uw schedule out

[Harrison]

agree with 4th and state the whole argument is misguided, stupid, and mostly ignorant.  I normally make it a point to not even read these strings.  You know what you guys that dont like the schedule should do?  After all your marketing analysis and agreement on how a consumer will not buy an inferior product.  Well you just should not buy it!!!  Show MU that you will not support there efforts to run an efficinet program that puts them in the fiscal postion to have charter flights, recruit national, operate the Al, go to canada, Go to Hawaii, etc.  Put your foot down and demand that they do not have the money to do that!! Demand they pay more for higher profile buy gmaes.  Demand they trade the buy games for more home and homes...demand it as a consumer by not buying the product.   Put your money where your mouth is and a s a consumer reject the product....that is what will get MU to change not your internet grumblings.

Also as a note to Mueng03... your comments on Colorado are wrong. A game like Colorado is not a "Buy" game  it is a home and home.  Meaning WI pays nothing to them and Colorado pays nothing to Wisc. to go to their place next year.  The "cost" is WI would give up a home date next year.  Mu is not in a financila position to do this more than 1 or 2 times a season.  for better or worse Mu has basically given up a home and home series to play in a Holiday tournament every year...a non brainer in my book as it benefits the team and the program infinitely more. 
Instead of home and homes MU needs to have buy games whereby it is a home game every year....yes they pay +/- $50K each year to bring a team in but the bottom line of two home buy games versus one free home game and a travel game the next year is not comparable.  Mu needs these to afford to run their program and the non revenue programs.

Mod Edit:  I'm getting tired of editing your foul language.  Next time, I'm just deleting your rants.

[Harrison]

Foul language?....I cannot use the B-word, which is allowed on TV?  Additionally I used symbols in doing it.  So much for the impartial editor, me thinks it has alot to do with the fact that the comment applied to the same group that complains ad nauseum with absolutely no idea of the big picture and what MU needs revenue wise includes you.   

[mu_hilltopper]

Honestly, it's the combination of cussing and the fact that you are personally attacking people (yes, me included) on this forum.  I have no qualms in removing course language when you are unable to express your opinion without labeling the opposition as "juvenile" "dense" "ignorant" and "stupid." 

One would think your previous warnings and bannings would have taught you that lesson.  And if YOU don't like it, take your own advice, and don't buy our (free) product, and go somewhere else.   

[murocky01]

i persoanlly can get over kicking the hell out of St Mary's instead of kicking the hell out of arguably the worst BCS basketball program in the country ( Colorado) so that we do not have to travel there the next year and can bring in another big pay day that allows us to compete and spend on an elite level. 

I would personally love to see a home and home with Colorado in the next few years, I think all of us MU alums in Colorado could turn Coors Event Center into Bradley Center West.  I agree that Colorado's basketball program was horrible last year and will probably be horrible again this year.  However, bringing in Jeff Bzdelik as coach was a great move, and he should be able to turn things around in 2-3 years.  UW will crush them this year, but it would be a more interesting match-up for me than MU playing Oakland or St. Mary's.

[Cooby Snacks]

Come on, people.  A home and home with Colorado is sparking this sort of debate?

Madison can afford to schedule like this, as their entire athletic department is not bankrolled by men's basketball. 

MU, as we all know fully well, unfortunately does not have that same luxury.  At this point, when looking at opponents from BCS conferences for home and home series, MU has to find definite made-for-TV matchups.  Most of the BCS home and homes in the Crean era that I can think of follow this pattern...Wake Forest, Arizona, Notre Dame, and I believe we even managed a televised game @ Dayton in 02-03.  The exception is the series with Nebraska that did absolutely nothing for us (minimal attendance/Christmas Break game in Milwaukee, and a non-televised affair in Lincoln).  Long story short, MU vs. BCS conference doormat is not going to land us on ESPN or even ESPN Plus, and therefore, it's not really worth our time.  The TV money really is that important.

MU had the right idea again going into this season with the schools it was in contact with...Maryland, Texas, Alabama, Gonzaga.  The terms just couldn't be agreed upon.  It happens.  It also didn't help that the SEC-Big East "Challenge" is more or less a complete joke this season.

[Canned Goods n Ammo]

Madison can afford to schedule like this, as their entire athletic department is not bankrolled by men's basketball. 

You got it exactly right, and that is why scheduling at MU is more challenging than most (maybe any) school in the nation.

There are only a handful of top-flight programs that depend so heavily on basketball for funding. Obviously I don't know every specific budget across the county, but common sense tells me that the vast majority of public schools don't have this problem given their budgets. Obviously some small schools have some challenges, but the top programs don't have the same issues as MU. Georgetown, SJU, DePaul, and SLU are probably all in similar situations (probably Gonzaga as well).

