gbgreenie wrote: ↑Mon Oct 11, 2021 12:26 pm
Facilities are not the problem, the fanbase is!!!
https://athleticdirectoru.com/articles/ ... ecruiting/
Athletes have mentioned the importance of the coaching staff, the university’s academic offerings, and surrounding environment (such as urban or rural campus) as important factors when choosing a school. Student-athletes also place a similar importance on facilities as non-athlete college students; this doesn’t provide much distinction on whether facilities can sway student-athletes, but may hint at its overemphasis in the recruitment process.
While a large number of athletic programs have been building or completing facilities projects, our study found little to no impact from new athletic facilities on the recruitment of potential football or men’s basketball recruits. The direct impact football projects represented the largest amount of facility projects during the time period of the study, yet their returns in recruiting were mostly non-significant. There were no recruiting improvements for direct football projects during the year before facility completion, nor the first and second year after the facility was completed. Only in the year right before a project was completed was there a marginally significant effect which showed that team recruiting rankings slightly improved before a facility project was completed.
Agreed. While some will really push the facilities angle, the fact of the matter is that Tulane is recruiting the best it has in the tracking era and that level is similar to the level of all of the top tier G5 programs. If that is the case, which it is, it's difficult to seriously argue that facilities are what is holding Tulane back and that a simple expenditure of x dollars for y facilities would somehow meaningfully improve Tulane's recruiting.
That begs the question: if recruiting isn't the issue, then what's the problem? The answer to that is extremely complex and a combination of factors work against Tulane that are relatively unique at the division 1A level, so, in order for Tulane to overcome those factors, it would have to produce the solution itself because there are no blueprints to follow from other programs that experienced similar factors simultaneously.
Factors include, but are not limited to:
1. Small enrollment for division 1A
2. Minimal in-state enrollment
3. Minimal post-graduation retainment of graduates in-state
4. High tuition
5. Not within a reasonable driving distance from a top 10-20 metropolitan area
6. Private school (
7. Minimal endowment for a major private division 1A school (i.e. smaller than TCU/Baylor/SMU)
8. Lack of a major religious affiliation (i.e. think Notre Dame)
The above results in Tulane undergraduate student body not being familiar with Tulane athletics growing up and no vested interest in either Tulane or Tulane athletics after they graduate (as evidenced by the geographic diversity in both recruiting and post graduation along with Tulane's small endowment). Tulane does not have an easy pathway to fix that issue, but fixing it would go a long way to improving both the athletics program and the university overall.