Student Athletes should set themselves up for the best opportunities in life. All this sentiment that posters would stay and that these players do not care about the fans are moot. Players are receiving opportunities to receive more fiscal earnings for larger brand names than Valparaiso. Valparaiso has a donor problem. Probably a great deal of that donor problem (especially young donors) is the high price tag, limited alumni job market, and overall lack of ROI on attending the University in the past 15 years.
Everyone can yell into a pillow about it being unfair and not right but the rules are what they are. Until the above problem is fixed the basketball team, football team, and University will not exceed expectations rather than remain afloat. At least in sports there can be diamonds in the rough to give flash in the pan success.
In terms of what I have seen about lowering divisions athletics wise... Lots of thought here. I would say about 60% of Valparaiso athletes are not on full ride scholarships (really anyone outside of Basketball / Volleyball / Partials of Softball & Baseball), I do not believe the fiscal savings would be there in tuitions. In terms of regional travel and scheduling, we would lose pay games across the board. Our conference is already regional with mostly bus travel again no major savors here, football pay games more than pay for the airfare of the PFL league.
The only hope is that Division 3 will make Valparaiso more competitive in sports. I would argue that this would be an extremely dangerous move for the University. Do we have a similar alumni network to the Wittenberg / DePauw / Wabash / North Central / Mount Union traditional powerhouses? Do we have the same facilities (quick answer, no)? Is our price tag cheaper (again, no)? So we run the risk of becoming a middling Division 3 Program instead of a middling Division 1 program. We lose the scholarship athletes and the non-scholarship athletes that pay tuition because they are going Division 1. Athletes are a larger portion of our student body than I would argue a vast majority of division one.
Forgot about the football buy games. Yeah. Let's eliminate them and see what happens to the rest of the sports program.
Student Athletes should set themselves up for the best opportunities in life. All this sentiment that posters would stay and that these players do not care about the fans are moot. Players are receiving opportunities to receive more fiscal earnings for larger brand names than Valparaiso. Valparaiso has a donor problem. Probably a great deal of that donor problem (especially young donors) is the high price tag, limited alumni job market, and overall lack of ROI on attending the University in the past 15 years.
I think we can safely dispense with the term "student-athlete" in the current D1 MBB context. I don't hear much about transfers to pursue better academic opportunities. It's about cash.
VU's fundraising challenges go way back to a day when the university didn't engage in serious development work. It's not about young donors. It's more about not sufficiently cultivating older alums decades ago, to set the table for bigger asks when they have achieved some financial success.
I'd be surprised if your assessment about more recent graduates is as bad as you suggest; in some instances it may even be the opposite. VU's undergraduate indebtedness, while not ideal, is comparable to similar universities. Furthermore, professionally oriented programs such as engineering and nursing place quite well after graduation. I'm sure that business does at least decently at entry level and opens doors to graduate programs, and arts & sciences remains a good ticket to graduate and professional degrees. In any event, big gifts rarely come from recent graduates, even at tonier institutions. Middle and senior years become prime "ask" years.
But my bigger point is that no one should expect even the wealthiest of VU alums to be writing huge checks for NIL purposes, unless Valpo somehow manages to become the Gonzaga of the midwest. In fact, with the challenges facing higher ed funding and associated philanthropy and fundraising generally, this whole NIL thing may soon crumble of its own weight, leaving P5 schools, if that, as the only institutions that can deliver $$$ to athletes.
Right, I think there's a non-zero chance that the NIL cash grab system will just eventually kill the golden goose.
In the big scheme of history, isn't it pretty remarkable that the sports have gotten an entire social sector (US higher ed) to sponsor their games for this last 100 or so years, give or take? (Sure, there have been alternative benefactors like the Roman imperial structure funding the gladiator games and whatnot - but in the modern era, it's been universities). It's been mutually beneficial because of the scholar-athlete model and the decent potential for the sports to build enough community and reputation that it actually helped most universities rather than not. But if all these NIL payments are so expensive and if the coaches and players have no loyalty beyond a year, I really wouldn't blame university administrators if they ultimately conclude that it's actually *not* not worth it to maintain the stadiums, pay all those NIL salaries, fund coach packages and HR benefits etc. Why all the rigamarole and cost just to lose as much or more than you win, and then shuffle players off to the next, richer place?
I suspect there will just be fewer colleges that are willing to maintain the carousel, so we're looking at ultimately fewer coaching and playing positions -- unless it just gets completely corporatized and the teams somehow find a way of getting Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos types to back some new, non-collegiate system.
I reject the entire pay-for-play system. I used to earmark gifts to the athletic dept., but no more. To consider my donation being used to pay off our mid major student athletes already on free rides is an absurd proposition.
Is it fair to assume the Valpo football team, from a financial standpoint, is only solvent because of these players not being on athletic scholarships & thus helping with enrollment?
@rezynezy - I would not say Indiana is a blue blood in the past couple of decades.
I think the “supply” of available players is going to be greater than the “demand.”
There are 363 D1 teams each with 15 roster spots for a total of 5,445 positions.
Once a program with a large NIL pool fills their 15 roster spots, they’re out of the market. A player is only worth what someone is willing and able to pay. There are a lot of players who are over valuing their abilities and under valuing a D1 roster spot. Especially when there are plenty of D2, D3, and NAIA players who will provide similar production.
I think there’s a lot of talent that will be available for less. It just might take awhile for roster spots to get sorted out.
I think the “supply” of available players is going to be greater than the “demand.”... A player is only worth what someone is willing and able to pay....I think there’s a lot of talent that will be available for less. It just might take awhile for roster spots to get sorted out.
