FCS to expand playoffs, Non scholarship Pioneer league to get bid. Shocker Football?

[Shockerman]

The Pioneer league, which Drake and Butler play football in is going to get an auto bid. This would be a great way to get Shocker Football back without having to fight Title IX right away. It would sort of be a soft landing kind of deal while we ramped up the program for a decade.

http://api.viglink.com/api/click?format=go&key=1686da1044273e8a4540f89500b72810&loc=http%3A%2F%2Fcsnbbs.com%2Fshowthread.php%3Ftid%3D569683&v=1&libid=1336741679096&out=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.sun-sentinel.com%2Fsports%2Fnationworld%2Fwire%2Fsns-ap-fbc-fcs-playoff-expansion%2C0%2C529328.story&ref=http%3A%2F%2Fcsnbbs.com%2Fforumdisplay.php%3Ffid%3D296&title=FCS%20Wants%20to%20expand%20Playoffs%20to%2024%20Teams&txt=Article%20Link&jsonp=vglnk_jsonp_13367425897253

[rrshock]

I think WSU would struggle without scholarships. That doesn't seem like a great idea, IMO. But I'm not the one making decisions either.

[SubGod22]

I'd rather just start with scholarship football and work at it from that angle. Pioneer league may end up costing just as much with where they have to travel for conference games. I believe they're like the Big East in that they go coast to coast.

[Ta town]

I'd rather just start with scholarship football and work at it from that angle. Pioneer league may end up costing just as much with where they have to travel for conference games. I believe they're like the Big East in that they go coast to coast.

Here is the thing, it would get it off and running. I think it costs schools around 1mil a year to run a non scholarship team. It would help get things like a new field, maybe scoreboard at Cessna stadium, no additional woman's sports needed. Also you can award academic scholarships to the players, you just have to make sure they would meet the standards for those academic awards.

Drake, Butler, Dayton, Valpo, Morehead all play. None of those schools are that far from Wichita. True others are on one coast or the other but remember half your games are going to be home games. It's football, it's not like you are traveling but 5-6 times a year.

I just think it's a way to get some needed ground work laid and could make the transition to FCS (Valley) very easy.

[rrshock]

I agree that it would lay the groundwork, but it would still, IMO, be unadventagious to not have athletic scholarships. How much would the scholarships add to that 1 mil number?

[Ta town]

Well you suddenly have to add womens sports and scholarships.

I just think non scholarship would get it going. Do that for a few years then jump into the Valley and Scholarships.

[SubGod22]

You're also not going to get a lot of support from fans for non-scholarship football. I'd rather see the University start up Women's Soccer soon and start building towards joining the MVFC and take it from there. Odds of success would increase. The goal would be to eventually get to FBS status.

I just don't see non-scholly football getting us there. It would die before there was ever a real shot at doing it right.

[Ta town]

Very different from non scholarship football but someone is starting club football at WSU:

http://www.kansas.com/2012/05/11/2332869/one-wichita-state-student-takes.html

[SpanglerFan316]

I think club football is a great idea. (Will WSU have any "concussion" liability?)

[1972Shocker]

Very different from non scholarship football but someone is starting club football at WSU:

http://www.kansas.com/2012/05/11/233...ent-takes.html

I think TRYING to start club football is the more accurate description of the current state of affairs. At least that was my impression from reading the article. I wish him luck but it's not a sure thing that he will get even a club football team off the ground.

[Ta town]

TRYING.

touche

[RoyalShock]

With the apparent financial stability of the athletic department, I could see a plan for non-scholarship football leading to bigger things at WSU.

Let's look at Drake. Last year they had 2 away games outside the region, one in CA, one in NY. Attendance ranged from 4100 down to 1800, with most under 2500. That's in a city of similar size to Wichita with D1 options not as far away. I think WSU could easily match that. Put 20,000 through the gates over 5-6 games at $7/person to help offset coaching salaries and recruiting costs.

Running a non-scholarship team would offset some of the start-up costs of an FCS program (buying equipment and expanding lockerroom facilities). It would begin to change the fall campus feel and give students and alumni a taste of having football back. It gives the athletic department time to adjust to having one more sport to administrate without the full cost burden of scholarship football.

It would also show potential conference suitors that there is at least a plan in place to resurrect a scholarship program.

2013, Fall - Start a club team (effort already underway).
2014, Spring - Announce creation of non-scholarship program to begin in fall of 2015.
2016, Fall - Add women's soccer. Begin alumni fund-raising and building student support for FCS football.
2017, Fall - Announce planned jump to FCS contingent on modest ($5/credit-hour) increase in student fees.
2018 or 2019 - Play first FCS game.
2023-2024 - Hope that jumping to FBS is an option.

By that point (2018-2019), WSU may have already been left behind in the conference shuffle, finding ourselves in a conference that looks like this:

Drake
UNI
Indiana St
Missori St
SIU
Wisc-Milwaukee
Oral Roberts
Murray St
Wright St

CU and BU went to private school league, UE to the Horizon, Illinois St to the MAC. Hopefully, some non-power FBS conference still has a spot for a non-FBS football school looking to someday move up to that level.

[Ta town]

I don't know about football but if you are going to try women's rowing is the sport to start. The CUSA rowing league has Kansas, Tulsa, Oklahoma in it and it eats up 20 scholarships. Also there is already club rowing at Wichita State. Although 20 won't be enough and soccer along with swimming/diving probably make the most sense after rowing. 12 and 8 scholarships respectively. Both sports being offered by MVC. Lacrosse and Field hockey would be really expensive as not much regionally. The addition of those 3 women's sports would give WSU something like 64 scholarships + on the women's side. I believe FCS football is 63 scholarships.

[1972Shocker]

Keep in mind the current number of scholarships available in the Shocker Athletic progam already favors the Ladies.

Shocker Men (Basketball is a head count sports, all the rest are equivalency sports):
Basketball 13
Baseball 11.7
XC/Track & Fied 12.6
Golf 4.5
Tennis 5
Men's Total Scholarships: 13 Head Count + 33.8 Equivalency = 46.8 Total

Shocker Women (Basketball, Volleyball & Tennis are head count sports, all the rest are equivalency sports):
Basketball 15
Volleyball 12
Tennis 12
Softball 12
XC/Track & Fied 18
Golf 6
Women's Total Scholarships: 39 Head Count + 36 Equivalency = 75 Total

These are available scholarships. Women's basketball has rarely used their full alotment and the women's tennis roster has only 8 players on it so they are not using all of their scholarships. I'm pretty confident that all the equivalency scholarships are used. The scholarships available for XC/Track & Field is ridiculously low IMHO considering the number of student athletes involved in those sports. In any case, it appears to me that we already have a fairly substantial Title IX cushion to work with.

I'm not sure what the breakdown of males and females in our undergraduate enrollment is but one of the Title IX tests is that athletic opportunites are proportional to the respective undergraduate enrollment.

Title IX was in place when before we dropped football, but was still evolving I suppose. In any case, that may account for why we now have more scholarships available for women then for men.

[rrshock]

Maybe non-scholly would be a good option. Im starting to change my mind on this. I really just want football back.