Weekend (Day 19-20)

Over the weekend I finished the Wofford Article, and received permission to post it online. I also read some more of "The System," and started on the Berry Article. This will be a very busy and important week for my project, as I have to finish the Berry and Georgia Tech articles, as well as prepare a defense for my project, and a presentation to present to my teachers and classmates. I hope everyone enjoys my Wofford article, which covered lots of different parts of the Wofford program from recruiting to sport popularity statistics. Special thanks to Brent Williamson from Wofford for helping to make it happen.
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The Wofford Terriers are a small division one FCS school located in Spartanburg, South Carolina, about thirty minutes north of Greenville. The school, which is home to just over 2,000 students, has become more well known for its basketball team, who recently made the NCAA tournament as a twelve seed and almost upset fifth seeded Arkansas.

The Terriers also play some football on Saturdays in the fall, playing in a stadium that can seat 13,000. The program has been around for a long time, as their inaugural season was in 1889. Furman, the school's biggest rival, is located just 30 minutes away in Greenville.

Despite their storied history, the team has been struggling to get wins recently.  After five appearances in the FCS playoffs in six seasons, the Terriers did not made the playoffs in back-to-back seasons for the first time since 2006. “Getting back to the playoffs is one of the biggest challenges are team has faced,” said Assistant Athletic Director for Media Relations Brent Williamson. “We had a very young team in 2014, but will have 20 of 22 starters returning for the 2015 season as we hope to return to the playoffs.”

With the current mediocrity of the football program came the rise of the basketball program who has made the NCAA tournament three times in the last five years. They also made an appearance in the CBI in 2012. “In the past couple of years, football has been passed by our men’s basketball program in terms of popularity,” Mr. Williamson said. “We have won the Southern Conference Championship in 4 of the last 6 years and advanced to the NCAA Tournament, which has been great exposure for the school.”

However, attendance for home football games (last year, 5 for 38,820) is still greater than home basketball games (last year, 14 for 33,357).

Even with footballs higher attendance numbers, basketball has drawn more attention to the school as a whole. “In the past several years, we have discovered that the impact of reaching the NCAA Tournament in men’s basketball does more in terms of recognition for the school than any other sport could,” Mr. Williamson said. “While football does draw attention to the school, nothing can compare to the numbers we draw for basketball (website visits, media mentions, etc.)”

There is a big spread between the Power 5 conferences and the mid-major conferences in football that Mr. Williamson says does not exist in basketball. “The differences between the FCS and FBS schools is quite large in terms of budgets and scholarships provided,” Mr. Williamson said. “In basketball, all schools at the Division I level have the same scholarship numbers, which makes a much more level playing field.”

Recruiting is also different on this FCS level with there being less resources and scholarships at FCS schools. For that reason, schools like Wofford usually don’t try to compete with the bigger FBS schools in recruiting. “The schools we generally compete with are also FCS schools, such as Furman, Mercer, and The Citadel,” Mr. Williamson said. “We also recruit with schools such as Army and Navy, as our academic standards play a big role in the type of player we can recruit.”

Like most schools, Wofford does not make a profit from football. “Football costs us far more than it bring in from revenue,” Mr. Williamson said. “While it still is our largest revenue sport (from ticket sales, sponsorships, guarantee games, etc.), men’s basketball is not too far behind.” Interestingly enough,  no sports at Wofford make a profit.

Mr. Williamson said that revenue is important in terms of competing with other schools, but “While revenue is important, the way the economics work we will never make a profit from athletics,” he said. “It is important when competing with other schools, but only in the ability to provide for student-athletes and their experience.”

In the end, fans will always want to see a winning team regardless of the fan “experience” at the game. “You can run all the promos, specials, gimmicks, that you want, but people really want to see a winning team,” Mr. Williamson said.

Getting a winning team and making it back to the play-offs is a challenge that the Terriers will look to solve in the near future. The team opens up against nearby division one powerhouse Clemson and also plays the FBS level Idaho Vandals before going into conference play.