pan American — approved a fee increase of $11.25 per hour, capped at 12 hours. The money would fund, among other things, football, which would compete in the WAC starting in 2025, as well as women’s swimming and diving and not just one but two marching bands.

Of course, in UTA’s defense, you don’t need even one marching band if you don’t have a football team.

What UTRGV has going for it that UTA doesn’t in this case, anyway, is the largest and most populous area in the nation without a D1 football team. The North Texas area already has SMU, TCU and UNT. For that matter, UTA was the fifth-largest university in the state in 1985, and size didn’t save the football program then. Most of its students were commuters, prompting a smart-aleck local columnist to call it a “drive-thru university.”

The thing of it is, UTA officials didn’t exactly disagree at the time.

“I think we could become a more traditional school,” UTA athletic director Bill Reeves told reporters in ‘85, “but we’d have to have some success to begin with.”

On that front, Baker, the outgoing athletic director, is mostly famous at UTA for firing Scott Cross, only the best basketball coach in school history. The first day he’s on the job, Fagg will constitute an upgrade.

UTA can claim all sorts of improvements, starting with the fact that the Mavs no longer play basketball on a stage. College Park Center is a nice place to watch a game, and no one hollers for you to sit down up front.

Cowley said she hears from alums all the time about what they’d like for her to do as president. The return of football comes up. She said it’s not on the front burner now, even on simmer, but “it’s certainly open for long-term thinking.”

One step at a time, apparently. An alum stood up at Monday’s press conference and asked the new president if she could do something about the fact that he can’t walk into a sporting goods store in Hurst and buy so much as a UTA keychain. Cowley told him she’s on it. Practically got a standing ovation.

(06-22-2022 11:40 AM)CrimsonPhantom Wrote:  New AD Jon Fagg is dreaming big at UT-Arlington. Will football fit into his vision?

Quote:ARLINGTON — Front and center in the black-and-white photo, Chuck Curtis stands underneath his trademark cowboy hat, hands jammed into his jacket pockets. He doesn’t look happy, and he had no reason to be. Only a couple weeks earlier, his own administration sacked his football team.

A rally in protest of the decision turned out one of Maverick Stadium’s biggest crowds in Curtis’ two years as head coach. Behind him in the photo hangs a banner:

“UT Arlington football will return.”

Nearly 37 years later, a lot is going on at UTA, but football is still as dead as Chuck Curtis.

Meaning that, with no imminent signs of resurrection, UTA will remain the largest university in the nation without a major in blocking and tackling.

Here in Texas, where football ranks as the state religion, it almost seems like a sin.

On Monday at College Park Center, UTA’s new president, Jennifer Cowley, hired in April, introduced UTA’s new athletic director, Jon Fagg, at a press conference in which they jointly celebrated the athletic department’s pending move from the Sun Belt Conference to the more neighborly WAC. Cowley, an Arlington native, boasted of two dozen conference titles at UTA over the last decade and clamored for more.

Backing up Cowley’s motto to “dream big,” Fagg, getting his first shot as an AD after two decades in college athletic offices, said he wants to make “the impossible possible.”

Apparently some dreams are too far beyond the pale.

“I didn’t come here to start football,” Fagg told me after the presser. “I came here to handle the sports that we have and we’ll cross other bridges later.”

For the record, at least twice this century the university has undertaken feasibility studies to determine the cost of restoring football. Chuck Neinas, the interim AD who would bail out the Big 12, headed the first in 2004. Neinas reported that it would have been less difficult to maintain the UTA football program over the previous 19 years than to start up a new one.

Cowley has seen that study. Her take on a restart?

“It’s expensive.”

Here’s how big the tab would be: Another feasibility study, revealed after an open records request by The Dallas Morning News in 2018, concluded that adding football as well as women’s soccer and beach volleyball to satisfy Title IX requirements would run $146.7 million over 10 years. Pretty steep for an athletic department that reported $503,000 in donations the previous year and a $14.1 million overall operating budget.

The cost was so prohibitive, Jim Baker, Fagg’s predecessor, stipulated that football would have to be funded exclusively by boosters or other private resources, not student fees.

Considering the expense, it’s no wonder UTA officials aren’t football crazy. Given the landscape of college football these days, what with NIL making millionaires out of teenagers and big-name coaches driven to distraction as a result, there’s a lot to unpack. And then there’s the economy. Frankly, I wouldn’t start a hot dog stand in this climate. Assuming I knew how to run a hot dog stand.

But here’s the PR problem for UTA: If it’s too costly to put on a football program when you’re the fourth-biggest university in the state, with an enrollment of more than 40,000, how come Texas at Rio Grande Valley is doing it?

In November, the 30,000 students at UTRGV — a regional merger of the former UT Brownsville and UT Pan American — approved a fee increase of $11.25 per hour, capped at 12 hours. The money would fund, among other things, football, which would compete in the WAC starting in 2025, as well as women’s swimming and diving and not just one but two marching bands.

Of course, in UTA’s defense, you don’t need even one marching band if you don’t have a football team.

What UTRGV has going for it that UTA doesn’t in this case, anyway, is the largest and most populous area in the nation without a D1 football team. The North Texas area already has SMU, TCU and UNT. For that matter, UTA was the fifth-largest university in the state in 1985, and size didn’t save the football program then. Most of its students were commuters, prompting a smart-aleck local columnist to call it a “drive-thru university.”

