SDSU athletics: A no win situation?

As spring football practice concludes this weekend at San Diego State, the old football vs. academics debate has resurfaced.

Specifically, the academics are wondering why SDSU President Stephen Weber gives so much discretionary funding to football as cutbacks in the classroom continue.

Here were some of the arguments in last Sunday’s San Diego Union-Tribune:

Former SDSU football player and long-time actor Fred Dryer: “The benefits of a successful football program are overwhelming. Such a program breeds pride and participation from the community, students and alumni.”

English Professor Peter C. Herman: “SDSU is subsidizing 42 percent of the athletics budget, about double the average for the NCAA's top-tier programs. Every academic department at SDSU must meet its budget, or face consequences. Why not football?”

Let’s take a look at the success rate of academics vs. athletics:

Academics –
For two years in a row, SDSU has been ranked the No. 1 most productive research university, among schools with 14 or fewer Ph.D. programs.
SDSU ranks No. 2 among universities of its type nationwide and No. 1 in California, for students studying abroad as part of their college experience.
Since 2000, SDSU faculty and staff have attracted more than $1 billion in grants and contracts for research and program administration.

Athletics –
The Aztecs have not had a winning football season since 1998.
The men’s basketball team has never won an NCAA Tournament Division I playoff game.
SDSU has not made the NCAA Tournament field since 1991
The alumni center now under construction will be two stories high, or half the size of the original plan; reportedly due to lack of funding.

What’s more important at SDSU; academics or athletics? You make the call.

Television deal will kill SDSU recruiting

Let’s say you are a top high school prospect and want to play college sports where you can get a lot of television exposure.

If so, then you can forget about attending San Diego State.

The television deal that the Mountain West Conference has is eventually going to destroy some teams – and SDSU could be at the top of the list.

The conference has a ridiculous deal whereby most of its teams have conference games televised on a network called themtn.

Only 1.2 million people nationwide get the channel. The number is extremely low in San Diego because you must have Cox Communications digital cable to watch themtn.

Whenever SDSU football or basketball games are televised on themtn., there probably aren’t 1,000 local households watching … or able to watch.

Sadly, any top recruit who wants his or her friends and relatives see them play on TV will want to go to a school where people actually get the channel which televises their games.

This certainly works if you are on networks such as ESPN, CBS, NBC or Fox.

Too bad San Diegans can’t even watch their own team play. In the long run, this will kill recruiting … and possibly the already downtrodden SDSU athletic program.