Idaho Vandals Back To Big Sky

[boisebengal]

You Vandal fans say some of the most ridiculous, ludicrous, asenine, and delusion statements I've ever heard. If I need a good laugh once in a while I'll go to the Vandal message board and get entertained by some of your ridiculous statements. Like how great a shape the WAC is, when everyone knows it's a sinking ship, and how Idaho is first in line to be invited into the MWC. And when Idaho is picked to be one of the worst teams in 1-A, many of you out there think that Idaho will contend for the WAC championship. All this stuff is ridiculous, but it's also very sad to hear.

Like Skippy was saying, last year the ESPN WAC contract was for about $4 million, but with BSU leaving this year the teams will split up about $1 million. And next year after Nevada, Fresno and Hawaii all bolt that sinking ship WAC, which every school in the WAC is trying to get out of right now, then the contract is expected to be about $100,000 or less. Skippy is just saying that with the huge loss of revenues that the WAC will encounter over the next few years relative to what it was when BSU was in the league, then why would Montana or any other Big Sky school, wish to spend millions more every year when there's no money available in return?

No vandals, it's the Big Sky that's very stable and the WAC that's in serious trouble, and everyone knows it. It wouldn't surprise me to see teams like NMSU and La. Tech soon leave for the Sun Belt, because they know that league is more in their region and it's much more stronger and more stable. If the MWC invites one more team then it would probably be either USU or SJSU. It's the remaining teams that will likely have to compete as a 1-A indy, compete at the 1-AA level, or drop FB altogether. I was just saying that Idaho would probably try to compete as an independent for a while when the WAC falls apart, which is financial suicide. But when that doesn't work out, then eventually they'd much rather drop FB than go back to the Big Sky -- because of their pride. It's pride that caused Idaho to think they could try to keep up with BSU, but now I think that reality is finally starting to settle in. But hey, I respect your effort in trying to compete at the 1-A level, but we all know that you should have stayed in the Big Sky all along.

 

[spazdog1]

You know you have a Vandal right where you want them when they try to turn a football thread into an academic thread. There's no where to go after that. I'm not going to ruin the day of the Vandals lurking but a BIG chunk of the research money that UofI receives is from the land grant status that they have had for years. In the "what have you done for me today" world, should they still be granted 100% of those funds rather than having them split between the other state institutions. In my view, no. Yet it's the final rebuttal when they defend their poor performing athletic programs. Beyond that, I have a two word response to their arrogant academic tirade... Yardley Report. 'Nuff said.

Back to athletics... Tom Cable was a visionary. When Cable left Moscow, he indicated that U of I was not supported and funded as a D1A (that was designation at the time) team. He said that they are better suited for D1AA. No one knows how successful the Vandals would be if they stayed in the Big Sky. One thing is for sure, their facilities and competition for recruits is a better match with E. Washington than it is with Washington State.

 

[biobengal]

No doubt, the WAC is on life support, but I don't see it going away soon. Two Texas schools (Lamar and Sam Houston State) would jump at a WAC invite. These are obviously poor choices, adding Lamar and SHSU to the WAC quickly blurs the line with FCS and the Southland Conference. Their desperation is evident in Benson's salivation for Sacramento State and Portland State, two institutions that draw little interest from Big Sky fans.

Ultimately, the WAC has what many big market programs crave... the increased exposure they believe will put them over the edge. Despite the dimished view of the WAC it is still much more visible than the BSC.

 

[Vandals_n_Bengals]

Um, there is a reason it's called COLLEGE football, and the word Student is in the name student athlete. Maybe if Zamberlin and ISU had paid more attention to the academic part of college football, then the Bengals would not be banned from the postseason for the foreseeable future. You know you have a bronco right where you want them when they try to ignore the academic side of collegiate athletics.

The fact that you bring up the Yardley Report shows that you haven't actually read it, that you don't understand what it is about, and that you're just repeating something you probably got off of a BJC forum. U of I paid $130,383 to the Yardley Research Group to evaluate graduate programs at U of I. The report dealt only with graduate programs, and has nothing to do with undergraduates, which the overwhelming majority of student athletes are. The main critiques of the Yardley report deal with the fact that U of I's graduate programs are staffed by too few professors and their enrollment of a smaller number of graduate students in relationship to the size of the university. The Yardley report also criticizes the faculty of U of I for "criticizing the administration" of the University. This goes against the Yardley Research Group's stated recommendation of giving the U of I a more centralized system of governance and authority, with less academic freedom, and to create a two-tiered system of faculty whereby full-time professors devote all of their time to graduate studies and research, and part-time faculty and graduate students teach undergraduate courses (President Valias and ISU are following this same recommendation from the Yardley Group in remaking ISU into a major research University instead of a glorified community college like Boise State, the difference is that U of I was already a research University, and therefore does not need to change as drastically as ISU does in order to fit this mold). The other main critiques in the Yardley Report state that professors at U of I have "counter-culture values" such as "a vivid sense of entitlement to state funds that support higher education." Um... Don't all faculty members of any University feel that they are entitled to state funds that support higher education? They certainly do here at ISU, and I'm sure that those professors at Boise State feel that they deserve adequate funding as well. Another of the "counter-culture" views expressed by U of I professors according to the Yardley Report is that their view of academic freedom "is too free," that U of I professors believe they "can conduct academic research on any topic they want, regardless of what the State of Idaho needs, thus failing to match their demand for state funding with a corresponding sense of service obligation to the state." This is an asinine argument if I've ever heard one. Does University of Washington, University of Texas, University of Colorado, or any other of the "public ivy" schools devote a majority of their graduate level research to topics pertaining to Washington, Texas, or Colorado respectively? The answer is no! They devote the majority of their graduate research to whatever the individual professors doing it feel like researching. This is how most major universities operate.