The thing of it is, UTA officials didn’t exactly disagree at the time.

“I think we could become a more traditional school,” UTA athletic director Bill Reeves told reporters in ‘85, “but we’d have to have some success to begin with.”

On that front, Baker, the outgoing athletic director, is mostly famous at UTA for firing Scott Cross, only the best basketball coach in school history. The first day he’s on the job, Fagg will constitute an upgrade.

UTA can claim all sorts of improvements, starting with the fact that the Mavs no longer play basketball on a stage. College Park Center is a nice place to watch a game, and no one hollers for you to sit down up front.

Cowley said she hears from alums all the time about what they’d like for her to do as president. The return of football comes up. She said it’s not on the front burner now, even on simmer, but “it’s certainly open for long-term thinking.”

One step at a time, apparently. An alum stood up at Monday’s press conference and asked the new president if she could do something about the fact that he can’t walk into a sporting goods store in Hurst and buy so much as a UTA keychain. Cowley told him she’s on it. Practically got a standing ovation.

$503k in donations is absolutely pathetic for such a large alumni base. Might be even worse than Sam's.

Looking at stats for UTA I can see why their sports don’t have anyone showing up. Sure, they quote the number 48,000 or whatever, but almost half of their undergrads are only part time, and a majority of undergrads are taking at least some classes online, including 30% that are entirely online. Approaching half of all undergrads are over 25. With those dynamics, it’s a wonder they get the attendance they do. When you look at traditional undergrads living on campus, 4,xxx is actually pretty small.

This quote above about being the largest university in the nation without football is suspect. As with everything, it all depends on how you count it I suppose. But if you are looking at undergrad student body, that’s not even close to correct.

(06-22-2022 04:02 PM)Itinerant Texan Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 11:40 AM)CrimsonPhantom Wrote:  New AD Jon Fagg is dreaming big at UT-Arlington. Will football fit into his vision?

Quote:ARLINGTON — Front and center in the black-and-white photo, Chuck Curtis stands underneath his trademark cowboy hat, hands jammed into his jacket pockets. He doesn’t look happy, and he had no reason to be. Only a couple weeks earlier, his own administration sacked his football team.

A rally in protest of the decision turned out one of Maverick Stadium’s biggest crowds in Curtis’ two years as head coach. Behind him in the photo hangs a banner:

“UT Arlington football will return.”

Nearly 37 years later, a lot is going on at UTA, but football is still as dead as Chuck Curtis.

Meaning that, with no imminent signs of resurrection, UTA will remain the largest university in the nation without a major in blocking and tackling.

Here in Texas, where football ranks as the state religion, it almost seems like a sin.

On Monday at College Park Center, UTA’s new president, Jennifer Cowley, hired in April, introduced UTA’s new athletic director, Jon Fagg, at a press conference in which they jointly celebrated the athletic department’s pending move from the Sun Belt Conference to the more neighborly WAC. Cowley, an Arlington native, boasted of two dozen conference titles at UTA over the last decade and clamored for more.

Backing up Cowley’s motto to “dream big,” Fagg, getting his first shot as an AD after two decades in college athletic offices, said he wants to make “the impossible possible.”

Apparently some dreams are too far beyond the pale.

“I didn’t come here to start football,” Fagg told me after the presser. “I came here to handle the sports that we have and we’ll cross other bridges later.”

For the record, at least twice this century the university has undertaken feasibility studies to determine the cost of restoring football. Chuck Neinas, the interim AD who would bail out the Big 12, headed the first in 2004. Neinas reported that it would have been less difficult to maintain the UTA football program over the previous 19 years than to start up a new one.

Cowley has seen that study. Her take on a restart?

“It’s expensive.”

Here’s how big the tab would be: Another feasibility study, revealed after an open records request by The Dallas Morning News in 2018, concluded that adding football as well as women’s soccer and beach volleyball to satisfy Title IX requirements would run $146.7 million over 10 years. Pretty steep for an athletic department that reported $503,000 in donations the previous year and a $14.1 million overall operating budget.

The cost was so prohibitive, Jim Baker, Fagg’s predecessor, stipulated that football would have to be funded exclusively by boosters or other private resources, not student fees.

Considering the expense, it’s no wonder UTA officials aren’t football crazy. Given the landscape of college football these days, what with NIL making millionaires out of teenagers and big-name coaches driven to distraction as a result, there’s a lot to unpack. And then there’s the economy. Frankly, I wouldn’t start a hot dog stand in this climate. Assuming I knew how to run a hot dog stand.

But here’s the PR problem for UTA: If it’s too costly to put on a football program when you’re the fourth-biggest university in the state, with an enrollment of more than 40,000, how come Texas at Rio Grande Valley is doing it?

In November, the 30,000 students at UTRGV — a regional merger of the former UT Brownsville and UT Pan American — approved a fee increase of $11.25 per hour, capped at 12 hours. The money would fund, among other things, football, which would compete in the WAC starting in 2025, as well as women’s swimming and diving and not just one but two marching bands.

Of course, in UTA’s defense, you don’t need even one marching band if you don’t have a football team.

