04/25/24
December 07, 2014
538: 7 Other Schools That May Follow UAB Out of Football: The number crunchers at 538 look at the financial situation that led University of Alabama at Birmingham president Ray Watts to announce the shutdown of the school's college football program this week. Eight other schools have added football programs since UAB in 1996, and seven of them have similarly difficult funding situations: Florida Atlantic, Florida International, South Alabama, UT-San Antonio, Georgia State, Old Dominion and UNC-Charlotte. "All of them are based in the South, and all of them felt they had a chance to succeed because of the prestige of the game and the fertile recruiting grounds in the region. But they've found it incredibly expensive to field a competitive FBS program," writes David Goldenberg. "And as the Big 5 power conferences start to crank up the financial pressure -- both with lavish spending on facilities and upcoming allowances for players -- it's possible that some of these programs could join UAB on the sidelines."
Way less money coming in, pretty much the same amount of money going out, I guess. You'd be spending less on coaches, but I can't imagine it's much less at the Div II levels than at upstart schools like these.
posted by Etrigan at 01:46 PM on December 07, 2014
Looking down the list of those schools, couldn't help but think: well heck, some of 'em are UNT's favorite folks to whup up on. During those occasional times when UNT is capable of laying on a whuppin.
posted by beaverboard at 02:10 PM on December 07, 2014
Dumb Question Alert:
Why kill the program altogether? Why not just drop down to Division II or III?