Why Am I Not Surprised?

[timlan2057]

One of the "In The News" articles headlined on Tulane New Wave is this bullshit piece in the Washington Post.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 02218.html

The article calls for quixotic NCAA "reforms" such as lowering the amounts of scholarships ...
AND capping coaches' salaries.

What I am NOT surprised at, is the article quotes our own Scott Cowen, getting on board the "reform" train.

The obtuse author is totally unaware that in most cases, athletics drives and contributes moolah to academics. LSU would be in much worse shape academically if the football program was not partially funding academics. Sure, there is corruption (a la Scam Newton and his father) that needs to be cleaned up, but blame the NCAA for that.

More wishful thinking from Scott, that everybody is going to start doing it the "Tulane Way."

Give it up, Scott. That ship sailed long ago.

Better academic institutions than Tulane spurn the "Tulane Way."

I wish Scott wouldn't allow himself to be quote fodder for nonsense articles, but ... I'm not surprised.

[gbgreenie]

This article proves Cowen must go. With his comments it proves he won't spend the money to win in Division 1. He sounds like he is going to continue penny pinching Tulanes Athletic Budget and keep retrictions on the players and recruiting until the program dies.

[JTLiuzza]

He never met a microphone or camera he didn't like.

Where does he get off spouting off like some sort of expert? First of all, Tulane or any other school is not immune to it's athletes doing shady things, even worse (Ray Boudreaux anyone?).

Second, if the author wanted to quote an expert on the subject, wouldn't it be better to select the president of a university that not only educates it's athletes, and whose athletic programs are free of scandal, but one that actually puts winning programs on the field, representing their institutions in a favorable light thereby being a giant asset to the school?

There are plenty schools that fit the bill. Tulane isn't one of them by a long shot.

The trouble is if she would have asked one of those university presidents, she probably wouldn't have gotten the "look at how bad they all are, I'm not abdicating my responsibility but they are" self-serving bullsh!t that you get out of Cowen.

The presidents of the TCU's and Ga Tech's of the world might have had an entirely different take, one that wouldn't have fit so nicely with the tone of her article.

[sader24]

He just doesn't get it and never will. I went to LSU from 2001-2005 right when LSU football blew up. LSU applications went through the roof because everyone wanted to be in Baton Rouge for football season. What did that do? It increased the quantity of people applying which alllowed LSU to not only increase enrollment but also increase the ACT score and GPA for the kids they admitted. This of course increased the academic standing of the University. Not only that but construction and development and new businesses exploded (before Katrina) from Campus south through Baton Rouge. This was all pretty directly related to LSU football. What it took to get into LSU in 2000 and what it took in 2006 were extremely different. Why are so many schools that are better than Tulane academically able to compete at a high level athletically? If I remember correctly in 1998-99 after we went 12-0 our applications increased noticeably as well. This guy is living in a dream world.

[JTLiuzza]

If I remember correctly in 1998-99 after we went 12-0 our applications increased noticeably as well. This guy is living in a dream world.

Yes they did. I can remember a spot on the news about the season and how it energized not only the Tulane community but the community in general. They actually talked to the director of admissions who had a smile from ear to ear talking about the spike in applications.

[RWR]

Actually the idea of 70 scholarships is dead on. Not so much from the cost perspective but from the standpoint of parity. There should also be a hard cap of 18 signees a year. Currently 85 scholarships leaves you 3 short of having a 4th stringer at every position. That's ridiculous. 70 gives you a 3rd stringer at every position and 4 special teamers,pk,p,ls,returner. Of course the idiots will scream that you wouldn't have enough for spring practice but that's BS. You would have about 50 players before you include walk-ons. However, the idea that has never put out there is that those seniors who are still on scholarship and in school would participate in spring practice. Just this season Toledo went on about the seniors wanting to leave something for the team to build on. Well this would help the team continue to build. It also allows them to justify their scholarship for that last semester.

[NOLABigSteve]

Interesting idea... having the graduating seniors play scout team for spring practice of their last semester as part of their scholarship obligation. Pretty sure it'll never happen, but hmmm.