What UTRGV has going for it that UTA doesn’t in this case, anyway, is the largest and most populous area in the nation without a D1 football team. The North Texas area already has SMU, TCU and UNT. For that matter, UTA was the fifth-largest university in the state in 1985, and size didn’t save the football program then. Most of its students were commuters, prompting a smart-aleck local columnist to call it a “drive-thru university.”

The thing of it is, UTA officials didn’t exactly disagree at the time.

“I think we could become a more traditional school,” UTA athletic director Bill Reeves told reporters in ‘85, “but we’d have to have some success to begin with.”

On that front, Baker, the outgoing athletic director, is mostly famous at UTA for firing Scott Cross, only the best basketball coach in school history. The first day he’s on the job, Fagg will constitute an upgrade.

UTA can claim all sorts of improvements, starting with the fact that the Mavs no longer play basketball on a stage. College Park Center is a nice place to watch a game, and no one hollers for you to sit down up front.

Cowley said she hears from alums all the time about what they’d like for her to do as president. The return of football comes up. She said it’s not on the front burner now, even on simmer, but “it’s certainly open for long-term thinking.”

One step at a time, apparently. An alum stood up at Monday’s press conference and asked the new president if she could do something about the fact that he can’t walk into a sporting goods store in Hurst and buy so much as a UTA keychain. Cowley told him she’s on it. Practically got a standing ovation.

$503k in donations is absolutely pathetic for such a large alumni base. Might be even worse than Sam's.

Why would the donate? UTA gives them no reason to.

(06-22-2022 05:33 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 04:02 PM)Itinerant Texan Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 11:40 AM)CrimsonPhantom Wrote:  New AD Jon Fagg is dreaming big at UT-Arlington. Will football fit into his vision?

Quote:ARLINGTON — Front and center in the black-and-white photo, Chuck Curtis stands underneath his trademark cowboy hat, hands jammed into his jacket pockets. He doesn’t look happy, and he had no reason to be. Only a couple weeks earlier, his own administration sacked his football team.

A rally in protest of the decision turned out one of Maverick Stadium’s biggest crowds in Curtis’ two years as head coach. Behind him in the photo hangs a banner:

“UT Arlington football will return.”

Nearly 37 years later, a lot is going on at UTA, but football is still as dead as Chuck Curtis.

Meaning that, with no imminent signs of resurrection, UTA will remain the largest university in the nation without a major in blocking and tackling.

Here in Texas, where football ranks as the state religion, it almost seems like a sin.

On Monday at College Park Center, UTA’s new president, Jennifer Cowley, hired in April, introduced UTA’s new athletic director, Jon Fagg, at a press conference in which they jointly celebrated the athletic department’s pending move from the Sun Belt Conference to the more neighborly WAC. Cowley, an Arlington native, boasted of two dozen conference titles at UTA over the last decade and clamored for more.

Backing up Cowley’s motto to “dream big,” Fagg, getting his first shot as an AD after two decades in college athletic offices, said he wants to make “the impossible possible.”

Apparently some dreams are too far beyond the pale.

“I didn’t come here to start football,” Fagg told me after the presser. “I came here to handle the sports that we have and we’ll cross other bridges later.”

For the record, at least twice this century the university has undertaken feasibility studies to determine the cost of restoring football. Chuck Neinas, the interim AD who would bail out the Big 12, headed the first in 2004. Neinas reported that it would have been less difficult to maintain the UTA football program over the previous 19 years than to start up a new one.

Cowley has seen that study. Her take on a restart?

“It’s expensive.”

Here’s how big the tab would be: Another feasibility study, revealed after an open records request by The Dallas Morning News in 2018, concluded that adding football as well as women’s soccer and beach volleyball to satisfy Title IX requirements would run $146.7 million over 10 years. Pretty steep for an athletic department that reported $503,000 in donations the previous year and a $14.1 million overall operating budget.

The cost was so prohibitive, Jim Baker, Fagg’s predecessor, stipulated that football would have to be funded exclusively by boosters or other private resources, not student fees.

Considering the expense, it’s no wonder UTA officials aren’t football crazy. Given the landscape of college football these days, what with NIL making millionaires out of teenagers and big-name coaches driven to distraction as a result, there’s a lot to unpack. And then there’s the economy. Frankly, I wouldn’t start a hot dog stand in this climate. Assuming I knew how to run a hot dog stand.

But here’s the PR problem for UTA: If it’s too costly to put on a football program when you’re the fourth-biggest university in the state, with an enrollment of more than 40,000, how come Texas at Rio Grande Valley is doing it?

In November, the 30,000 students at UTRGV — a regional merger of the former UT Brownsville and UT Pan American — approved a fee increase of $11.25 per hour, capped at 12 hours. The money would fund, among other things, football, which would compete in the WAC starting in 2025, as well as women’s swimming and diving and not just one but two marching bands.

Of course, in UTA’s defense, you don’t need even one marching band if you don’t have a football team.

What UTRGV has going for it that UTA doesn’t in this case, anyway, is the largest and most populous area in the nation without a D1 football team. The North Texas area already has SMU, TCU and UNT. For that matter, UTA was the fifth-largest university in the state in 1985, and size didn’t save the football program then. Most of its students were commuters, prompting a smart-aleck local columnist to call it a “drive-thru university.”

The thing of it is, UTA officials didn’t exactly disagree at the time.

