Ask the AD - September edition
09/27/2014 | 12:00:00 | General
E-Mail a question to Mario Moccia
Who asks the questions during Coach Lennon's press conferences that are transcribed on the website? Some of them show a remarkable lack of football knowledge.
The questions are asked by media members who cover our football program and are assigned to cover the press conference. This includes the local newspaper, radio and television reporters, plus student media.
In a previous column, you discussed the potential of adding men's or women's soccer to the athletic department. With statistics showing that more youth play soccer than any other sport, is this possibility still under consideration?
To remain in compliance with Title IX, we would only look at adding a women's soccer program, and there are pros and cons that must be considered. On the plus side, seven schools in the MVC offer varsity women's soccer, so there is a ready-made conference to join, and we have a finished field and locker room that could accommodate a team. The sport would also bring 30 women to campus and help increase enrollment. Finances, however, remain the biggest stumbling block to adding women's soccer. Annual expenses for the sport would run approximately $500,000 to cover scholarships, salaries, equipment, travel, etc. We would also have to purchase a scoreboard and build a press box.
I know that technical difficulties happen, but two-straight games without a working scoreboard? Is this being addressed?
We began experiencing problems with the auxiliary board in mid-August and have been working with our provider TS Sports, a nationally renowned scoreboard company with clients at all levels of college and professional sports. The board has been "repaired" several times, only to fail again. We thought it was fixed for the SEMO game, but it went down 100 minutes before kickoff. We are HIGHLY frustrated with the situation. A TS Sports technician was on site this week working on the problem and is confident that he's identified and corrected several electrical issues that have been plaguing the board. Andy Pettit, our Associate AD for Facilities and Game Operations, continues to coordinate with TS Sports and our campus electricians, and this is one of his top priorities.
How does the football team decide which color combination to wear to a specific game? I like the maroon jerseys with white pants, but that combination has not been worn yet this year.
What jerseys we wear are partly based on NCAA rules. The NCAA rule book says that the home team shall wear a dark-colored jersey, meaning we can choose between maroon or black jerseys at home. The opposite is true at road games -- the visitors must wear the light/white-colored jerseys, unless a change is mutually agreed upon between the schools before the start of the season. When deciding the color of the pants, Coach Lennon lets the team captains pick that color each week. Obviously, with us wearing all white on the natural grass surface at Purdue, it was not the choice of the equipment manager!
