I give the guy credit for stating the obvious:
Beilein, who spoke at the annual Michigan alumni event at Point O’Woods Country Club, said that after a 10-22 season, it’s OK to steal part of the game plan from Michigan State and its highly successful men’s basketball coach, Tom Izzo.
“I think we have to admire them and copy them a little bit and say, listen, what’s made them so good?” Beilein said. “We haven’t been in the (NCAA) tournament for 10 years, they haven’t missed the tournament for 10 years. We have to look at that and say, ‘Why is that happening?’ We have to say, ‘OK, what are they doing that we can do, whether it’s facilities, whether it’s marketing, all those types of things.’
“We have to work hard to play catch-up, knowing that if you just continue to do it the right way, you can catch up,” Beilein continued. “I think it adds to the flavor of college basketball in the state that that rivalry exists. If you’re in Minnesota and there’s not the other team, there’s no measuring stick. Michigan State is a great measuring stick for us.“
“They’re a year ahead of us with a lot of stuff,” Beilein said of Michigan State. “We’re still finishing 2008 and they’re on the 2010’s. They set a great model for people of how to do it, and we’re not dumb enough to say we’re not going to do it that way.”
Everything he said in the quotes above actually makes a lot of sense. But this seems a little odd to me:
“It’s important,” Beilein said of facilities that can compete with state-of-the-art facilities at Michigan State, Ohio State and Wisconsin. “I’m not going to say that we’re going to say, ‘Hey, we can’t recruit kids right now because of the facilities.’ We can do it. Sometimes facilities are more eye candy for recruits. While I know that’s a big part of today’s generation, but it’s more about efficiency with us.”
Efficiency? Yeah, I’m sure that’ll be a huge draw for recruits.
Maybe they can tie it in with an economics lesson — teach the kids about how spending a quarter of a billion dollars on the football stadium renovation means they’ll get to play in the most outdated basketball facility in the Big Ten for another decade.
I love what the Badgers had to say about Crisler last year:
Sometimes described as the 40-year-old landfill behind Michigan Stadium, Crisler Arena is in dire need of an overhaul. The 13,751-seat facility houses cushioned metal folding chairs and plenty of empty seats, as the arena is rarely sold out completely. It also is home to some of the more indifferent and quiet fans in the league, though Big Blue hasn’t had much to root for since the days of the Fab Five.
“The arena is pretty mediocre, considering the attention Michigan pays to its athletic programs and athletic department,” said Daniel Bromwich, senior editor at the Michigan Daily. “It is rarely filled up; only for Michigan State or Wisconsin games is the upper bowl full. The arena itself is old and not very nice.”
Still there are some positives, such as the perfect student seating — courtside, all the way down on one side — and no advertising anywhere in the building is a welcome comfort. Despite the few positives, the building is aging like vinegar at this point, not wine.
No advertising = no revenue.
No revenue = no renovations.
No renovations = no (or few) decent recruits.
No decent recruits = no fans.
No fans = no revenue.
Lather, rinse, repeat.
Go get ‘em, John.
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