“I think we could become a more traditional school,” UTA athletic director Bill Reeves told reporters in ‘85, “but we’d have to have some success to begin with.”

On that front, Baker, the outgoing athletic director, is mostly famous at UTA for firing Scott Cross, only the best basketball coach in school history. The first day he’s on the job, Fagg will constitute an upgrade.

UTA can claim all sorts of improvements, starting with the fact that the Mavs no longer play basketball on a stage. College Park Center is a nice place to watch a game, and no one hollers for you to sit down up front.

Cowley said she hears from alums all the time about what they’d like for her to do as president. The return of football comes up. She said it’s not on the front burner now, even on simmer, but “it’s certainly open for long-term thinking.”

One step at a time, apparently. An alum stood up at Monday’s press conference and asked the new president if she could do something about the fact that he can’t walk into a sporting goods store in Hurst and buy so much as a UTA keychain. Cowley told him she’s on it. Practically got a standing ovation.

$503k in donations is absolutely pathetic for such a large alumni base. Might be even worse than Sam's.

Why would the donate? UTA gives them no reason to.

Well, when you already have an arena that even some of the largest, richest, and most successful athletics programs in the country lust after, use as a model for their own plans etc, I suppose donors figure they don’t need any money.

(06-22-2022 06:06 PM)Todor Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 05:33 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 04:02 PM)Itinerant Texan Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 11:40 AM)CrimsonPhantom Wrote:  New AD Jon Fagg is dreaming big at UT-Arlington. Will football fit into his vision?

Quote:ARLINGTON — Front and center in the black-and-white photo, Chuck Curtis stands underneath his trademark cowboy hat, hands jammed into his jacket pockets. He doesn’t look happy, and he had no reason to be. Only a couple weeks earlier, his own administration sacked his football team.

A rally in protest of the decision turned out one of Maverick Stadium’s biggest crowds in Curtis’ two years as head coach. Behind him in the photo hangs a banner:

“UT Arlington football will return.”

Nearly 37 years later, a lot is going on at UTA, but football is still as dead as Chuck Curtis.

Meaning that, with no imminent signs of resurrection, UTA will remain the largest university in the nation without a major in blocking and tackling.

Here in Texas, where football ranks as the state religion, it almost seems like a sin.

On Monday at College Park Center, UTA’s new president, Jennifer Cowley, hired in April, introduced UTA’s new athletic director, Jon Fagg, at a press conference in which they jointly celebrated the athletic department’s pending move from the Sun Belt Conference to the more neighborly WAC. Cowley, an Arlington native, boasted of two dozen conference titles at UTA over the last decade and clamored for more.

Backing up Cowley’s motto to “dream big,” Fagg, getting his first shot as an AD after two decades in college athletic offices, said he wants to make “the impossible possible.”

Apparently some dreams are too far beyond the pale.

“I didn’t come here to start football,” Fagg told me after the presser. “I came here to handle the sports that we have and we’ll cross other bridges later.”

For the record, at least twice this century the university has undertaken feasibility studies to determine the cost of restoring football. Chuck Neinas, the interim AD who would bail out the Big 12, headed the first in 2004. Neinas reported that it would have been less difficult to maintain the UTA football program over the previous 19 years than to start up a new one.

Cowley has seen that study. Her take on a restart?

“It’s expensive.”

Here’s how big the tab would be: Another feasibility study, revealed after an open records request by The Dallas Morning News in 2018, concluded that adding football as well as women’s soccer and beach volleyball to satisfy Title IX requirements would run $146.7 million over 10 years. Pretty steep for an athletic department that reported $503,000 in donations the previous year and a $14.1 million overall operating budget.

The cost was so prohibitive, Jim Baker, Fagg’s predecessor, stipulated that football would have to be funded exclusively by boosters or other private resources, not student fees.

Considering the expense, it’s no wonder UTA officials aren’t football crazy. Given the landscape of college football these days, what with NIL making millionaires out of teenagers and big-name coaches driven to distraction as a result, there’s a lot to unpack. And then there’s the economy. Frankly, I wouldn’t start a hot dog stand in this climate. Assuming I knew how to run a hot dog stand.

But here’s the PR problem for UTA: If it’s too costly to put on a football program when you’re the fourth-biggest university in the state, with an enrollment of more than 40,000, how come Texas at Rio Grande Valley is doing it?

In November, the 30,000 students at UTRGV — a regional merger of the former UT Brownsville and UT Pan American — approved a fee increase of $11.25 per hour, capped at 12 hours. The money would fund, among other things, football, which would compete in the WAC starting in 2025, as well as women’s swimming and diving and not just one but two marching bands.

Of course, in UTA’s defense, you don’t need even one marching band if you don’t have a football team.

What UTRGV has going for it that UTA doesn’t in this case, anyway, is the largest and most populous area in the nation without a D1 football team. The North Texas area already has SMU, TCU and UNT. For that matter, UTA was the fifth-largest university in the state in 1985, and size didn’t save the football program then. Most of its students were commuters, prompting a smart-aleck local columnist to call it a “drive-thru university.”

The thing of it is, UTA officials didn’t exactly disagree at the time.

“I think we could become a more traditional school,” UTA athletic director Bill Reeves told reporters in ‘85, “but we’d have to have some success to begin with.”

