Panther247 Board

I would support anything that makes money for the university. That's what it's all about. Football is a means to an end.

Depends on what you mean by support.

If Paco's worst scenario would come to pass & Pitt is left in some leftover conference with no hope of competing for championships/BCS-level bowls, then I would completely understand & could agree with a decision to drop down. However, I would no longer be the least bit interested in attending games or donating to Pitt athletics.

I should add that if Paco's worst scenario should come to pass, I would be completely done with major college athletics. I wouldn't attend any games nor watch them on TV nor participate in any tournament pools or bowl pick 'ems

Let's hope it doesn't come to pass.

The key to fans of any team in any league at any level is the belief of a fair playing field. The belief that you can compete to be the best. Not that you will be every year, but the possibility exists to work towards that end.

Pitt is in no danger of dropping down any time soon. Despite the sometimes popular belief brought by undeniably justified frustration, Pitt has been very committed to winning athletics. There are realities and poor decisions that work against this, but Pitt's current administration does care. Execution doesn't always reflect intent. We don't need to rehash any more than that.

But from a university perspective, considering the whole of the institution, the existing belief is that athletics are the front porch of the University of Pittsburgh. Pitt has made great strides behind the scenes, in research and academics, in community outreach, all across the board. When you look at purely quantitative rankings that look at things like research funding, publication impact, admissions statistics, etc, Pitt is almost universally regarded, nationally, not as a top 25 to 30 public school, but as a top 25 to 30 school overall. Across the board, in almost any ranking like this, it is where Pitt typically falls out. Yes, that is built on the back of its health sciences, but look at the company Pitt keeps in that field. Now, when you factor in metrics that take into account opinion surveys from academics or guidance councilors, etc, the ranking drops precipitously under what you expect by the actual measures of quality that other rankings focus on. Why? Reputation takes time to build. Pitt's name is not that widely known in academia. It's not that widely known in the general public. Pitt wants to be a top national research university. It wants its name out there. Athletics is the best way to do that. Football is the best way to do that in athletics. It is committed to competing at the highest level, and dropping to FCS would undermine that.

Thank you Paco. Exactly.

Make mo money.

That's an aspect that is often lost. Beyond the intangibles of a bigger profile for the school, I read a report a couple years ago where FCS programs are even worse off financially than mid-major FBS ones. FCS teams are absolutely trying to move up.

I never said or thought that it will, my thinking is along the lines of spirt76. If we are left out of an automatic qualifying conference and our payouts are dramatically less, what's the point of competing at D1?

Better go route for someone else then cause Pitt aint dropping down to the Patriot League.

Those schools are great but they are largely liberal arts schools. Research is one component of universities. It is true when you look at the ranking you have to examine their methodology and metrics. Research being used as a ranking component for an overall institution really doesn't mean that research is a measure of quality of undergrads as much, say, the the size of undergrad component of the school and the range of students those schools take in. Lehigh and Colgate are much more selective than any of those bigger research schools, and thus, on average, their students are more academically adept from teh start. But I guarantee those liberal arts focused schools aren't produce better researchers or PhDs, and those are also students, just more advanced ones. It just isn't as big of a part of their mission, although Lehigh does have PhD programs. If schools have significant undergrad research components like Pitt is pushing, I'd also bet they aren't producing better or more experienced techs and bachelor level researcher assistant types as well. It depends what fields you are looking for. But if you want a better guarantee of quality from a school like Pitt, just recruit from Pitt's honors college. The freshman admission statistics for Pitt Honors is better than half the Ivy.

But for as much of a problem as Pitt has with name recognition, schools like Lehigh, Bucknell, and Lafayette have it much worse off. Outside the Northeast, would anyone know about Villanova or Providence if they weren't in a major conference? No.

In 30 years? Things are moving so fast! The current climate and financial constructs molding college athletics did not exist even 5-10 years ago and may be obsolete in another 5-10 years. Stadiums like Heinz that were built 10 years ago are already obsolete and ones built today may be obsolete in 5-10 years. In 30 years there is likely to be 2-3 more paradigm shifts in college sports. The NCAA may not exist. Who knows?

I see one way to avoid being carried away by every current that happens to wash over the landscape. Pitt must do something they have never adequately done, make a decision about what we want to be and who we are. We aren't public and yet we aren't private. We aren't a state school or a local, regional school. Are we a national school? If so, what's our national market? We aren't an eastern school. We aren't a midwestern school. What are we? Who are our peers? Where do we belong? We have very little in common with our athletic rivals, ND. PSU and WVU. All of them are quickly drifting away. Most schools in our geographic area are MAC-type schools. Most schools seem to be elite in athletics and average in academics or vice versa. We are good in academics and irrelevent in athletics. Pitt is in a word...nondescript (pardon the script reference).

We have not had an effective vision for a long time in many ways. We are having our destiny dictated to us. We need to ask these questions and get them answered or we will always be where we're at now.....wondering how we got here.....worrying about where we're going.

So the stadium becomes obsolete in 30 years.????? By whose calculations other than Ambassador Rooney. Theera of building new stadiumsis over. WE AS A NATION ARE BANKRUPT. THOSE DAYS ARE GONE