MU has to balance revenue, local fan interest, national interest, RPI, team needs, travel needs, school schedules, etc. etc.

Making a good schedule at MU isn't impossible... but I don't think MU will ever have the "perfect" schedule that some people want/expect. There are always going to be some "buy" games so MU can make some good $. Just the nature of what they have to do.

[Harrison]

murocky01...you state...

"I would personally love to see a home and home with Colorado in the next few years, I think all of us MU alums in Colorado could turn Coors Event Center into Bradley Center West.  I agree that Colorado's basketball program was horrible last year and will probably be horrible again this year.  However, bringing in Jeff Bzdelik as coach was a great move, and he should be able to turn things around in 2-3 years.  UW will crush them this year, but it would be a more interesting match-up for me than MU playing Oakland or St. Mary's."

On the very basic level , sure Colorado would be more interesting than a St. MAry's or Oakland as you state.  And traveling to Colo. is great for the alums.  But "what does that have to do with the price of tea in China"?

the entire reason Mu does not play that many of these games is THEY CANNOT AFFORD IT!   We gave up one by having to play another road BE game and gave up another home game by playing in aholiday tourney every year.  MU has stated that financially they must play an absolute minimum of 16 home games every year, period, finito,in order to generate the resources to operate the entire athletic department budget. 

Now no matter how often it is said that we have to have buy games someone will turn around and say they "would much rather have a home and home with Colorado even thosugh they stink".  What are we missing here folks?  lets do the math maybe that will help.

year one buy game with st. mary's of the blind:

pay them $40k
rent the BC $20k
ticket revenue 15,000 x $25 avg. ticket = $375,000  nets the program $315,000

Now in year two you bring in St. joh'ns of the poor and again net $315K

Versus a home and home with colorado or dayton or whomever.

year one pay them nothing they come to milwaukee
rent the BC $20k
lets say 16,000 just to appease those that argue a bigger gate x $25 a ticket=  $400,000

net $380,000

Year 2 travel to colorado say a cost of $15,000
net -$15,000


therefore MU makes 630,000 over two years with two buy games aversus neting $365,000 over two years on a home and home with a bigger name.  HMMMM is it that hard when Basketball is our only revenue producing sport?  those extra $265,000 dollars help fund the rest of the Athletic dept. and Allow Mu to operate the Al, recruit nationally, allowed us to give up millions to leave C-usa, fly via charter like other top 15 programs, go to canada, go to alska, got to hawaii, etc.   
But we get fixated on  the fact that we play 1-2 fewer home and home series than other BCS teams with football play!!!???   All I can say is WOW!

[Dish]

Just to play devil's advocate here, with two Jesuit schools depending on men's basketball to drive in atheltic department income. Both schools recruit nationally and played games far away from home....

DePaul 2006-07 Non-Conference Sked

@ Bradley
@ Northwestern
Eastern Illinois
Maui Invitational
Kansas
Chicago State
@ UAB
Wake Forest
@ URI
UC Irvine
Cal
Northwestern St.

Gonzaga 2006-07 Non-Conference Sked

Eastern Washington
Rice
Baylor
Texas-SA
North Carolina (@ MSG)
Butler (@ MSG)
Idaho
Portland State
Texas
@ Washington State
Washington
@ Georgia
Duke (@ MSG)
Nevada (@ Seattle)
@ Virginia
@ Stanford
Memphis

[mu_hilltopper]

That is a good analysis, Harrison, really.

We "make" (630k-365k) $265k on deciding to have two years of buy games vs a H&H.

Based on that, we should probably stop the home and home with Wisconsin, too. 

True, the figures would change slightly, ticket rev for the UW sell out at the BC would be (15k fans to 18k fans)  +3000 * $25/ticket = $75k.   So we'd only make ($265-75) $190k extra on two buy games vs. the UW H&H.

Those extra $190,000 dollars will pay for a charter flight or two.   Finally, we can stop playing those guys and getting our asses kicked. 

Maybe the reason MU decides to forgo this extra $190k, is because they want to give their customers a good product.  Amazingly, that concept could easily apply to any H&H of a decent quality, like Texas, Maryland (no reason to fixate on Colorado, clearly a lesser team, but the $$$ analysis is nearly the same.)

[Canned Goods n Ammo]

Just to play devil's advocate here, with two Jesuit schools depending on men's basketball to drive in atheltic department income. Both schools recruit nationally and played games far away from home....

DePaul 2006-07 Non-Conference Sked

@ Bradley
@ Northwestern
Eastern Illinois
Maui Invitational
Kansas
Chicago State
@ UAB
Wake Forest
@ URI
UC Irvine
Cal
Northwestern St.