On that front, Baker, the outgoing athletic director, is mostly famous at UTA for firing Scott Cross, only the best basketball coach in school history. The first day he’s on the job, Fagg will constitute an upgrade.

UTA can claim all sorts of improvements, starting with the fact that the Mavs no longer play basketball on a stage. College Park Center is a nice place to watch a game, and no one hollers for you to sit down up front.

Cowley said she hears from alums all the time about what they’d like for her to do as president. The return of football comes up. She said it’s not on the front burner now, even on simmer, but “it’s certainly open for long-term thinking.”

One step at a time, apparently. An alum stood up at Monday’s press conference and asked the new president if she could do something about the fact that he can’t walk into a sporting goods store in Hurst and buy so much as a UTA keychain. Cowley told him she’s on it. Practically got a standing ovation.

$503k in donations is absolutely pathetic for such a large alumni base. Might be even worse than Sam's.

Why would the donate? UTA gives them no reason to.

Well, when you already have an arena that even some of the largest, richest, and most successful athletics programs in the country lust after, use as a model for their own plans etc, I suppose donors figure they don’t need any money.

Yeah, that’s true!

Still waiting on those articles with the quotes, Mr UTA fan!

(06-22-2022 05:33 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 04:02 PM)Itinerant Texan Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 11:40 AM)CrimsonPhantom Wrote:  New AD Jon Fagg is dreaming big at UT-Arlington. Will football fit into his vision?

Quote:ARLINGTON — Front and center in the black-and-white photo, Chuck Curtis stands underneath his trademark cowboy hat, hands jammed into his jacket pockets. He doesn’t look happy, and he had no reason to be. Only a couple weeks earlier, his own administration sacked his football team.

A rally in protest of the decision turned out one of Maverick Stadium’s biggest crowds in Curtis’ two years as head coach. Behind him in the photo hangs a banner:

“UT Arlington football will return.”

Nearly 37 years later, a lot is going on at UTA, but football is still as dead as Chuck Curtis.

Meaning that, with no imminent signs of resurrection, UTA will remain the largest university in the nation without a major in blocking and tackling.

Here in Texas, where football ranks as the state religion, it almost seems like a sin.

On Monday at College Park Center, UTA’s new president, Jennifer Cowley, hired in April, introduced UTA’s new athletic director, Jon Fagg, at a press conference in which they jointly celebrated the athletic department’s pending move from the Sun Belt Conference to the more neighborly WAC. Cowley, an Arlington native, boasted of two dozen conference titles at UTA over the last decade and clamored for more.

Backing up Cowley’s motto to “dream big,” Fagg, getting his first shot as an AD after two decades in college athletic offices, said he wants to make “the impossible possible.”

Apparently some dreams are too far beyond the pale.

“I didn’t come here to start football,” Fagg told me after the presser. “I came here to handle the sports that we have and we’ll cross other bridges later.”

For the record, at least twice this century the university has undertaken feasibility studies to determine the cost of restoring football. Chuck Neinas, the interim AD who would bail out the Big 12, headed the first in 2004. Neinas reported that it would have been less difficult to maintain the UTA football program over the previous 19 years than to start up a new one.

Cowley has seen that study. Her take on a restart?

“It’s expensive.”

Here’s how big the tab would be: Another feasibility study, revealed after an open records request by The Dallas Morning News in 2018, concluded that adding football as well as women’s soccer and beach volleyball to satisfy Title IX requirements would run $146.7 million over 10 years. Pretty steep for an athletic department that reported $503,000 in donations the previous year and a $14.1 million overall operating budget.

The cost was so prohibitive, Jim Baker, Fagg’s predecessor, stipulated that football would have to be funded exclusively by boosters or other private resources, not student fees.

Considering the expense, it’s no wonder UTA officials aren’t football crazy. Given the landscape of college football these days, what with NIL making millionaires out of teenagers and big-name coaches driven to distraction as a result, there’s a lot to unpack. And then there’s the economy. Frankly, I wouldn’t start a hot dog stand in this climate. Assuming I knew how to run a hot dog stand.

But here’s the PR problem for UTA: If it’s too costly to put on a football program when you’re the fourth-biggest university in the state, with an enrollment of more than 40,000, how come Texas at Rio Grande Valley is doing it?

In November, the 30,000 students at UTRGV — a regional merger of the former UT Brownsville and UT Pan American — approved a fee increase of $11.25 per hour, capped at 12 hours. The money would fund, among other things, football, which would compete in the WAC starting in 2025, as well as women’s swimming and diving and not just one but two marching bands.

Of course, in UTA’s defense, you don’t need even one marching band if you don’t have a football team.

What UTRGV has going for it that UTA doesn’t in this case, anyway, is the largest and most populous area in the nation without a D1 football team. The North Texas area already has SMU, TCU and UNT. For that matter, UTA was the fifth-largest university in the state in 1985, and size didn’t save the football program then. Most of its students were commuters, prompting a smart-aleck local columnist to call it a “drive-thru university.”

The thing of it is, UTA officials didn’t exactly disagree at the time.

“I think we could become a more traditional school,” UTA athletic director Bill Reeves told reporters in ‘85, “but we’d have to have some success to begin with.”

On that front, Baker, the outgoing athletic director, is mostly famous at UTA for firing Scott Cross, only the best basketball coach in school history. The first day he’s on the job, Fagg will constitute an upgrade.