Yep. Now that the illusion/aura of the scholar-athlete model is busted and it's clear to everyone it's just a short-term contract job, there's going to be some kind of reckoning as society decides just how much they actually think 18 yr olds should be paid for the job of throwing a ball. In some cases, the truly top players will keep getting spectacular offers from the elite wealthy blue blood institutions to fill their rosters. But for most players, there's probably going to be some settling down of the NIL amounts as institutions figure out a) whether they really want to 'hire' for these jobs, and b) what it actually makes sense or is necessary to pay.
In a world where plenty of people with professional Masters and PHD degrees can't find work and/or are struggling on their 40-70K to buy eggs, I just have a hard time imagining that very many people are really going to support full-tuition scholarship + $200K NIL as the standard benchmark or something. Is there really the stomach for that in higher ed, let alone in the wider American society? In comparison, in all the talk about whether PSLF (Public Service Loan Forgiveness) folk should have their student loans forgiven after 120 payments etc., the US population is generally pretty hostile towards any such generosity and wants to see students pay their own full way rather than not. Or if players are going to be employees, then treat them like any other employee and you gotta make the job/salary make sense on the HR Excel sheet alongside the janitor making 40K and the professor making 50K and the dean making 200K.
@mj08 This is such a great point! All about perspective ... many ways to skin a cat, as it's said.
In fact, maybe the 'tuition remission' type of benefit that universities often offer employees could be one way to get players to stick around for longer and not just transfer every year!
If instead of being handed a scholarship they were just considered employee students (at whatever NIL pay rate for their sports 'job'), then they could participate in the same general type of plan that other employees get as a benefit - ie, you are allowed to take X classes per semester for free towards a degree. (Employees do have to pay taxes on the amount of the tuition which is not insignificant, but the cost of classes is otherwise remitted).
Honestly, this would probably better reflect the priorities of the players in this NIL era (sports job/salary comes first, education/degree comes second as a kind of ancillary benefit for some future professional shift), and the player-employees might actually stick around longer if they need to slowly accumulate time/credits as an earned HR benefit. After all, I know a bunch of Valpo profs who are doing precisely this... trying to re-tool for a post-Valpo existence (enrolled in MBAs or whatever) but haven't left yet, as they are staying in the primary 'job' till they can get the degree for some other future pivot of career.
This kinda idiosyncratic aspect of higher ed employment could make a lot of sense given that athletes want to be treated more like salaried employees and universities may want to keep them from hitting the transfer portal each year.
Is it fair to assume the Valpo football team, from a financial standpoint, is only solvent because of these players not being on athletic scholarships & thus helping with enrollment?
Not only football -but most of the sports we sponsor are just an extension of enrollment.It is bringing students here that pay...give em a few sheckles of "scholarship" money so their mommy and daddy can tell their friends that " my kid is a d1 athlete"...
We should never have cancelled men's soccer or tennis...another business blunder by former president and AD...it was bringing students here that would have never come otherwise
We should never have cancelled men's soccer or tennis...another business blunder by former president and AD...it was bringing students here that would have never come otherwise
Agreed! Soccer and tennis were an enrollment draw, and honestly those students were some of our brighter bulbs for whatever reason. I was always impressed with the work ethic and general intelligence of the soccer and especially tennis students. It's just an anecdotal observation and I have zero theory for why... but against the stereotype of the sports jocks dozing in the back or something, the soccer and tennis students were always taking notes, asking good questions, writing interestingly argued essays, etc. It was sad to see the teams get cut, though I don't know the cost-benefit analysis behind the decision.
I think the “supply” of available players is going to be greater than the “demand.”
There are 363 D1 teams each with 15 roster spots for a total of 5,445 positions.
Once a program with a large NIL pool fills their 15 roster spots, they’re out of the market. A player is only worth what someone is willing and able to pay. There are a lot of players who are over valuing their abilities and under valuing a D1 roster spot. Especially when there are plenty of D2, D3, and NAIA players who will provide similar production.
I think there’s a lot of talent that will be available for less. It just might take awhile for roster spots to get sorted out.
This is within my "sorting itself out" theory expressed somewhere on here.
We should never have cancelled men's soccer or tennis...another business blunder by former president and AD...it was bringing students here that would have never come otherwise
Agreed! Soccer and tennis were an enrollment draw, and honestly those students were some of our brighter bulbs for whatever reason. I was always impressed with the work ethic and general intelligence of the soccer and especially tennis students. It's just an anecdotal observation and I have zero theory for why... but against the stereotype of the sports jocks dozing in the back or something, the soccer and tennis students were always taking notes, asking good questions, writing interestingly argued essays, etc. It was sad to see the teams get cut, though I don't know the cost-benefit analysis behind the decision.
I think this is realized by some, not by others. These "minor" non-ticketed sports tend to have athletes that are good students, and want to be there as you mentioned. They make awesome self-starters in their post college career in the workplace too!!!
There are writes ups out there about expanding sports in smaller colleges to boost enrollment and increase revenue. Even D1s in some cases are adding.... If managed right expanding sports could help bring in NIL money, and at the very least increase enrollment while bringing in some revenue. Which in turn could help the basketball NIL bucket...
Just to play devils advocate, the D-3 decreased travel costs would make soccer and tennis more viable financially. Trips to Wabash, DePauw, and Rose-Hullman etc. as opposed to MVC school trips.
And I have said before that COVID was on to something when it minimized travel by playing a pair of hoops games at a school and then alternating years for the double game. Better still, for non-revenue sports, there could be a week-long or 2-week "season" in St. Louis for the conference or a 2-week tournament. St. Louis is central to the MVC footprint. Spring sports weather is horrible in most MVC schools anyway during a school year that ends in mid-May. Play them at St. Louis facilities with open dates for re-sets?
