• Hi Guest, want to participate in the discussions, keep track of read/unread posts access private forums and more? Create your free account and increase the benefits of your eGriz.com experience today!

Alabama-Birmingham shutting down football

MrTitleist

MrTitleist

Moderator
Staff member
Interesting development coming out of Alabama with UAB shutting down football. The president fired the AD and is meeting with the football coach tomorrow to let him know the football program is gone. First major program since Pacific in 1995 that a school has shut down football. A lot of people close to UAB say that Tide members of the Alabama BOR are the reason UAB football is gone, interesting stuff.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2014/11/30/uab-to-shut-down-football-program/19702899/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

With that said, there is a hole in CUSA which means there's some FCS programs that have been very clear in wanting to move up may get the opportunity.. apparently candidates that could replace them are Liberty, James Madison, then some recently former FCS schools like Texas State or South Alabama.
http://hamptonroads.com/2014/11/demise-uab-football-blow-conference-usa-and-thus-blow-old-dominion" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I guess the big question is, with the divide between the haves and have-nots, will we see more programs shut down football as they are hemorrhaging money? Or will this be a one-off because Alabama-Tuscaloosa wanted to dump more money into their already very wealthy program.
 
I do. I think more will survive than probably should, but given the red that some of these programs are running I don't see how they can continue.
 
XM channel 91, the Tim Brando show focused on this story all last week. Timmy B, called BS on the whole deal because of Bear Bryant's son trying to kill the UAB program over his dad's hard on against UAB with recruiting battles back in the day.
 
If they do shut down football, I would expect them to add some other men's sport (if they have to) to remain Division I. They have been very successful in basketball (men's), so I don't imagine they would want to give that up.

Their sports program is kinda weird. They carry six men sports, and eleven women's teams. I suppose that's to meet the Federal blackmail about numbers of male and female bodies. If they drop football, they could also cut back on some of those non-revenue sports and still have enough to stay D-I. The easy call would be to add a men's track team -- which they do not have right now.
 
MrTitleist said:
It's not if, it's done. CUSA is probably giving them the boot pretty soon too.
Click to expand...
There certainly are quite a few people who think it's a done deal -- both about dropping football, and getting dumped by C-USA.

And it's been several years since UAB basketball has been a power, when they won the C-USA championship. They've been just middle-of-the-pack in recent years, so that sport might not be enough to salvage the rest.
 
The flat earth status quo crowd was probably salivating - vainly - in the failed hope that Alabama Birmingham was an uppity FCS program that had gotten too big for its ambitions and been taken down a peg... Sorry :cry:
 
Fact, most college football programs are money losers.
Fact, most universities are not exactly rolling in cash.
Fact, football is an easy target for the haters...
...see multitude of press reports on sexual & domestic violence, concussions, etc...

Result is more colleges will drop the sport over the next few years. Of course not Alabama, or even Montana, but it will happen. The small private schools are probably high on the list, along with mid-tier public schools in states with large budget problems (such as Michigan, Illinois, California...).

Everyone loves a winner but the perpetually inept programs will become increasingly easy targets. As dollars become tighter will the Univ of Michigan or Michigan State do without something so that E. Michigan football can survive? Same with UCLA or Cal Berkley and say a San Jose State. I think this is inevitable but it will take several years (or decades) to see.
 
I think the requirement to carry x amount of sports is kind of ridiculous.. having to fund a ton of sports for the sake of Title IX to remain Div1 or whatever is a money loser.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Back
Top