UTA can claim all sorts of improvements, starting with the fact that the Mavs no longer play basketball on a stage. College Park Center is a nice place to watch a game, and no one hollers for you to sit down up front.

Cowley said she hears from alums all the time about what they’d like for her to do as president. The return of football comes up. She said it’s not on the front burner now, even on simmer, but “it’s certainly open for long-term thinking.”

One step at a time, apparently. An alum stood up at Monday’s press conference and asked the new president if she could do something about the fact that he can’t walk into a sporting goods store in Hurst and buy so much as a UTA keychain. Cowley told him she’s on it. Practically got a standing ovation.

$503k in donations is absolutely pathetic for such a large alumni base. Might be even worse than Sam's.

Why would the donate? UTA gives them no reason to.

Using the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics database, UTA's current donation amount is considerably higher. For 2021, the amount reported is $870,416.

The Knight Commission amount includes the following.

Quote:DONOR CONTRIBUTIONS
Funds contributed from individuals, corporations, associations, foundations, clubs or other organizations external to the athletics program above the face value for tickets.

Here's what Knight shows for UTA for the 5 most recent reporting years.

2017 - 637,322
2018 - 834,666
2019 - 653,137
2020 - 660,646
2021 - 870,416

Here's the link to Knight's database page if anyone wants to play with numbers.

Link - Knight Database

It's a good source that allows one to drill down to a little more detail than some of the other sources provide.

(06-22-2022 04:10 PM)Todor Wrote:  Looking at stats for UTA I can see why their sports don’t have anyone showing up. Sure, they quote the number 48,000 or whatever, but almost half of their undergrads are only part time, and a majority of undergrads are taking at least some classes online, including 30% that are entirely online. Approaching half of all undergrads are over 25. With those dynamics, it’s a wonder they get the attendance they do. When you look at traditional undergrads living on campus, 4,xxx is actually pretty small.

This quote above about being the largest university in the nation without football is suspect. As with everything, it all depends on how you count it I suppose. But if you are looking at undergrad student body, that’s not even close to correct.

This is all true its mainly a commuter school and the median age of students is older than the average college. Sports is probably an afterthought for the majority of students at UTA. But, they do have some nice venues.

(06-22-2022 06:23 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 06:06 PM)Todor Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 05:33 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 04:02 PM)Itinerant Texan Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 11:40 AM)CrimsonPhantom Wrote:  New AD Jon Fagg is dreaming big at UT-Arlington. Will football fit into his vision?

$503k in donations is absolutely pathetic for such a large alumni base. Might be even worse than Sam's.

Why would the donate? UTA gives them no reason to.

Well, when you already have an arena that even some of the largest, richest, and most successful athletics programs in the country lust after, use as a model for their own plans etc, I suppose donors figure they don’t need any money.

Yeah, that’s true!

Still waiting on those articles with the quotes, Mr UTA fan!

I thought I made it clear I was done with your sorry rear end. This WAC board is so toxic I’m not visiting it as much as the SBC board. Pat yourself on the back.

The links are there. I’ve seen them. Not hard to find. You even shown your ability to look up other claims in this same post. I will just give you the link for one ranking of WNBA arenas. CPC is fourth, Key Arena was 11th (second to last). https://herosports.com/top-venues-womens...enas-ruru/

As for UT-Austin’s arena envy, I’m sure any RGV fan will tell you there won’t be anything on record, but they compare themselves to everyone and believe they should have the best at everything. If the Vaqueros build a better baseball facility, UT Austin would renovate or get a better one in a decade. Donors were aware, admin was aware and athletic officials were. Reed Arena at A&M was built in the late 1990’s. No biggie for the teasips. CPC was built in 2012, Longhorn nation becomes embarrassed and a decade later have a place as nice but bigger capacity.

As for Baylor, I’m not privy to the off the record stuff, but my wife is a Bear and is privy to rumors. Mulkey also mentioned it after a game where we had a high contingent of traveling fans and said our arena is nicer and our fans took over the building there. Seems like it was on their radar to me. Timing is also awfully coincidental.

(06-23-2022 02:17 AM)FoUTASportscaster Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 06:23 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 06:06 PM)Todor Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 05:33 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 04:02 PM)Itinerant Texan Wrote:  $503k in donations is absolutely pathetic for such a large alumni base. Might be even worse than Sam's.

Why would the donate? UTA gives them no reason to.

Well, when you already have an arena that even some of the largest, richest, and most successful athletics programs in the country lust after, use as a model for their own plans etc, I suppose donors figure they don’t need any money.

Yeah, that’s true!

Still waiting on those articles with the quotes, Mr UTA fan!

I thought I made it clear I was done with your sorry rear end. This WAC board is so toxic I’m not visiting it as much as the SBC board. Pat yourself on the back.

The links are there. I’ve seen them. Not hard to find. You even shown your ability to look up other claims in this same post. I will just give you the link for one ranking of WNBA arenas. CPC is fourth, Key Arena was 11th (second to last). https://herosports.com/top-venues-womens...enas-ruru/

As for UT-Austin’s arena envy, I’m sure any RGV fan will tell you there won’t be anything on record, but they compare themselves to everyone and believe they should have the best at everything. If the Vaqueros build a better baseball facility, UT Austin would renovate or get a better one in a decade. Donors were aware, admin was aware and athletic officials were. Reed Arena at A&M was built in the late 1990’s. No biggie for the teasips. CPC was built in 2012, Longhorn nation becomes embarrassed and a decade later have a place as nice but bigger capacity.

