Richmond NIL
- Thread starter nathanw19
- Start date
why would he think I care about Ukrop? This board is so ridiculous, still adjucating a lax decision that was made nearly 10 years ago (two presidents ago)? At the end of the day, a business decision was made-and its safe to say, it was the right one. I am talking about the here and now and all the big boys who are making an investment in the NIL (remember the school can't fund it) have big hitters bankrolling it.
As far as NIL goes, Ukrop couldn't open up a lemonade stand for our hoops players.
There have been a handful of once in a lifetime family donors to this school, including Robins, Queally. One had the family patriach's statue covered in Red paint and had woke/fake outrage spewed about the other. Those are the people that can make sure we have a strong collective, not some food hall owner.
Volleyball is the cheaper option than softball. No need to build out extra facilities. I like the idea of Acrobat and Tumbling as well. That could use that sport to help balance out the tennis scholarship discrepancy.
Haven’t you all heard, the University of Pennsylvania has decided to destroy the whole concept
of Title 9, and then the NCAA joined them in naming their swimmer “female athletes of the year.”
Pretty soon Bubba Bambi will be our next All American on the football team.
of Title 9, and then the NCAA joined them in naming their swimmer “female athletes of the year.”
Pretty soon Bubba Bambi will be our next All American on the football team.
The school down the road has "acrobatics and tumbling." It's glorified cheerleading, with tumbling and acrobatic skills that any 10-year-old gymnast has.The participation stat on volleyball always astounds me...95% of D-I schools sponsor it, but not us. Softball is the other big one we're missing...85% of D-I schools sponsor it.
After that it's a big drop-off...about a quarter of schools have women's rowing. Gymnastics and beach volleyball are in the 15–20% range, and then you're dropping down into the 10% and below range for sports like water polo, ice hockey, bowling, fencing, etc.
Here's an interesting new one...acrobatics and tumbling, a subset of gymnastics. There are only a handful of D-I programs, but Duquesne just announced they're adding it and it has passed 40 total NCAA programs so it can now be considered for an NCAA championship.
NCAA Acrobatics & Tumbling has taken a significant step on the road to forty
NCAA Acrobatics & Tumbling has taken a significant step on the road to forty.thencata.org
Athletic departments are now competing against their own fanbases to get funding from their own fanbases.
This is not a good path for collegiate sports.
NIL, which agree with in principle, needs more guardrails...otherwise it just becomes an auction.
NIL, which agree with in principle, needs more guardrails...otherwise it just becomes an auction.
I’m sure there are some, but I don’t know anyone that likes the NIL situation, including ex D-1 players
that are friends of mine.
When a school like Alabama, where getting NIL money is a walk in the park, gets criticized by Nick Sabin,
you really know there is something wrong.
that are friends of mine.
When a school like Alabama, where getting NIL money is a walk in the park, gets criticized by Nick Sabin,
you really know there is something wrong.
8legs1dream
Team Manager
The Ukrop's are a wonderful family and it is disappointing that Bobby is not as active with the University as he once was. With that said, they are insignificant compared to Queally relative to giving to the University. I also believe adding lacrosse was a great decision long term for the school. It is very impressive how successful the lacrosse program has been and it aligns well with the type of student interested in attending U of R. Very sorry about the soccer program. I never attended a soccer game while at U of R. Does anyone know how many spectators they used to get at games?
I have no problem with all college athletes being paid SO LONG AS THEY GO TO CLASS and make reasonable grades. Take away the scholarships and pay them what they can get. Year to year contracts.
Whatever happened to being "academically ineligible"?
Whatever happened to being "academically ineligible"?
I think the point is that we shouldn't have had to choose between Ukrop and Queally, regardless of donation level.
And I find the school's stated mission of becoming a nationally and internationally known, diverse institution to be antithetical to the current demographics of lacrosse, which is dominated by upper-class white people from the northeast. We already had that market well covered without lacrosse.
