Upside

[professorjackson]

I'm not seeing much upside to Titan basketball anymore.
The embarrassment of the antics of the previous coach.
The humiliation of NCAA punishment for academic reasons.
The shame of constant losing.
The indignity of being in a crappy conference of no-name state schools (and not being able to win in it).
How does it help the university to spend millions of dollars on this program?
Is it time to eliminate athletics use the money for something else?

[JDetroitTitan]

When I read this comment I must of been on a bridge. Sounds like a troll.

[professorjackson]

Nahhh...not a troll...Titan fan since 1986, U of D graduate from 1991. The evidence causes me to have a pessimistic view of things right now. The football program was in much better shape when they dropped it in 1964. They were averaging over 11,000 fans per game, but losing $65,000 per year. We are certainly subsidizing the basketball program more than the equivalent of that in today's dollars, and for what? A few column inches very few days to the effect of "Detroit Mercy Titans lose again."

[JDetroitTitan]

Ok I see. I understand. My feeling is we have the right people in place but it will take time to turn this ship around. I don’t think people understand how far this program fell along with the conference at the same time. This band is another issue that will take a couple of years too correct if the NCAA doesn’t help us out.

I hope you will stick it out from a Titan fan and alumni to another.

[Rogobob77]

Nahhh...not a troll...Titan fan since 1986, U of D graduate from 1991. The evidence causes me to have a pessimistic view of things right now. The football program was in much better shape when they dropped it in 1964. They were averaging over 11,000 fans per game, but losing $65,000 per year. We are certainly subsidizing the basketball program more than the equivalent of that in today's dollars, and for what? A few column inches very few days to the effect of "Detroit Mercy Titans lose again."

I bet 250+ of the roughly 350 D1 basketball programs operate in the red, so we have plenty of company.

Why aren’t you on the bus to Notre Dame professor J? I have an extra ticket if you can make it to South Bend before tipoff.

[NC Titan]

Professor Jackson is far from being a troll. He’s been a board contributor for a long time.

That said, I disagree with what he says, if for no other reason than looking at the overall impact of athletics on the student body. If you go up and down the rosters for almost all the sports you will see that our athletes are in Finance, Five-Year MBA, Nursing, Biology, Engineering, Architecture. A good number of those men and women come to Detroit because they can get a great (and challenging) education and still play D1 sports.

I spoke with the father of one of the women on the basketball team. She had offers to go elsewhere but chose Detroit Mercy because it was one of the few D1 schools that would let her major in engineering and be on the basketball team. The men’s soccer coach told me that if he is recruiting a soccer player who wants to be an engineer he sells the kid on the engineering program, not the soccer program. And the UDM soccer team is in the top five in the country for GPA. Not “top 5 percent,” but top five. Ben Kendell, the track star who probably is the most successful UDM athlete in the past decade or more, earned an electrical engineering degree. The softball team, which went to the NCAAs last season, is peppered with nursing and bio students.

That’s why we can call our kids STUDENT-athletes. It's great for the students, it's great for the University.

[Resurget Cineribus]

I, too, understand the frustration. But the school is in much better shape financially than in a
long time. I don’t want them to give up on basketball because it’s the only team I’m a true
fan of win or lose. Yes, I would have expected a better second year from this coach, and the NCAA academic
violation is embarrassing, and yes it will be another tough year. But I’ve seen other programs, like
EMU basketball and football, come back when I thought they were done with D1 and should throw in the towel.
And I know of schools that have thrown in the towel only to regret it and come back. Like Jesuit schools Seattle
U and San Francisco U.

Look at how bad our professional teams are in Detroit. And their fan base is way off. But when
they win the fans will come back. As will Titan fans who have gone dormant.

[professorjackson]

Couldn't we just use the money we spend giving scholarships to student-athletes and salaries to coaches to give scholarships to students?

110-71 loss to Notre Dame, and 1-8.

What is achieved by the millions spent on this program that could not be achieved by walk-on players and a volunteer coaching staff?

[StJoeUofD]

On WSBT radio (NDs station in South Bend) the commentators said after the game that their walk-on was better than the Detroit guy guarding him. That stung!

[StJoeUofD]

Does anyone know what is the most amount of points ever allowed by U of D or Detroit Mercy in a men's basketball game?

[Rogobob77]

Does anyone know what is the most amount of points ever allowed by U of D or Detroit Mercy in a men's basketball game?

127, to Loyola in 1985.

Margin of defeat, we lost by 50 to Vanderbilt a few years back, 102-52.

[NC Titan]

On WSBT radio (NDs station in South Bend) the commentators said after the game that their walk-on was better than the Detroit guy guarding him. That stung!

On TV they referred to a "preferred walk-on," which is more than a walk-on. I don't know if he was the same player, I think he was a big man.

[UDDRUMMER]

I agree with JDetroitTitan, I think the basketball program has the right staff in place. The rebuilding of the program will take time, like I said before mid major teams like Gonzaga and Butler were not built over night. Butler dominated the HL for a long time before they moved to the Big East. It might be difficult to watch now, but it is part of the process.

[professorjackson]

Perhaps we should drop to DIII and join the MIAA. We could bring back football and still spend less money and be among mostly quality institutions of higher education.

[ptctitan]

Perhaps we should drop to DIII and join the MIAA. We could bring back football and still spend less money and be among mostly quality institutions of higher education.

Nope.