Gonzaga 2006-07 Non-Conference Sked

Eastern Washington
Rice
Baylor
Texas-SA
North Carolina (@ MSG)
Butler (@ MSG)
Idaho
Portland State
Texas
@ Washington State
Washington
@ Georgia
Duke (@ MSG)
Nevada (@ Seattle)
@ Virginia
@ Stanford
Memphis

This is interesting.

On first look, I don't think MU's and DePaul's are that different... (7 home games and 4 away games) but I guess I would really have to look at a game by game schedule and compare. Maybe Depaul can have less "buy" games because they don't have to pay rent on the All-State? I really don't know.

Also, I think I made a mistake mentioning Gonzaga before. When I think about it, there situation is totally different than MU's given the conference that they play in. If they want to be a top program, they have to go out and play a bunch of people because their conference is so weak... I don't know how they make it balance budget wise... but in order to compete they have to take more of an "anytime, anywhere" approach.

[Harrison]

hilltopper...I hear what you are saying and I dont ever think MU has said that they would not like to play more home and homes.  correct me if I am wrong but I have never heard that.  And along your point Wisco does have some advantages 1. sold out and 2. basically no cost to the team when they travel.  

However, what i have heard and I do know is that when the Athletic dept. sitts down like any business they look at costs and revenue, and it has long been established that we must have a absolute minimum of 16 home games.  Now we all know we lost one do to the BE.  And we lose one to the Holiday tournaments ...now maybe I am wrong but I would rather have aHoliday tourney than a Home and home.  I think it is much better for the team and the program to go play 3-4 games over 1.  it helps the win total, it helps the RPI, it helps with notoreity, and any team young into a season will benefit more by playing 4 times than 1.  So one choice may be to abandon the holiday tourneys.  I dont think that will hapened nor should it. IMO.  

Now this was all made more difficult by leaving C_USA and the Depual schedule and the Gonzaga schedules are not apples to aplles as neither of those schools left millions of dollars on the tabel to leave their confernce.  additonally Gonzaga s games we TV games...big difference.  Also Gozaga owns there arena, but the biggie is TV.  Maybe in 3 years if Mu has had a good run and earned some nice NCAA units and the BE continues to do well that income will be replaced and we can look at adding another one.  I think Mu has always used atop down approach saying we need 16 home games.. now maybe if revenue increases faster than cost in the future things may change.  But again I have never heard Mu said they did not want to play home and homeswhat they have said is they needed 16 home dates.

[Dish]

I don't remember what DePaul's deal was with leaving C-USA, but I think they got to keep their NCAA C-USA money by playing teams from C-USA for a certain number of years? I really don't know how they can schedule like they do. It seems like every year they have a great non-conference schedule every year.

With Gonzaga though, they only have a 6,000 seat arena. Given, it's on their campus and they own it, but MU is drawing a minimum of double that to 10k-12k more (depending the opponent), even with rent. While they also do play in the WCC, they are almost guaranteed an NCAA bid each year, so they don't necessarily have to go out and play the sked that they do. I think it's to their credit they play "anyone, anytime". Not saying that should be MU's philosophy (different strokes for different folks).

[Schoolyard]

MU loves to sing the woe is me budget song, they've sung it so long everyone buys in.  I have too - but why can DePaul do it and we can't?

[herboturbo]

Depau loses alot more money than our program does, and they don't seem to have a problem with that.  MU decides that they want to make more money. 

I'm also finding this really halarious about Colorado sparking this conversation since its not a H & H, but a tournament.  It's as if someone was looking at Air Force in the same manner when we hosted that tourney a few years ago. 

This whole scheduling thing can be summed up into a few sentances.  Would people like to see better names in the non-con? Yes.  Are people willing to buy season tickets with the non-con they currently have? Yes.  So until the answer to no.2 becomes 'no' than this whole point is mute.  It then breaks down to people complaining about stuff because they like to complain or have nothing better to do.

[PuertoRicanNightmare]

MU loves to sing the woe is me budget song, they've sung it so long everyone buys in.  I have too - but why can DePaul do it and we can't?

DePaul is not paying their coach nearly as much as we are.

[Canned Goods n Ammo]

MU loves to sing the woe is me budget song, they've sung it so long everyone buys in.  I have too - but why can DePaul do it and we can't?

DePaul is not paying their coach nearly as much as we are.

But, hasn't MU always played more home games to generate revenue? I don't think this is predicated off of the current coaches salary.

[Harrison]

herbo is right and that is what i said as well.  you guys can complain all you want but until you give up your tickets nothing will chnage....and on tha note if any of you guys that are going to finally stop crying nad do something about it....well if you have lower arena center court seat s i would be wllng to buy them from you.

