IF WSU had football and realignment

[ABC]

I thought this deserved a new thread. Apologies (or screw you) if you disagree.

If WSU had never dropped football, in my opinion, we would have already been in the Mountain West with no trajectory upward. It is just the way it is.

WSU Athletics has almost always punched above our weight . . . except football. Maybe if there were so many damn bowl games in the early 1980s as there are now, surely the 8-3 Prince McJunkins team makes a decent bowl and maybe wins. AND we would be in the Mountain West.

Look what SMU is doing to get in the ACC. Pathetic.

Maybe all of this realignment is good for WSU is that I've seen more regional non-conference basketball games because of conference travel and time.

So having home and home non-conference games against the Big 12 (KSU, OSU), SEC (OU, MU) and ACC (SMU) are not out of the realm of possibility. Maybe we can through in Iowa and Nebraska.

Here is some trivia: I attended the very last WSU football game at Arizona State in 1982. It was 7-6 at one point and ASU put their starters back in.

The WSU players I talked to said it was a depth problem. (I am sure it was more than that) ASU won the PAC 12 that year and played in the Rose Bowl. I don't know if they won or lost and really don't care.

[ShockBand]

Full game video of that last one against ASU on November 15, 1986.

[WuDrWu]

Ron Chismar was 3 yards and a cloud of dust, even down 40. The evolution of the game over the last 40 years is remarkable.

Good thing there wasn't replay back then (late bomb was out of bounds) not that it mattered.

Shoulder pads.

I was surprised by the lack of difference in physicality. ASU had more speed for sure, but they didn't have the massive size difference you'd see today when say, an Oklahoma State plays Missouri State.

[shoxlax]

Jeff’s teams had speed and some size…they just lacked depth, especially on defense. That 5-5 team could’ve easily been 9-2 but had some injuries that cost them close games.

[SHOCKvalue]

I’d sell an organ in the parallel universe where we still have football and play in the MWC. That statement is not so much referring to the MWC olympic sports (a wash compared to post-2023 AAC), but because MWC football (and pre-2023 AAC football) is a respectable level of the game. Yes it’s not P5, but it’s damn sure a clear step up from the rest of the G5 as it stands today.

I’ll say it again for those in the back - there’s list of about a half dozen ankle biter schools who have brought back G5 football in the past 10-15 years, but somehow WSU and all its donors see it as climbing Mt Everest circa 1925. Bizarre but also so #Wichita in every context.

We are a blue collar public university without football, in a conference that is rapidly dying. There’s one sorta-comparable school to us in all of D1 - VCU. That’s it! WSU sports will eventually meet its demise competitively because we clearly don’t meet the P5 profile and we’d be a zebra amongst donkeys in the Big East (who’s never inviting us anyway). We literally have no way to control our destiny at this point, and it ALL focuses like a laser back on Lew killing off football in 1986.

[Kel Varnsen]

We are a blue collar public university without football, in a conference that is rapidly dying. There’s one sorta-comparable school to us in all of D1 - VCU. That’s it! WSU sports will eventually meet its demise competitively because we clearly don’t meet the P5 profile and we’d be a zebra amongst donkeys in the Big East (who’s never inviting us anyway). We literally have no way to control our destiny at this point, and it ALL focuses like a laser back on Lew killing off football in 1986.

I stand by my statement that it would be damn hard to make it work, but this paragraph illustrates why it might be necessary to bring back football to even have a shot (albeit an outside one) to be in a meaningfully better position for conference realignment.

[1972Shocker]

Lew Perkins was definitely the one to pull the ripcord to end Shocker football, but I as there attending games at the end. My opinion is that fan apathy and lack of support from the big booster class is what killed off Shocker football. The lack of support was very depressing. I think it is impossible to know how things would have gone had we left the program in place. It is possible we would be worse off today. Doesn't make sense really to revisit that at this point.

The big question is, is it feasible to try to bring football back in 2023? Unless a major benefactor or group steps up to make it financially feasible it doesn't look like that will be answered in the affirmative. Is that possible? Yes. Is it likely? Probably not. Is it a guarantee of success if it does happen? No.

[SHOCKvalue]

Was K-State football in a better spot, with stronger fan support, than WSU in 1986?

Honest question. Can’t really bring conference affiliation into the discussion because the world was drastically different back then. It was far less of a disparity - light years.

WSU would have been about the same size in enrollment, if not larger, and was an urban university as opposed to nothingville Manhattan back then.

[Aargh]

It might help tounderstand a little more about WSU in 1986.

Few "traditional" students. Many who were older, had families, and jobs. that made a lot of students who didn't have time for leisure activities. The students didn't support football.

Warren Armstrong was President, and he was known to think athletics were a detriment to the academic side of the university.

