In Depth: Football has impact on USU’s image
Never mind that USU’s space program is one of the best in the world, and 10 other programs are among the best in the nation.
No big deal.
“How ’bout that Aggie football team?” is the hot topic of conversation.
According to Ross Peterson, USU vice president for university advancement, though those other parts of USU are accomplishing substantial things, they aren’t a main topic with alumni or citizens of Cache Valley.
The ‘front porch’ effect
“Seriously, wherever we go for alumni gatherings – or even out in public – people will make a comment, ‘I wish you could do better in football,'” Peterson said. “They aren’t going to say, ‘Wow, that’s amazing what your engineers are doing in space.’ They aren’t going to say, ‘Wow, you do so much good for the water lab.’ They’ll talk about sports.”
Why? It’s simply a reflection of the interests of the society, Peterson said.
USU Director of Athletics Scott Barnes calls the athletic department – namely the football program – “the front porch” of USU.
“It’s not the only room in the house, but it’s the most visible,” Barnes said. “With football being a flagship program, it’s one of the leads in that visibility program. So, a vibrant, healthy football program attracts people to the university. We serve as a magnet to introduce people to the university.”
With this in mind, therefore, is the poor performance (two winning seasons in the past 20 years) on the field casting a negative image on the university as a whole?
USU President Stan Albrecht said it’s a debatable issue with no concrete answer.
Consider, for example, last year’s $200 million fundraising campaign (which was raised to $400 million in August). Peterson said approximately $9.5 million of the $200 million was donated to athletics.
“Where we rank the lowest is in fundraising for athletics,” Peterson said. “Lowest in the Western Athletic Conference, even. That’s what we’ve got to increase.”
Some could interpret the modest amount given to athletics as an indicator that it isn’t as big a deal as USU sports aficionados would like to think. Gary Chambers, vice president for Student Services, disagrees with this assertion.
“I wouldn’t interpret it that way,” said Chambers, who graduated from USU and has worked on campus for 30 years. “The real push in that campaign was really geared towards the academic side of the campus. I would say that (amount) is very significant. I think it’s pretty darn good.”
Albrecht agreed.
“Frankly, very little of (the fundraising campaign) is athletically driven,” Albrecht said. “That $200 million has come to us because of the quality of our business school, our college of education, our entrepreneurship program.”
On-field success = more admissions applications?
Next to the importance of fundraising is on-field success. There is a documented history of universities receiving an increased number of admissions applications after an especially successful season from the football team.
The University of Oregon and Boise State University are two examples of this.
When the USU football team played at Oregon, Sept. 6, Albrecht was able to speak with University of Oregon President Dave Frohnmayer.
“He said when Oregon got to the Rose Bowl in the ’90s, all of a sudden that made a huge difference in terms of student recruiting and fundraising and other kinds of things,” Albrecht said.
Furthermore, according to a 2007 report in The Idaho Statesman, Boise State had a 3.5 percent increase in the number of freshmen that applied following the Broncos’ Fiesta Bowl victory over Oklahoma.
Even with these numbers, Albrecht said the issue is still up in the air.
“It’s a complicated question,” he said. “There’s an argument of whether highly successful football programs play an important role in attracting an expanded donor base. That issue is still a little bit controversial.”
He also said that where Oregon and Boise State have gone is – at least for now – out of the Aggies’ league, even though Boise State is in the same conference as USU.
“We’re not in that world,” he said. “If you have a football program that’s going to the Rose Bowl every year, that shifts (numbers) a little bit because of the national attention it brings to the institution.”
The attendance issue
According to the USU football media guide, Romney Stadium has had an average attendance 14,066 since it was built in 1968. Over the past 10 seasons the number is at 16,325 – more than the 15,000-person average needed to avoid NCAA probation, but still a ways away from its full capacity of 25,513.
This season the trend is continuing. The home-opener against the University of Utah drew a crowd of 19,061 – the first time since 1992 there has been less than 20,000 fans at Romney Stadium for a USU-Utah game. The 42-17 victory over Idaho was witnessed in person by 10,154. That comes out to a two-game average of 14,608 fans.
With nearly 100,000 citizens in Cache Valley and 15,000 students on the USU’s main campus, filling Romney Stadium’s seats might not seem like too tough an assignment.
Nevertheless, it has been.
According to a Feb. 2007 survey of alumni by the Office of Analysis, Assessment & Accreditation, only 10 to 15 percent of the USU alumni surveyed said they had attended a home or away football game during the last five years.
A survey of freshmen and sophomores, released in April, had better numbers: football games were attended by 67.4 percent of respondents.
Chambers said the difficulty in getting fans to the stadium could be attributed in part to the remote location of Cache Valley, as opposed to the Salt Lake Valley and Utah Valley.
“In Cache Valley we’re a bit removed,” Chambers said. “It’s a tough assignment to get 15,000 people to these games. That’s going to be a challenge.”
Nevertheless, Barnes is optimistic for the future. He said nearly 700 new season tickets have been sold this season; last year only 195 new season tickets were purchased.
“In terms of excitement, I see it growing,” he said. “The increase is impressive. There’s a new-built excitement.”
Peterson said for that kind of excitement to last and help the program’s image, the team doesn’t just need to win, it needs to win now.
“This is the year they really have to step up and turn it around,” Peterson said.
“We’re really in a position where we have to start winning games, pure and simple. For fundraising purposes, for maintenance of the program purposes, just for respect. If we were successful and went out and won half the games and got invited to one of the four bowls the WAC gets, I know we would use that heavily in the ($400 million fundraising) campaign. It would be a mammoth turnaround,” he said.
–samuel.hislop@aggiemail.usu.edu