Not another one

[Jim Johnson]

bye bye erikson

a great coach will recruit and get his team to win

poor facilities is an excuse

uf ,fsu and ftu/ou/oc don't play in yankee stadium

Have you seen FSU's stadium??  I have been to minor league ball parks that are smaller and not as nice.  To be sure, it's not Camden Yards or the BOB... but it has to be among the best baseball facilities in the nation.

in football we had no facilities

Right.  See also Raymond James Stadium.

usf fans love to have plenty of excuses for their  teams failures

Hello kettle, this is pot. You're black.

the coaches need to recruit better talent  and coach that talent

it is that simple

Thus spoke the guru.  So the question becomes, why are you in LA??  If you're a good enough lawyer, why not be a lawyer in Bismark, North Dakota??

Could it be that location (or rather the level of facilities) does have something to do with where talented people go??

To be sure, as some have noted, better facilities are not the panacea... there are many other factors... playing time... proximity to home... the coaching staff, both their reputation and their personalities... other players on the team... the quality of the opposition... etc.

But the facilities have an impact because they are part of the "first impression" players have...

[fscmoc]

Using facilities as an excuse is really getting very old.

Florida Southern College in Lakeland has NEVER had their own baseball facility. The locker room is THE SAME as it was in 1966-no improvements.

The players have to take a bus to every game at Henley Field approximately 5-6 miles each way. They practice on an open field that

the school plays intramurals on. Yes Henley's playing surface is nice-so

is USF"S. The stadium is the same one that Babe Ruth, Al Kaline, Mickey Mantle played in years ago. The only improvement is they brought in some seats that SEA WORLD got rid of a few years ago.

They now have 9 National Championships in Division II!!! Just beat

UNF this month(BTW has a great facility)

They won their first World Series in 1971 and had to get donations from

local business for expenses to Springfield, Mo.

Hal Smeltzley, Joe Arnold, Chuck Anderson, Pete Myers never used facilities as an excuse and all have World Series rings.

Enough already!

[Sitting_BULL]

Then again....the football team did start losing when we moved into the new building.....hmmm......

NO!!!!!  The football team started loosing when it started playing against REAL 1-A TEAMS!!!

Something the base and softbulls have been doing all along!

[bulls96go]

All I know is that if he does go, our girls softball program will go to pot! Nobody will want to come here to play, and all the top prospects will go somewhere else. It would be devistating to say the least!   Reaper

the facility problem is temporary now that a plan is in place so if he leaves some new coach will be soon moving into some nice digs

[Big_Hairy_Bull]

NO!!!!!  The football team started loosing when it started playing against REAL 1-A TEAMS!!!

Something the base and softbulls have been doing all along!

Dude, you really think the baseball team loses when it plays REAL 1-A teams?  It is actually the opposite. They usually play well or beat the REAL teams and lose to the par or sub-par teams.

They swept Fl this year who is in the College World Series and had 3 one run games with the #1 team in the country!

Anyways, you can't compare a Div. II school's winning to a Div 1 school. Totally different scenario!

[Guest S.  Bien]

>> AD Woolard has given permission to talk with Eriksen

WHY?????

It's actually a common courtesy thing among NCAA faithful, and AD's.  Quite obvious these schools could simply call Ericksen on the side, and steal him away if they wanted to.  Because they asked doesn't really mean much.   Woolard really has no legal recourse to prevent them from talking, and they asked as a common courtesy to USF, NCAA, and Woolard (the NCAA has asked that programs contacting another program's coach contact the respective school's AD to notify- it isn't an NCAA violation but it is frowned upon if proper notification isn't provided).  However, the fact ASU, and UF have asked him is actually a benefit to Woolard.  It allows him to prepare for either an impending coaching departure, or an impending contract re-negotiation.

Some schools don't take the upfront approach- Auburn sneaking up to UL to steal Petrino away, Bama talking to Leavitt, UT stealing Mack Brown from UNC.  They asked, and Woolard can't say no, he doesn't have the right, he was just asked as a courtesy gesture.

[fscmoc]

"Anyways, you can't compare a Div. II school's winning to a Div 1 school. Totally different scenario!" ???

Respectfully, I don't see how you CANNOT compare the two. Why does Florida Southern continue year after year

to produce top 10 teams-same for UNF,Tampa,Rollins?

They don't always get the top players-actually rarely do.

They do it with good coaching. D1 schools will not play them. They can't afford a loss to a DII school and believe it-it has happened.

[smazza]

just an excuse

jimsigusf- you are another usf apologist

usf will need them when we have our worst football season this year

[MikeG]

Our coaches are not indentured servants. "Letting them" talk to other schools is par for the course. Whether Ken leaves or not is the main question. In light of plans to upgrade facilities, including the ones his team would use-- I see it as a toss up.

People often look past WHERE we are located over the name of some school. The quality of life in G'ville is fine. But it is not Tampa -- and if it were me, that would matter more so than the "prestige" associated with ASU or UF, regardless of the facilities.

Obviously, KE could probably coach anywhere he wanted to in the entire country. He IS a national and Olympic team coach afterall. He picked USF. I'm hoping that still means something to him.

As for facilities, Rome was not built in one day. Smazza, you need to stop being so **** negative all the time. You act like every step of the way "there goes USF screwing up again". It's one thing to have an opinion and quite another to simply put a negative spin on anything you can twist around.

[Apis Bull]

A school needs to have the entire package.  Good coaching, nice facilities, nice location, academic programs, tradition, good conference affiliation, and strong fan support are all pieces of the puzzle.  We should strive to improve in all of these areas.  Improvement in any can only help.

Good coaching - yes in some ares, no in others

Nice facilities - already discussed ad nauseum

Nice location - check

Academic programs - check

Tradition - long way to go there, but you can't just create tradition

Conference affiliation - check

Fan support - mediocre at best