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USM leaving CUSA Early

Well that throws a huge wrinkle in the football schedule. Well, all sports but I'm more worried about football.

We only lose two opponents since we played USM last year. Unless some scheduling agreement can be made.
 
According to CUSA bylaws, they are not permitted to leave early. It'll be interesting to see what happens.
 
CUSA is going to have to hold the line with this one. It’s business. It’s simple.

You either negotiate out of a contract or pay a penalty for not holding your end of the deal.

better get Saul Goodman on the line.
 
Apparently CUSA has been negotiating but it hasn't gotten anywhere and they've unilaterally declared they're leaving, which they can't do...
Did you not read the well coordinated statements from the three leaving? C-USA has more or less ignored them (aside from telling them they expect all three to honor their commitment), which is consistent with what I had heard through the grapevine. Commissioner Judy is a complete joke and should have been fired long before this debacle happened. C-USA was in better position of strength than the Sun Belt and she got completely outplayed. She’s literally run this conference into the ground.

Lastly, they can do exactly what they’ve declared. There are no penalties in the leagues by-laws for leaving early. There has never been a worse commissioner in college sports and there is no recourse for them leaving early.
 
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If what you posted is true, she should be voted out immediately. Unreal. You know what. Scratch that… you are solid on this stuff. Par for the course.
Unfortunately not in this case.
 
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The same thing is what is going around Twitter. That the by-laws say the schools have to pay the exit fee no matter what.

The kicker is a 14 month notice is required, but there is NO penalty if they leave before that. Zero. Nada. I can't believe the contract was written that way. That is ALL on Judy for allowing that and not creating a tiered fee structure based on number of months under that 14.

Can't blame the schools at all. Cost the same to leave now, or later.
 
Thanks for the explanation on the lack of any penalties. How do the folks who begged that we stay in this outhouse of a conference feel now?
 
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Let me rephrase. Are you excited for games against Jacksonville State instead of Old Dominion? Might be sooner than later.


The sad thing, Jacksonville St already announced their schedule their 2022. So if CUSA tries to get them to move , they will be forced to buy out those games as I am sure all JSU opponents put protections in contract just in case.

CUSA knew this was coming and could have already announced a schedule with the 11 remaining teams. It makes me wonder if the 6 going to the AAC may jump early to. We may end up with a home and away against FIU, WKU, La Tech and UTEP for our 2022 conference schedule.
 
Let me rephrase. Are you excited for games against Jacksonville State instead of Old Dominion? Might be sooner than later.
Not really. But thanks to our incompetent leadership we don’t really have any choice. And in all honesty it doesn’t really matter if it’s this year or next year. Plus losing Marshall is a plus because we can’t beat them Huntington and we would have gone there this year.
 
The sad thing, Jacksonville St already announced their schedule their 2022. So if CUSA tries to get them to move , they will be forced to buy out those games as I am sure all JSU opponents put protections in contract just in case.

CUSA knew this was coming and could have already announced a schedule with the 11 remaining teams. It makes me wonder if the 6 going to the AAC may jump early to. We may end up with a home and away against FIU, WKU, La Tech and UTEP for our 2022 conference schedule.
I’m fairly confident that’s not going to happen. There’s no room at the inn with the AAC. Their departing teams aren’t leaving until next year.
 
Let me rephrase. Are you excited for games against Jacksonville State instead of Old Dominion? Might be sooner than later.
So, games against Kent St and Akron excite you? ODU, from a football perspective, have been deadweight. Southern Miss has the name recognition, but also have been deadweight since we joined. Marshall will be missed
 
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I still have not seen anything to disabuse me of the notion that M&M have hitched their wagon to the failed commish.

In the era of massive realignment especially focused on facilities and demonstrated willingness to invest in facilities, why did M&M wait until just after being passed over by realignment to make a public announcement of facilities? Why not a couple of months earlier or even a few weeks earlier?

Good on CNM for recent winning to at least briefly take my mind off the ongoing debacle of MT & C-USA leadership. I imagine Massaro appreciates it as well.
 
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I still have not seen anything to disabuse me of the notion that M&M have hitched their wagon to the failed commish.

In the era of massive realignment especially focused on facilities and demonstrated willingness to invest in facilities, why did M&M wait until just after being passed over by realignment to make a public announcement of facilities? Why not a couple of months earlier or even a few weeks earlier?

Good on CNM for recent winning to at least briefly take my mind off the ongoing debacle of MT & C-USA leadership. I imagine Massaro appreciates it as well.
It really is hard to fathom when the AAC specifically sited investment toward the future as a key factor. And you know you’re sitting on these plans and announcements and then wait until right after the other leagues make their choices to make your facility plans public. It makes absolutely no sense.

Unless our administration was so clueless that that schools in our conference were talking to other conferences. Hell it was public information that the Sun Belt commissioner was actively recruiting Marshall and USM. I just don’t understand it.

Making those facility announcements last fall may or may not have made a difference but it’s just mind blowing that we waited to do it right after. I’ve said before and I will again even if you had leadership trying to do so it would be hard to make as many bad decisions as have been made under McPhees direction.
 
It really is hard to fathom when the AAC specifically sited investment toward the future as a key factor. And you know you’re sitting on these plans and announcements and then wait until right after the other leagues make their choices to make your facility plans public. It makes absolutely no sense.

Unless our administration was so clueless that that schools in our conference were talking to other conferences. Hell it was public information that the Sun Belt commissioner was actively recruiting Marshall and USM. I just don’t understand it.

Making those facility announcements last fall may or may not have made a difference but it’s just mind blowing that we waited to do it right after. I’ve said before and I will again even if you had leadership trying to do so it would be hard to make as many bad decisions as have been made under McPhees direction.
They are clueless! No guessing.
 