As for Baylor, I’m not privy to the off the record stuff, but my wife is a Bear and is privy to rumors. Mulkey also mentioned it after a game where we had a high contingent of traveling fans and said our arena is nicer and our fans took over the building there. Seems like it was on their radar to me. Timing is also awfully coincidental.

If you call toxic, calling people on bullcrap statements, then yeah. When I am here, I call out bullcrap statements. Earlier you claimed, the CPC was the best arena in Texas and UT/Baylor modeled their arenas after it. Of course, those are all lies and junk you are presenting as fact.

(06-23-2022 08:22 AM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-23-2022 02:17 AM)FoUTASportscaster Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 06:23 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 06:06 PM)Todor Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 05:33 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  Why would the donate? UTA gives them no reason to.

Well, when you already have an arena that even some of the largest, richest, and most successful athletics programs in the country lust after, use as a model for their own plans etc, I suppose donors figure they don’t need any money.

Yeah, that’s true!

Still waiting on those articles with the quotes, Mr UTA fan!

I thought I made it clear I was done with your sorry rear end. This WAC board is so toxic I’m not visiting it as much as the SBC board. Pat yourself on the back.

The links are there. I’ve seen them. Not hard to find. You even shown your ability to look up other claims in this same post. I will just give you the link for one ranking of WNBA arenas. CPC is fourth, Key Arena was 11th (second to last). https://herosports.com/top-venues-womens...enas-ruru/

As for UT-Austin’s arena envy, I’m sure any RGV fan will tell you there won’t be anything on record, but they compare themselves to everyone and believe they should have the best at everything. If the Vaqueros build a better baseball facility, UT Austin would renovate or get a better one in a decade. Donors were aware, admin was aware and athletic officials were. Reed Arena at A&M was built in the late 1990’s. No biggie for the teasips. CPC was built in 2012, Longhorn nation becomes embarrassed and a decade later have a place as nice but bigger capacity.

As for Baylor, I’m not privy to the off the record stuff, but my wife is a Bear and is privy to rumors. Mulkey also mentioned it after a game where we had a high contingent of traveling fans and said our arena is nicer and our fans took over the building there. Seems like it was on their radar to me. Timing is also awfully coincidental.

If you call toxic, calling people on bullcrap statements, then yeah. When I am here, I call out bullcrap statements. Earlier you claimed, the CPC was the best arena in Texas and UT/Baylor modeled their arenas after it. Of course, those are all lies and junk you are presenting as fact.

Junk is stating anything you have no way to prove as a fact. I see a lot of that on this site and yes, I am probably guilty occasionally myself. For me I'll take someone's pride in something their school has accomplished as an exaggeration at worst.

It must suck to go through life with the name Fagg.

(06-23-2022 06:39 PM)AssKickingChicken Wrote:  It must suck to go through life with the name Fagg.

Nope. What’s sucks is some people are d**** making fun of people with different last names.

Quote:As for UT-Austin’s arena envy, I’m sure any RGV fan will tell you there won’t be anything on record, but they compare themselves to everyone and believe they should have the best at everything. If the Vaqueros build a better baseball facility, UT Austin would renovate or get a better one in a decade. Donors were aware, admin was aware and athletic officials were. Reed Arena at A&M was built in the late 1990’s. No biggie for the teasips. CPC was built in 2012, Longhorn nation becomes embarrassed and a decade later have a place as nice but bigger capacity.

Any RGV fan here, and I don't know man. You've got an awesome bridge over Cooper Street and Austin hasn't built anything to match. And they aren't even trying to have a better mariachi than RGV.

But seriously, their donor base is an order of magnitude larger than other campuses. They can afford to do stuff purely for bragging rights.

(06-23-2022 08:22 AM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-23-2022 02:17 AM)FoUTASportscaster Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 06:23 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 06:06 PM)Todor Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 05:33 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  Why would the donate? UTA gives them no reason to.

Well, when you already have an arena that even some of the largest, richest, and most successful athletics programs in the country lust after, use as a model for their own plans etc, I suppose donors figure they don’t need any money.

Yeah, that’s true!

Still waiting on those articles with the quotes, Mr UTA fan!

I thought I made it clear I was done with your sorry rear end. This WAC board is so toxic I’m not visiting it as much as the SBC board. Pat yourself on the back.

The links are there. I’ve seen them. Not hard to find. You even shown your ability to look up other claims in this same post. I will just give you the link for one ranking of WNBA arenas. CPC is fourth, Key Arena was 11th (second to last). https://herosports.com/top-venues-womens...enas-ruru/

As for UT-Austin’s arena envy, I’m sure any RGV fan will tell you there won’t be anything on record, but they compare themselves to everyone and believe they should have the best at everything. If the Vaqueros build a better baseball facility, UT Austin would renovate or get a better one in a decade. Donors were aware, admin was aware and athletic officials were. Reed Arena at A&M was built in the late 1990’s. No biggie for the teasips. CPC was built in 2012, Longhorn nation becomes embarrassed and a decade later have a place as nice but bigger capacity.

