Fridays are for mail. This week we tackle some looks at the future. The future of: Gampel, Geno and the AAC. Get some!
Remember: If your question wasn’t answered, or you’re just hearing about this and want to get in on the fun, you can submit your questions here or on Twitter.
Sean asks: With both Gampel and especially XL showing their age, what’s your long term solution for UConn’s home court(s)?
My personal solution? A new, on-campus arena that seats 15,000 and serves booze where UConn plays all its basketball and hockey games. Students sitting along the side of every game, being insane and loud and awesome. An arena of that nature would almost certainly cost in excess of $100M, but I firmly believe that’s what would be best for UConn and its athletic programs.
However. It is unlikely in the extreme that the state allows that to happen. The XL Center, and, really, Hartford more generally, need UConn basketball to stay afloat. It’s not a good thing, but it’s real. The politics involved are tricky, and I can’t imagine a scenario that has UConn totally out of Hartford. Gampel is nearing the end of its shelf-life, so it behooves us to figure out what happens when it’s no longer a viable place to play games. It’s a bummer, because Gampel is a great place to watch a great game. Unfortunately, there isn’t really anywhere else to put an on-campus arena, so it would probably mean playing at least one season, but more likely two, entirely in Hartford while the new arena gets built.
Also, UConn’s Master Plan envisions a new, on-campus hockey arena, as well as new soccer, baseball and softball facilities where the current ones stand. It includes upgrades/maintenance on Gampel, but that’s just a band-aid. They obviously aren’t thinking about combining hockey and basketball facilities (which is dumb). And it doesn’t appear that anyone at UConn is planning for the inevitable day when Gampel isn’t an option anymore. As for the XL? Hartford needs it, and I care enough about the city (and the state) to know that it’s an important part of keeping the capital city viable. But short of extorting some NHL team to come there? I got nothin’.
Jon asks: Conference realignment questions!! The Americon seems to be on somewhat of an upward trend (3 ranked football teams, men’s basketball good has good teams, women’s at least has USF to keep UConn entertained). Assuming this pattern continues, is this really such a bad place for us to be stuck for the foreseeable future?
That all depends on whether or not ESPN/FOX/CBS/etc. see what we’re seeing: that the American is becoming a highly-competitive and entertaining league. If this leads to bigger TV revenues, a necessity to compete with P5 schools, then it might make this league viable in the long-ish term. But make no mistake, if we want to remain among the top athletic programs in the country, we need to eventually make our way to one of the top leagues. And there are pitfalls. First of all, we’re not the only school in the AAC pursuing a P5 bid, and the success of Temple, Houston, and Memphis is going to make them more attractive options for expansion.
Jon (again) asks: Let’s say the unthinkable happens and Geno decides to retire at the age of 100. Do you think the program will continue to be unstoppable after he’s gone?
Geno seems like one of those guys who could drop dead on the court and still insist on coaching, so we can rest easy knowing this scenario isn’t imminent. But we are all mortal (except maybe for St. Rebecca Lobo), so it will happen eventually. The greatness of the program will depend on who the next coach is. We’ve discussed this as a group and there are a few candidates that come to mind. The first ones that popped up were: Jen Rizzotti, Shea Ralph (!) and Jamelle Elliott. All are obviously great people, but all also come with drawbacks. Rizzotti has had a couple rough years at Hartford, Elliott may be fired from Cincinnati and Ralph has never had a head coaching job. There’s no home run option. Like we’ve mentioned when discussing potential Ollie replacements, it would help to have a candidate who has already succeeded with a mid-to-high major. How much does that matter in the women’s game? I’m not sure. UConn is still UConn and its name alone should draw some quality players, regardless of the coach. You can’t count on there being any four-peats post-Geno, but the program isn’t going to turn into Syracuse over night.
In conclusion, the next head coach will be Tyler Summit and in time, he will be even greater than Geno.