Also it is correct that Depaul kept the money from C-usa.  Notice their schedule they have to play uab this year as part ofthe agreement.   MU chose not to do that if they did they would have had to drop the tourneys or Wisconsin in favor of a home and home with tulane, so miss, tcu and the like oh that would have gone over well with the complainer crowd.

[Canned Goods n Ammo]

With Gonzaga though, they only have a 6,000 seat arena. Given, it's on their campus and they own it, but MU is drawing a minimum of double that to 10k-12k more (depending the opponent), even with rent. While they also do play in the WCC, they are almost guaranteed an NCAA bid each year, so they don't necessarily have to go out and play the sked that they do. I think it's to their credit they play "anyone, anytime". Not saying that should be MU's philosophy (different strokes for different folks).

I agree Gonzaga deserves credit for  playing a tough schedule, but if they want to be a top program, they don't have a choice. Their strength of schedule would be very low if they didn't go out and play a lot of tough games out of conference. They would still have a shot at winning their conference, but they would get a very low seed every year and wouldn't be a "top program".

To be honest, Gonzaga and MU's schedules are almost flip-flopped when you think about it. MU has to make sure it doesn't schedule too many tough games early on because the team will get plenty of tough games during conference play. Gonzaga has the exact opposite approach. They need to make sure they play their tough games early because later in the year they have some soup cans to knock over.

[mu_hilltopper]

Reactions to some random points above ..

While it is true that as long as people buy tickets, this conversation is "mute" (moot) .. it is not complaining for the fun of it.  It's a valid discussion, especially  in comparison with other teams.  What's preposterous is the idea that complaints are somehow invalid.  This is an expensive product that clearly has its great points and its not so great points.

What this is, is a conversation about balance and priorities.  And it works just like any other company.  It takes money to increase customer satisfaction. 

If money were the only factor, there would be one clear path:  Have the maximum amount of home games each year.   No home and homes.  No pre-season tournaments.  No UW.  100% buy games, year in and year out, would maximize revenue.  As we've seen, with the BE schedule, even if we played the worst teams available, our SoS would end up fine.

But MU doesn't do that.  They forgo income to have a UW game.  They've played H&Hs with the last teams being Valpo, Nebraska, Notre Dame, and Minnesota, again, forgoing income.

Why?  Why give up revenue for these teams?   The reason is: To make the schedule better.  Why do that?  A variety of reasons, NCAA resume being one, but certainly customer satisfaction is another -- And I think we forget about organizational satisfaction. --  I'm betting that not a single coach, administrator, let alone player (or prospective player) seriously likes MU playing Morgan State.  They do it because they have to have some games like this.

So it comes down to balance.  It is clearly not all about money. -- I'm really not even sure what you guys are arguing for.  MU has an (recent) average of 2 H&Hs on the schedule each year, and your position would favor dropping one or both.  MU clearly intends to continue having H&Hs.  While it fell through, talks with GU, MD, and TX did happen.  And there'll be another H&H on this year's schedule or it'll be the first season ever to not have one (besides UW.) 

MU also has something that tilts the market in their favor .. their product is somewhat unknown at the time of purchase.  Season ticket money is due weeks before the schedule comes out, so people are buying (and donating) to a product they only know about half the details.   

They've got a captive customer base, who absorb the bad to get to the good. -- Not many products out there can do this.  -- But this CAN get out of balance, as prices go up and (relative) value goes down.

And I'll repeat it again.  I believe our schedule will strike the right balance next year, with 9 BE homers, a UWM team that will be fun to crush, AND a mystery H&H that will get done, since it always does.

[herboturbo]

Reactions to some random points above ..

While it is true that as long as people buy tickets, this conversation is "mute" (moot) .. it is not complaining for the fun of it.  It's a valid discussion, especially  in comparison with other teams.  What's preposterous is the idea that complaints are somehow invalid.  This is an expensive product that clearly has its great points and its not so great points.

That is what happens when you type on a message board after drinking all night - words come out wrong.

But my point wasn't that complaints are invalid, but that they're a waste of energy.  MU isn't going to change anything unless people complain with taking dollars out of the equation instead of adding words.

In another point I think our schedule in 2009 has huge potential if we don't wind up in a preseason tourney next season (we havn't been included in one yet).  That opens up a possible 2 H & H's starting on the road next year meaning return games in '09 plus our rumored inclusion into the orlando tourney that year and wisconsin game.  Good times.

[dennycrane]

Colorado is not a home and home. Colorado is part of a round robin tourney hosted in Madison that includes Savanna St. and Fla A&M.