As for Baylor, I’m not privy to the off the record stuff, but my wife is a Bear and is privy to rumors. Mulkey also mentioned it after a game where we had a high contingent of traveling fans and said our arena is nicer and our fans took over the building there. Seems like it was on their radar to me. Timing is also awfully coincidental.

If you call toxic, calling people on bullcrap statements, then yeah. When I am here, I call out bullcrap statements. Earlier you claimed, the CPC was the best arena in Texas and UT/Baylor modeled their arenas after it. Of course, those are all lies and junk you are presenting as fact.

Yes, I can see you are the expert from the NW of all things arenas in Texas. I’m just the idiot broadcaster who been to most of them and talked to other people with similar experiences. Sorry to offend your extensive resume.

(06-24-2022 04:48 PM)FoUTASportscaster Wrote:  

(06-23-2022 08:22 AM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-23-2022 02:17 AM)FoUTASportscaster Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 06:23 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-22-2022 06:06 PM)Todor Wrote:  Well, when you already have an arena that even some of the largest, richest, and most successful athletics programs in the country lust after, use as a model for their own plans etc, I suppose donors figure they don’t need any money.

Yeah, that’s true!

Still waiting on those articles with the quotes, Mr UTA fan!

I thought I made it clear I was done with your sorry rear end. This WAC board is so toxic I’m not visiting it as much as the SBC board. Pat yourself on the back.

The links are there. I’ve seen them. Not hard to find. You even shown your ability to look up other claims in this same post. I will just give you the link for one ranking of WNBA arenas. CPC is fourth, Key Arena was 11th (second to last). https://herosports.com/top-venues-womens...enas-ruru/

As for UT-Austin’s arena envy, I’m sure any RGV fan will tell you there won’t be anything on record, but they compare themselves to everyone and believe they should have the best at everything. If the Vaqueros build a better baseball facility, UT Austin would renovate or get a better one in a decade. Donors were aware, admin was aware and athletic officials were. Reed Arena at A&M was built in the late 1990’s. No biggie for the teasips. CPC was built in 2012, Longhorn nation becomes embarrassed and a decade later have a place as nice but bigger capacity.

As for Baylor, I’m not privy to the off the record stuff, but my wife is a Bear and is privy to rumors. Mulkey also mentioned it after a game where we had a high contingent of traveling fans and said our arena is nicer and our fans took over the building there. Seems like it was on their radar to me. Timing is also awfully coincidental.

If you call toxic, calling people on bullcrap statements, then yeah. When I am here, I call out bullcrap statements. Earlier you claimed, the CPC was the best arena in Texas and UT/Baylor modeled their arenas after it. Of course, those are all lies and junk you are presenting as fact.

Yes, I can see you are the expert from the NW of all things arenas in Texas. I’m just the idiot broadcaster who been to most of them and talked to other people with similar experiences. Sorry to offend your extensive resume.

You do not know my background or where I am from. I don’t care if you’re a broadcaster or where you live. All we know, is you said untrue statements that you cannot prove were ever said by a credible source. They’re bullcrap.

Nothing was untrue. Just your assumptions. But YoU aRe SmArT, so it is what it is.

(06-24-2022 05:55 PM)FoUTASportscaster Wrote:  Nothing was untrue. Just your assumptions. But YoU aRe SmArT, so it is what it is.

Show me where the CPC was “the best arena in Texas”? Who said it, which newspaper was it in?

Show me the article where someone from UT said they were modeling their arena after the CPC. Then do the same for Baylor. I will even take where the CPC was even mentioned in an article.

Unless you can show me this, it is bullcrap. Pure fantasy you are trying to broadcast here.

(06-24-2022 06:04 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-24-2022 05:55 PM)FoUTASportscaster Wrote:  Nothing was untrue. Just your assumptions. But YoU aRe SmArT, so it is what it is.

Show me where the CPC was “the best arena in Texas”? Who said it, which newspaper was it in?

Show me the article where someone from UT said they were modeling their arena after the CPC. Then do the same for Baylor. I will even take where the CPC was even mentioned in an article.

Unless you can show me this, it is bullcrap. Pure fantasy you are trying to broadcast here.

There are no articles and he knows it. But he isn’t going to give up imagining it, while trying to convince you it’s somehow your fault for asking. Classic.

(06-24-2022 06:51 PM)Todor Wrote:  

(06-24-2022 06:04 PM)DoubleRSU Wrote:  

(06-24-2022 05:55 PM)FoUTASportscaster Wrote:  Nothing was untrue. Just your assumptions. But YoU aRe SmArT, so it is what it is.

Show me where the CPC was “the best arena in Texas”? Who said it, which newspaper was it in?

Show me the article where someone from UT said they were modeling their arena after the CPC. Then do the same for Baylor. I will even take where the CPC was even mentioned in an article.

Unless you can show me this, it is bullcrap. Pure fantasy you are trying to broadcast here.

There are no articles and he knows it. But he isn’t going to give up imagining it, while trying to convince you it’s somehow your fault for asking. Classic.

Of course. For some reason he is trying to make UTA and the arena look better and for what??? If he would have stated “In my opinion,….”, that’s different. Instead he presented those statements as fact. They are not facts or even remotely true. UT and Baylor do not give 2 ***** about UTA sports or their 10 year old arena.