By the way, there is no such thing as "land grant status." It is not something to be gained or to be lost. Being a land grant school stems from the Morrill Acts of 1862 and 1890, which granted federally owned land to the states and territories to develop or to sell in order to raise funds to create colleges and universities in order to teach agriculture, science, and engineering. U of I was created from one of these land grants, hence it is a land grant school. It's not something that is granted and can be lost. BSU and ISU will never be land grant schools because they were not founded due to the Morrill Acts of 1862 and 1890.

The fact of the matter is that U of I receives more research money because it produces more research. If you want to look at the list of "what have you done for me today," U of I's agriculture program continually comes up with ways make farming more efficient, it leads a bio-medical research project that has received world renown, it contributes over $1 billion to the economy of Idaho annually through it's research and the activities of it's alumni, it has awarded more that 100,000 degrees (none of which are associate's degrees), etc., etc., etc. BJC won the Fiesta Bowl wooptie doo! That really helped the State of Idaho in the long term.

As far as for "poor performing athletic programs," the Vandal men's basketball team finished 3rd in the WAC, the women's finished 5th, cross country and track both had numerous first place finishers in the WAC championship meets, and sent several athletes to nationals, football finished 6-7, after being predicted to win two games, the season before, the went 8-5 including a bowl victory after being picked to finish dead last in the WAC. That hardly sounds like poor performance. No, what pisses donkey fans off is that win or lose, Vandal fans support their team. We don't turn on our coaches and demand their firing or send death threats to our athletes if they miss a field goal the way donkey fans do. We're not fair weather fans. You can claim that we switch to academics to shy away from our mediocre athletics, but the reality is that Vandals are proud and loyal their University both in academics and in athletics, and don't just focus on one to hide our embarrassment of our lack of the other. The fact of the matter is that the University of Idaho has a strong academic and athletic tradition, and it galls donkeys to hear us praise it.

 

[biobengal]

BSU and ISU will never be land grant schools because they were not founded due to the Morrill Acts of 1862 and 1890.

You're flirting with the turth here, but this is technically inaccurate. Land grant colleges were not "founded due to the Morrill Acts", the ultimate founding was left to the states. Some land grant colleges received land on which campuses were later built, this was not the case with Idaho, the state purchased land for the college. Ultimately, land grant instituntions received land to sell or manage as ways to fund and endow colleges teaching the agricultural and mechanical arts.

The actual politics of Idaho's founding are very interesting, a short history of the University of Idaho can be found here: http://www.ucm.uidaho.edu/default.aspx?pid=86022" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The fact of the matter is that U of I receives more research money because it produces more research.

Hmmm... a very strange statement. You don't seem to have a very strong grasp of how research funds are procured. Instead, I would suggest that UI receives more research money because of funding from the state. A large portion of research is done in the agricultural fields, most of this money comes from the state funding the Agricultural Research and Extension Service to the tune of $22 million, about 40% of the total appropriation to ISU. Smaller teaching loads, fewer undergraduates to educate, professors that can devote more time to research, nearly double the state appropriations of Idaho State..... I think the real question is "why isn't the UI doing more"? Why is Montana State classified as RU/VH but Idaho is in the same classification as Idaho State?

 

[spazdog1]

Like I said, hijack a football thread and try to turn it into a Vandal academic thread. Good job.

I must have struck a nerve. Where do I start? Yardley. Have I read the entire report? You're right. No, I've glanced at it. But I've read the so-called Vandal fans and their emotional tirade about the findings. The faculty's response was complete denial. Spin the findings any way you'd like. The bottom line, Instead of rubber stamping the U of I's sense of entitlement, it found... let's say, fault and lots of it. Let's just leave it at that.

Redirecting from academics to athletics...

Student athletes... We can discuss APR, but I won't.

Fan and student support... You're kidding, right? With all of the support, as you tell it, there shouldn't be an empty seat in the Kibbie Dome at home football games. Look into the stands during the next television broadcast. Throw out the attendance figures given by Spear. Empty seats everywhere. You want proof, go to Youtube, choose a game highlight and see for yourself. Since you brought it up, the mighty third place Vandal men's basketball team finished dead last in attendance in the WAC this past year. If you're counting, the NCAA reports Idaho had a whopping 1359 home game attendance this past season (ISU averaged 1921). If you factor out the overflow number of fans in attendance at the Spectrum when that team from down south played in Moscow, the average attendance was less than 1000. There's your attendance for revenue sports, you know those sports that bring in the fans. Lip service. That's the fan support.

Now let's talk about the record setting 2009 Vandal football team (8-5 overall)... 6 of the 8 wins were against teams with losing records. Those 8 wins were against teams whose combined win/loss records were 36-64. Their 4-4 WAC record was good enough for 4th place in the WAC. Granted, that's better than ISU's record for the same year. But, puffng up your chest and boasting about those numbers? Come on.

And by the way, why do lurking Vandals want to bring BSU into the conversation. Other than their move to the MWC and how their move impacts the WAC, they have nothing to do with this topic. Nothing.

Let's face it. With the WAC on life support, the Vandals are in no man's land. All you lurking Vandals, what are the Vandals going to do or better yet, where will they be in 5 years? And don't pee on my leg and tell me it's rain.

 

[spazdog1]

Here's a thread that is very interesting 5 years later...

 

[spazdog1]

Here’s a thread from 9 years ago. The Vandals calling everyone crazy about their returning to the BSC.