Rick, I wonder the same. Is the hoops player getting 400,000 per season at Miami being required to go to class? The kid who transferred from Duquesne to San Diego state, Chad Baker, was just ruled academically ineligible. First time I can recall that happening anywhere in along time. But with huge NIL payments have to wonder if the top earners care about grades.
Of course they don’t. The big NIL deals make professional athletes. The player gets paid to play their sport and I am sure the people paying the NIL deal want the athlete to train/practice and to not be bothered with any other distraction like class.
The transition is on to “played for” instead of “went to”. Of course, the use of “mercenaries” is not new. It is how football started when it was first played in the Ivy League.
This is such a bad take. Not worth debating just wish there was a dislike button as an alternative.
To be clear, I’m fine with BOTH soccer and lacrosse. I just think it was dumb to dump soccer in favor of lacrosse.
To play Devil’s advocate, we have a pretty darn good men’s lacrosse team while our soccer and track teams weren’t very successful when compared to all of the Division 1 programs. Men’s lacrosse is probably our most successful program right now. Is most of the anger coming from former runners and soccer players?
it takes a while, but lacrosse has grown so rapidly across the country.
I think with more high schools and colleges like UR starting programs and offering scholarships, diversity of the sport should follow. it's not like hockey which demands a huge annual investment at the youth level.
soccer declined w move to A10 same as baseball. They were pretty solid in the 90s early 20s w 3 ncaa trips over 12 years.
lack of sustained success can be pointed at many sports at different times including football & baseball.
I agree lacrosse should be here at UR & fits very well but still a surprise u don’t have soccer the most popular global sport & what also runs what 4th here in US & likely higher for participation.
hockey is expensive mainly due to renting all the ice time but lacrosse isn’t cheap. Even when u get to high school where my feeling is ppl think sports is basically free & covered by the school district it’s really not. I mean it costs a grand to play hs football. Not disputing your point but it’s all pay to play.
I am a biased former runner, current soccer enjoyer and not a lacrosse bro fan, but a part of this is strictly being a numbers game. I'm seeing 73 D1 lacrosse schools versus 205 D1 soccer schools and 338 D1 track programs, so you're standing out but in a smaller pool.
Track was actually huge in the 80s for us with a couple of Olympians and was cut after making NCAA's and getting 24th in XC in 2010 without scholarships, which is basically unheard of unless you count the Ivy's. You could argue Richmond was better at distance anyways, but having XC without track definitely set the program back a few years before they've rebounded recently. Always up there with team GPA as well. From what I know it was indeed a Title IX issue. Regardless, cutting a program in favor of another in order to follow the money I think is a bad look but I understand those not involved in running or soccer with Richmond may not care one way or the other.
Should also note that women's track at Richmond has been extremely successful recently, so it's not like it's an A10 issue.
when I ran, early 70's, we had 2 schollies and competed in some events, but not enough depth as a team. CARL WOOD was #3 in world in IM hurdles and #10 in Decathlon. Our 2 mile relay was #10 in country (all walk ons). still won a number of events at state and conference levels.
I don't know all the facts on this but I strongly suspect lacrosse has much more financial support from the school than did soccer. Including the fully allowed number of scholarships which soccer did not!
You’re right about less competition, but at the same time we do hold our own against the very best teams that are in the ACC. I think if we competed against them in track, soccer, football, basketball, etc. we would get our doors blown off. So it’s nice to have a program of that caliber to get behind.
There is no discussion ending reason why a school as wealthy as UR can not have men's soccer and track along with the additional women's sports perhaps volleyball and crew to meet Title IX criteria. Don't buy at all into the mindset that adding all those sports would increase the percentage of athletes to an unsustainable or disproportionate level.
Miss him on many levels. Plain out liked the man and his enthusiasm to get everyone running. Responsible for literally leading me to "love running" ...which has continued ever since although now my ambulation resembles moving forward more so than "running".
And if you haven't seen it this was Bill Jordan's tribute (Bill was an inspiration to runners as well).
https://mastersrankings.com/fred-t-hardy/
https://mastersrankings.com/fred-t-hardy/
safe bet that if we had soccer alumni donating as much as Queally, we'd have found a way to keep it.
