FB: American Southwest Conference

[Ron Boerger]

Many of you have seen this website. Sometimes the numbers look suspect. Example: Lamar University Enrollment. But checking other institutions, it seems close. Admittedly, I have not checked enrollment at all schools.

If you sort on Conference and select either Southland or Lonestar (or both), then click next you will see full member schools in that conference as well as "enrollment" figures.

Equity in Athletics Data

I wonder how they came up with their conference alignments.  Some schools are shown in multiple conferences so it looks like if you are an affiliate for a sport you show up in both.  Clark Atlanta shows in the SAA (for 2022 anyway) for some reason.  And UMHB shows 70 football athletes in 2022; other years are around 200 as you would expect. 

[CNU85]

Good Points Ron,

Sometimes when I see some of my search results, I have to dig a little further to help me interpret things. I also noticed that when you select Capital Athletic Conference, Mary Washington does not show up - Only CNU and Salisbury.

So it's not a perfect system, but I do find it a useful starting point.

Years back I was able to compare the expenses of University of Texas Football to the overall budget for CNU athletics. HAHAHA!

[Pat Coleman]

Many of you have seen this website. Sometimes the numbers look suspect. Example: Lamar University Enrollment. But checking other institutions, it seems close. Admittedly, I have not checked enrollment at all schools.

If you sort on Conference and select either Southland or Lonestar (or both), then click next you will see full member schools in that conference as well as "enrollment" figures.

Equity in Athletics Data

Someone has to file this report and sign it -- that makes it legit in my book. In a quick dive into Lamar's info, I found a dashboard that lines up pretty well with the DOE numbers.

https://www.lamar.edu/about-lu/dashboards/interactive-enrollment-dashboard.html

The DOE numbers are full-time undergraduates, which is why I prefer those numbers and use them on the site. Once you add in grad students, part-timers, etc., the numbers can vary widely as to what each school publishes. So when Lamar crows about having 17,500 students, only 7,000 of them are undergrads, and who knows how many of those are full time?

[CNU85]

Thanks Pat! I figured there were reasonable explanations for the anomalies. Sometimes I find them when I do some more digging. Sometimes I just get more confused! 

[Ron Boerger]

Good Points Ron,

Sometimes when I see some of my search results, I have to dig a little further to help me interpret things. I also noticed that when you select Capital Athletic Conference, Mary Washington does not show up - Only CNU and Salisbury.

So it's not a perfect system, but I do find it a useful starting point.

Years back I was able to compare the expenses of University of Texas Football to the overall budget for CNU athletics. HAHAHA!

LOL, the buyout UTexas is going to have to send Texas A&M for hiring away their baseball coach ($2.7M) by itself outdoes some schools' annual outlay. 

[Hawks88]

Good Points Ron,

Sometimes when I see some of my search results, I have to dig a little further to help me interpret things. I also noticed that when you select Capital Athletic Conference, Mary Washington does not show up - Only CNU and Salisbury.

So it's not a perfect system, but I do find it a useful starting point.



Years back I was able to compare the expenses of University of Texas Football to the overall budget for CNU athletics. HAHAHA!

Reminds me of several weeks ago when Auburn announced the new $25mil video board for the north end of Jordan-Hare Stadium. Huntingdon's new president tweeted how that was more than HC's entire budget.

[TheChucker]

According to the EIA data, Southland FCS undergrad enrollment is smaller than I thought. A median of 4,470.

The privates only:
Incarnate Word 3,940
Houston Christian 2,152
plus Abilene Christian 3,055

Incarnate and Abilene hold their own, but Houston is a bottom feeder.

UMHB listed at 2,822

Median undergrad enrollment for FCS private universities is 3,836 including the Ivy, 3,141 excluding the Ivy. Again, smaller than I thought.

In the end, the current mess at the top of D1 makes a move to any D1 seem risky.

[Crubacker]

Kinda quiet lately!


Pat----------when does the Preseason TOP 25 usually come out?

[Ron Boerger]

Last year's preseason poll was released around the end of July.  YMMV.

[Pat Coleman]

On Monday of this week we sent out a request to 40-some schools to get preseason information from them to share with our voters. Our deadline for that is next Monday, end of day. Often schools do not hit this deadline so we have to send out a second round of requests.

With any luck, I can get the info to our voters by the end of this week, give them until Monday or so to vote, and midweek next week release a poll. That would be pretty good for us, frankly!

[Crubacker]

Awesome!  Just excited for some football. 

[CruFrenzy]

Another Cru Football starter has hit the portal and transferred. This time it's freshman All-American center Elijah Mankins to ETBU, a month before fall camp...

Here is a list of starters that have left the program since the spring of 2023:

Josh Patteson - DT
Cam Mitton - Safety
Khyren Deal - Safety
Raul Tandoh - Left Tackle
Connor Mullins - Tight End

Treshawn Adams - Corner back
Keneth Cormier Jr - RB
Elijah Mankins - Center
Myles Terry - DE

That is 9 starters in over the last season of football. I also may have missed a few because we have started removing players from the roster after they leave in some cases.

I think it's important to share this information. We are used to having almost all if not all our eligible starters back from year to year, so this trend is a bit alarming to say the least.

Doesn't mean we can't win but it's concerning that Harmon and staff aren't retaining their top talent.

[BSCpanthers]

Have to wonder how much of that has to do with the conference situation.  Guys don't want to go to college to play prep teams and 4 schools twice.  The ASC 4 really need to figure out their football schedule for the '25 season now so they aren't stuck with the same terrible schedule. 

[Ron Boerger]

Mitton stepped away from football altogether according to TrueToTheCru.com.  How many of the others actually are playing elsewhere?  Could not find anything on Patteson, Deal, Tandoh, Cormier; Mullins and Adams went D1 (SFA); Terry went D1 (North Dakota); Makins is the only one I can find still playing at the D3 level.  Hard to blame anyone taking their talents to D1 if they have the opportunity.

The NIL era and open transferability have changed the landscape so dramatically.  But for every successful transfer you see more enter the portal, never to emerge again. 

[Mavchamp]

TBH....at this point...I'm hoping ETBU is no longer in the ASC for the 2025 season.  Leadership has completely failed.

I'd be thrilled with the Sooner conference at this point.  The schedule would be more appealing.  Maybe something in D3 will come long later in the future.....or maybe a stepping stone to D2. 

Hard to imagine the ASC administrative office recovering from nearly a year and a half of complete silence.

Looking like it's going to be every man for himself after 2025....or sooner.