It really is hard to fathom when the AAC specifically sited investment toward the future as a key factor. And you know you’re sitting on these plans and announcements and then wait until right after the other leagues make their choices to make your facility plans public. It makes absolutely no sense.

Unless our administration was so clueless that that schools in our conference were talking to other conferences. Hell it was public information that the Sun Belt commissioner was actively recruiting Marshall and USM. I just don’t understand it.

Making those facility announcements last fall may or may not have made a difference but it’s just mind blowing that we waited to do it right after. I’ve said before and I will again even if you had leadership trying to do so it would be hard to make as many bad decisions as have been made under McPhees direction.

this. Our facilities have been deficient since we started losing recruiting battles to Troy in 2006. Everyone around the program knew this too. Troys facilities were the #1 cited reason for recruits choosing them over us back in those days. Troy Athletics had a sweet heart movie company that poured money into their athletics and that gave them a distinct advantage over MT. And again, this was circa 2006 and possibly even earlier than that.

so we have 16 years of well known deficiencies with our facilities. And we wait until we are left in the dust to even make an announcement. It’s amazing these people are paid so well to be our administrators and “leaders”

they would have been fired long, long ago if this place had any accountability.
 
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That's one thing I don't fault Stock for at all. He's done a lot I haven't liked, but he has said for years that we needed facilities upgraded. CM and McPhee just didn't hear or chose not to care. Probably thinking it didn't matter "that much".
 
That's one thing I don't fault Stock for at all. He's done a lot I haven't liked, but he has said for years that we needed facilities upgraded. CM and McPhee just didn't hear or chose not to care. Probably thinking it didn't matter "that much".

Exactly. Our damn head coach has said this for years, going on DECADES, that we need new facilities.

So much so, he donated half a million dollars just to get the damn thing going, which he shouldn't have had to have done.

Such a F'd up situation.
 
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So with these teams leaving early Are they still apart of our schedule? If not who are we even going to play?
 
if we only lose 3 teams it should not be a problem for us. We just replace the 2 road games at Marshal and ODU with 2 other conference teams we were not set to play. May actual work in our favor because we could get another home game….. 2023 is going to be another story!
 
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I would expect that within 36 months you see us invited to the AAC and Western to the MAC with EKU. At that point, CUSA Is done. we just need to focus on facilities and winning as many games as possible.
 
With the change to CUSA 4.0 I’m excited to get to play LT and UTEP yearly. I think they are great names.
 
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I would expect that within 36 months you see us invited to the AAC and Western to the MAC with EKU. At that point, CUSA Is done. we just need to focus on facilities and winning as many games as possible.

I think the dominos could fall correctly for that.

There's a lot of smoke that the B12 wants 2-4 more when TX/OU leave. Memphis is at the top of that list.

The AAC then will look to backfill, and despite our blundering, we're still a Tennessee school and in theory keep AAC in Tennessee. If we're made the requisite upgrades to the program, there's at least a chance this could happen.
 
Did anyone else get the True Blue Give 2022 yesterday from the BRAA?

The new Director, DeLeon isn’t even mentioned in the piece. Just his new staff. Seems kinda odd.
To be fair, Lee’s “big reveal” was the #TrueBlue announcement in November.

That said, I do agree the entire new BRAA staff (Lee, Hans, Robert, etc) need to be front and center of everything right now
 
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That's one thing I don't fault Stock for at all. He's done a lot I haven't liked, but he has said for years that we needed facilities upgraded. CM and McPhee just didn't hear or chose not to care. Probably thinking it didn't matter "that much".
IMO, the failure to upgrade facilities sits squarely on McPhee.

Massaro knew facilities needed to be upgrade, but his hands were tied until McPhee realized Massaro was right.

McPhee is an “academic“ at heart. He knows what to do to advance MT academically / internally, but isn’t great with the “external“ functions (Fundraising, athletics, enrollment).
 
IMO, the failure to upgrade facilities sits squarely on McPhee.

Massaro knew facilities needed to be upgrade, but his hands were tied until McPhee realized Massaro was right.

McPhee is an “academic“ at heart. He knows what to do to advance MT academically / internally, but isn’t great with the “external“ functions (Fundraising, athletics, enrollment).

Which shows to me how bad of a leader he is. A good leader knows their shortcomings and surrounds themselves with people that are good at what he isn't. Leans on them and listens to them.

If even CM was pushing for it and McPhee still didn't see the reasoning, that makes McPhee look even worse in my book.
 
IMO, the failure to upgrade facilities sits squarely on McPhee.

Massaro knew facilities needed to be upgrade, but his hands were tied until McPhee realized Massaro was right.

McPhee is an “academic“ at heart. He knows what to do to advance MT academically / internally, but isn’t great with the “external“ functions (Fundraising, athletics, enrollment).
Yep. Stock's a symptom of the lack of ambition disease that is pervasive in the entire AD. I wouldn't hold any of the underlings blameless though.

Massaro doesn't act like a man stifled by his boss. He's been here almost 2 decades. The simple fact that he's still here doesn't speak of an ambitious man who wants greatness and is thwarted by his boss. More than likely, he's just a "yes" man enjoying the easiest gig in major college sports.

If Stock wanted facilities, he certainly could have had the most impact. At the end of the day, he's as responsible as any of them in presenting an entertainment product that separates people from their money. What would this fan base and the ensuing budget look like had we won 3 or 4 conference titles over the past 16 years, had some ranked teams, big wins and some big time NFL guys, and generally been a product that people get excited over and want to be a part of?

That said, I do think the door is cracked open a bit for further realignment and getting off the death row that the new CUSA is. Hoping against hope, but we need to start making some big moves here soon. Not just fancy drawings and "competing" our way to 6-6 again.
 
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