Basketball under Gene Smithson was on a bad downward trajectory. Steadily downhill from 25-3 in '82-'83 to 14-14 in '85-'86. Basketball was getting better attendance than football. That was also Gene Smithson's last year. Word was that too many late nights at the Candle Club were involved in his termination.

The athletic department was millions of dollars in debt and football was draining money out of the athletic department instead of contributing. the students, the city, and the donors were not supporting football.
.
The athletic department's debt may have directly contributed to the bad basketball in the '90's. The athletic department was on a shoestring budget due to the massive debt. The students weren't voting to raise tuition to support athletics, and President Armstrong did NOTHING to help the athletic department. If Perkins had been competent and Armstrong had been supportive things may have worked out better. Armstrong and Perkins were a lot like Golden and Boatright.

WSU also led the nation in athletic department sanctions from the NCAA. I think that in 1986 it was more likely that WSU was on a path to disbanding the athletic department rather than being on a path to joining the MWC.

[Kung Wu]

I wonder if the Wichita Wings selling out game after game and Wichita's mucky mucks spending their time and money on the Wings played a role in lacking donor support and attendance for WSU football?.

[BAShocker]

Not to knock a guy, but Chismar was a charismatic dud.

[Veritas]

It might help tounderstand a little more about WSU in 1986.

Few "traditional" students. Many who were older, had families, and jobs. that made a lot of students who didn't have time for leisure activities. The students didn't support football.

Warren Armstrong was President, and he was known to think athletics were a detriment to the academic side of the university.

Basketball under Gene Smithson was on a bad downward trajectory. Steadily downhill from 25-3 in '82-'83 to 14-14 in '85-'86. Basketball was getting better attendance than football. That was also Gene Smithson's last year. Word was that too many late nights at the Candle Club were involved in his termination.

The athletic department was millions of dollars in debt and football was draining money out of the athletic department instead of contributing. the students, the city, and the donors were not supporting football.
.
The athletic department's debt may have directly contributed to the bad basketball in the '90's. The athletic department was on a shoestring budget due to the massive debt. The students weren't voting to raise tuition to support athletics, and President Armstrong did NOTHING to help the athletic department. If Perkins had been competent and Armstrong had been supportive things may have worked out better. Armstrong and Perkins were a lot like Golden and Boatright.

WSU also led the nation in athletic department sanctions from the NCAA. I think that in 1986 it was more likely that WSU was on a path to disbanding the athletic department rather than being on a path to joining the MWC.

Shox were about $6.7 million in total debt in TODAY’s money and in 1987 alone ran a deficit of about $1m in debt in todays money.

Short sighted decision by Perkins/Armstrong and the consultants.
Shox surpassed MBB attendance every year but 1 since 1969 and avg more than 20k in 1970, 77, 82.

Besides the struggles on the field, the stadium itself was a terrible design. High sides like a HS stadium on steroids. No end zone seating and fans far from the action. Probably better for a 25k stadium, with lower height and end zone on the north side.
ADTB did it on the cheap and it showed. It was a cold design.

Perkins and Armstrong together sounds like an alchemy of ineptitude.

[WuShock16]

Shox were about $6.7 million in total debt in TODAY’s money and in 1987 alone ran a deficit of about $1m in debt in todays money.

Short sighted decision by Perkins/Armstrong and the consultants.
Shox surpassed MBB attendance every year but 1 since 1969 and avg more than 20k in 1970, 77, 82.

Besides the struggles on the field, the stadium itself was a terrible design. High sides like a HS stadium on steroids. No end zone seating and fans far from the action. Probably better for a 25k stadium, with lower height and end zone on the north side.
ADTB did it on the cheap and it showed. It was a cold design.

Perkins and Armstrong together sounds like an alchemy of ineptitude.

I thought that stadium was done before the plane crash. 1968-69ish. ADTB wouldn’t have had anything to do with it.

[1972Shocker]

How the Decision to Drop Football was Reported in 1986:

https://www.kansas.com/sports/colleg...le1212729.html

You can convert the 1986 dollars to 2023 dollar by multiplying by 2.8.

Perhaps more critical than the dollar amounts involved was that attempts to raise the funds to cover the debt, projected to increase to $3.6 million by 1990 was met with little no interest or support.

[Aargh]

How the Decision to Drop Football was Reported in 1986:

https://www.kansas.com/sports/colleg...le1212729.html

You can convert the 1986 dollars to 2023 dollar by multiplying by 2.8.

Perhaps more critical than the dollar amounts involved was that attempts to raise the funds to cover the debt, projected to increase to $3.6 million by 1990 was met with little no interest or support.

Thankx '72. The $3.6 mill is the number I remember from 1986. Over the last 37 years it seems I forgot that was the projection, not the actual number in 1986.