[Tacitus651]

I’m not sure if prof Jackson works in higher ed, but as someone who does I could easily see a new president at UDM starting the job someday and having a “what the hell is this?!” reaction when looking at the athletics budget. One thing Garibaldi has been good about is believing in the power of athletics (MBB specifically) to possibly elevate the reputation of the university and thus increase applicants. Of course, our enrollment has been going up the past years despite having a MBB program that arguably couldn’t be worse. I personally don’t feel athletics will increase apps until you get to the level of a Dayton or Gonzaga. And, unfortunately, I feel that’s virtually impossible for UDM because of the “Mercy” issue and branding nightmare. I think it was Rogo who recently posted the athletics branding standards for Duquesne. It’s sleek, clean, all REALLY well done and uniform and clear. The people that worked on that did A+ work. We have nothing like that and instead have official documents that ask the press to call us “Detroit Mercy” and within an inch of that direct people to read more at DetroitTitans.com. You can’t make this stuff up and if it were not us it’d be funny.

I do think Garibaldi’s biggest failure was not being able to convince the board to change back to UD. Gosh, it would have just solved so many problems. I’m not even saying that to criticize him anymore because I’m really just about done caring. Also, I don’t know what kind of fight he was up against in trying to make that change so I’ll just leave it be. I don’t think “Detroit Mercy” will ever be brandable (making up that word for lack of a better one) and I think our ceiling is probably winning a HL tourney every 10 years or so if we get the right coach, the right combination of players, and a little luck.

Will UDM offer D1 athletics in 10 years? 20? Honestly, I don’t know. One good benefit of the HL is that the travel costs are low because of proximity. It’s not like we are Chicago State in the WAC constantly flying to the west coast and hemorrhaging that kind of cash. Back to the profs point though, running even this relatively low cost D1 department does cost serious resources, especially when paying D1 coaches. I wouldn’t be shocked if we had another bad few years on the court and a new president and board decided to drop down a level or two in sports. Just my take, I don’t enjoy admitting that.

I’ve been a rather engaged fan since 2005. I watched the end of the Watson era hoping the team would rise again because there’s so much history, it’s fun to root for a mid major, and when you spend time living in Detroit it’s just plain awesome to see a Detroit team win. There’s something about the spirit of the city and it’s special when a Detroit team wins because we got the bad end of a lot of deals. That’s what made the McCallum era so much fun. I loved watching those teams, loved going to games, and really enjoyed the road games at places like Loyola and UIC. I’ll always be grateful to Ray for giving us that, and for the 2012 dance.

That’s plenty from me. Heck, I’d write more but I’m also finding myself uninterested in this team. I used to watch every game. Never missed a second. If it was a rare game that wasn’t televised then I’d listen over internet radio or follow on espn gamecast. I watched the first two games on tv this year and watched in person last night. Don’t really plan on watching more than a few more games this year. I’m just tired of the losing (blowouts), branding failures, bad recruiting, leading us on about fictional recruits from foreign lands that never show up.

[JDetroitTitan]

I am more disappointed with Jonathan B. LeCrone running this conference slowly into the ground. Maybe the Horizon League needs to bring in someone new. Look at this tread:

Year (Conference RPI ranking (1-32))
2018-2019 ( 22)
2017-2018 ( 26 )
2016-2017 (18)
2015-2016 (18)
2014-2015 ( 17)
2013-2014 ( 14)
2012-2013 (12)
2011-2012 (13)
2010-2011 (12)
2009-2010 ( 12)
2008-2009 (13)
2007-2008 (11)
2006-2007 (12)
2005-2006 (15)
2004-2005 (19)
2003-2004 (11)
2002-2003 (13)
2001-2002 (16)
2000-2001 (11)
1999-2000 (25)
1998-1999 (16)
1997-1998 (10)

We did have some off year's like 2005 (19), 2000(25) but we also followed it up with a better year {2001 (11), 2006(15), 2005(11)} as a conference. Looking from 1998 to 2014 are conference didn't fall under 15th two years in a row beside 1999(16) and 2000(25).

People complain about the product on the court and how we get blown out against real opponents. People wanted to jump ship after a hard start. Most of the teams are in the top 10 or even the top 5 conferences we are playing. This is going to be a process to move up as a team and we are not going to get any help from this conference. You want better recruits, this is how we are going to get them. We will be the option/team that plays a tough nonconference schedule to get exposer for the player that got over looked or want more playing time in(but doesn't want to sacrifice playing lesser opponent). At first it is going to be are hard pill to swallow but in time we will see improvement.

"Easy times create weak men, hard times create strong men"

[ptctitan]

+1 JDetroitTitan. LeCrone's so old, he was running the HL when the Dead Sea was still alive.

Also, if you want better players, you have to make your facilities and services competitive with those that will seen by the better players when they visit the better mid-major programs. The university will spend part of its $100 million capital campaign funds on these projects; but it also takes new donations from fans and alumni to help upgrade the stuff that we don't see on a daily basis ... that is, if you want a better program that survives the personality of any coach.

I want a better program. It takes time to build one.

[professorjackson]

I appreciate the thoughtful comments here from people who recognize I'm not a troll.
I do work in higher ed, as a professor at BGSU, where we waste millions on football.
There are great universities without DI athletics, and there are great universities with DI athletics.
For a university that's as under-resourced as BGSU it's worth considering whether the money spent losing basketball games couldn't be better spent on scholarships to attract more students.
This is both theoretical for me. I love U of D. I used to love going to basketball games, but making the tournament every 20 years in this rotten league just isn't that interesting. However, I do like the camaraderie I enjoy with lots of my friends when I come to Calihan. I've even thought that dropping football was a mistake, so I can be all over the place on these issues.

[professorjackson]

I meant as under-resourced as U of D