Iowa vs Iowa state - Men's Basketball Potential

[cycloneworld]

Originally Posted by CyCy

Additionally Iowa still has a big advantage in spending. Their mens basketball income was $10.8M and spending was $4.6M. Our income was $5.0M and spending was $3.0M, That gives them more money to spend on scouting, recruiting, salaries, travel, facilities. Thankfully Alford has evidently not spent that money wisely.

If that's true then WOW. How does Iowa have double our income with roughly the same attendance?

[CyCy]

A few of the differences in Iowa-ISU basketball income.
Iowa ticket sales $4.0M, ISU $2,4M. I think Iowa's net ticket price is larger because they allot less student tickets and don't have the $99 season ticket special.
Conference Distributions, Iowa $5.1M, ISU $2.4M. Lot better Big 10 TV packages, etc due to much bigger population base.
Sports camps $250,000 higher at Iowa.
Media rights, concessions, advertising $750,000 higher at Iowa.

[bleedcardinalandgold]

Your mom goes to college...at EIU.

[darts180]

Originally Posted by CyCy

Couple of points.
I agree that the Big 12 is certainaly the equal of the Big 10 in the past few years, but I'm not sure the average 17 year old high school athlete knows that. The Big 10 is has a lot of national exposure, and has had their share of highly ranked teams in the past, so I'm not sure that the conference comparisons actually gives us any recruiting advantage.
Additionally Iowa still has a big advantage in spending. Their mens basketball income was $10.8M and spending was $4.6M. Our income was $5.0M and spending was $3.0M, That gives them more money to spend on scouting, recruiting, salaries, travel, facilities. Thankfully Alford has evidently not spent that money wisely.

Excellent points, and very true. Where Iowa State can "catch up" is with the casual fan. The ones who have bought the media explanation that it is truly (and only) a "Hawkeye" state.

This is an opportune time to make strides due to the fact that all of Iowa's programs are struggling right now. People aren't happy with 2-6 in the conference, people know how bad the Big 10 was in basketball this year, and that is the only way Iowa finished with the record they did.

I think what Iowa State has to do is have players on each team that people can relate to. It should have been Meyer and Blythe (Iowa boys), but it never was about the players. It can be Wesley Johnson (great story), but give Iowans someone to relate to. I equate it to when Johnny first got it going, and had the most popular team in the state at that time. Here was Johnny, Mr. Homespun, much like McDermott, and he had the ultimate guy to sell in Jeff Hornacek. It was also at a time when Iowa had George Raveling, who while more popular than Alford, was certainly not loved by the Hawkeye fans.

It is there for the taking, it took people like Andre Tippett to make Hawkeye football popular, and Ronnie Lester to make Hawk basketball popular. We need to showcase our guys. It takes winning every year, but in a state like Iowa, you have to have the Hoiberg's, Hornacek's. It is also important for the coaches to be honest and realistic, read candid, as well.

[cardinal&gold]

<rant>

If the Big 12 is really better than the Big 10, then why does the Big 10 get 6 teams in the NCAA tournament to our 4, get much better national exposure, and has the complete and undying love of the media (especially ESPN)? We might all be able to detect the Big 10 for what it really is, but how much of that is because of our Big 12 bias? And how can anyone else in the country comparing the two conferences make an objective decision if there is so much Big 10 hype?

The Big 12 will not get respect in any major sport until the North gets strong again. For example, in football, we need Nebraska and Kansas State to get good again, even though we all hate them, and in basketball we need teams like Kansas to continue to do well, and hope that others like Missouri and Kansas State can continue to improve. The South gets all accolades, and they deserve them, but people will continue to diss the Big 12 until it becomes a more complete, balanced conference. top-to-bottom, north-to-south. Is that possible? Maybe.

I also agree with others on here--WHY must Iowa ALWAYS be a part of the conversation? Do we just tell ourselves that we doing so much better than them because they continue to beat us where it counts (i.e., on the scoreboard)? We need to stop comparing ourselves to Iowa because we should aspiring for more. I would personally rather want to be compared to a school like, say, Texas or Florida. I understand that they are our regional rivals, and that's fine, but we cannot outlive "little brother" syndrome as long as we keep making the types of comparisons that we do in this entire thread.

Whew. Sorry.

</rant>