Should San Diego add scholarships?

[Wildcat Ryan]

While I am not the most intelligent person when come to the nuances of college athletics and the monies involved. I do like college sports discussions and this is the newest thought that occurred to me.

Should the University of San Diego offer scholarships?

I say this mostly as a guy that wants to add that 14th member to the Big Sky after UND leaves to help even out the league and possibly go to divisions. I know in their current status (non-scholly ball) the Toreros aren't exactly a good fit for the Big Sky despite being well not technically geographically perfect but close.

San Diego is by average 2,275 miles away from the rest of the Pioneer league (Drake is the closest at 1,744 miles away, Marist is the farthest 2,808 miles away) while only being by average 859 miles from current Big Sky schools. (closest is Cal Poly at 312 miles farthest is E.Wash at 1,293 miles, Still 451 miles closer than San Diego's current closest member Drake)

I know it takes money, (and a lot of it) to award scholarships and investing more into the program, but could the money saved on travel help make up the difference? And is it possible that San Diego could one day start adding Scholarships?

I've read a few articles online saying that it would not be financially beneficial for the Toreros to do so, so that kinda answers my question, but it is still fun discussion.

In my opinion the Big Sky honestly needs to add another football member once the Hawks leave, and since the odds of Utah Valley, Grand Canyon or several of the other Cali schools who had football at once before dropping it, starting football are really low to most likely not happening. Bringing in San Diego who already plays FCS football could be a viable option.

Which would then hopefully lead to the Big Sky creating divisions to help alleviate the current unbalance in scheduling.

North
Eastern Washington
Idaho
Idaho State
Montana
Montana State
Northern Colorado
Portland State

South
Cal Poly
Northern Arizona
Sacramento State
San Diego
Southern Utah
UC Davis
Weber State

While I don't like the idea of separating Weber from the other founders, this alignment makes the most sense. And yes I know there will be the problem with deciding "who's the real champ". But the Big Sky already has that problem so it actually shouldn't be a new issue.

I know the topic of realignment is a tired issue, but we must look to the future

Let the discussion begin and my ignorance be known.

[Rich K]

The first thing I usually do after somebody suggests additional Big Sky schools is look at scheduling.

Here's one way to schedule a 2 division conference of 7 teams per division.

Every year each team plays the other 6 teams in their division.
Years 1 and 2 each team plays an additional 2 teams from the other division.
Year 3 each team plays 3 teams from the other division.

So years 1 and 2 each team plays 8 Conference games and 3 out of conference games.
In year 3 each team plays 9 conference games plays 2 out of conference games, unless by magic the 3rd year aligns itself to a year that teams are allowed 12 games.

[JALMOND]

Just speculation on my part, I look at it similar to St. Mary's a few years ago.

The WCC schools have raised their national profile substantially in basketball, particularly men's basketball in the last few years, given the success of Gonzaga, St. Mary's and Santa Clara nationally. They (with the exception of BYU) are all small enrollment, Catholic/Jesuit universities. They are all pumping tons of money in to their basketball programs in order to remain strong and viable at the national level, and they don't want to do anything to jeopardize that. San Diego is now the only one offering football, so I don't think they would want to increase expenses as much as scholarship football would do that. As with St. Mary's, I think it is more feasible that they would end the football program and the expenses associated with it than to start offering scholarships, especially given the rising costs in maintaining scholarship football.

[Mvemjsunpx]

San Diego is a Catholic school, so I don't see any way they would end up in the exclusively public Big Sky.

And, as JALMOND indicated, they probably don't want to add scholarships anyway.

[JALMOND]

There are other schools (Central Washington, Western Oregon, CSU-Pueblo) that do fit the model of the Big Sky better than San Diego, that have already established (and successful) scholarship football programs.

[UCD_MOO_COW]

Do you think Central Washington will ever move up?

[Mvemjsunpx]

Do you think Central Washington will ever move up?

Their stadium holds 4000 people, so not anytime soon.

[JohnStOnge]

As a fan I don't like big conferences. I'd like it better if the team I'm pulling for is in an 8 or 9 team conference so that everybody in the conference plays everybody else and there are three or four non conference games. To me it makes for much more interesting seasons.

I don't like the thing that's happened with college football in recent years with the conferences having too many teams to have them all play each other during the regular season while also allowing for some hopefully interesting non conference games.

[Grizalltheway]

Do you think Central Washington will ever move up?

Their stadium holds 4000 people, so not anytime soon.

They'd fit right in with a few Big Sky schools attendance-wise.

[Mvemjsunpx]

Their stadium holds 4000 people, so not anytime soon.

They'd fit right in with a few Big Sky schools attendance-wise.

Kinda, but every single Big Sky school averaged more than 4000 last year. PSU & NoCo were the only ones under 5000.

[SuperHornet]

The first thing I usually do after somebody suggests additional Big Sky schools is look at scheduling.

Here's one way to schedule a 2 division conference of 7 teams per division.

Every year each team plays the other 6 teams in their division.
Years 1 and 2 each team plays an additional 2 teams from the other division.
Year 3 each team plays 3 teams from the other division.

So years 1 and 2 each team plays 8 Conference games and 3 out of conference games.
In year 3 each team plays 9 conference games plays 2 out of conference games, unless by magic the 3rd year aligns itself to a year that teams are allowed 12 games.

Just one problem with that. Not every BSC school is playing the MVFC Challenge. Many are containing costs by playing the in-conference OOC game. A Sky-heavy schedule under those conditions would be rough.

I'd much rather resurrect the program at UOP and send SUU/UNC packing back east, or at least split into two conferences to have a traditional 9-11 team conference. But my preferences are beside the point....