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RMU to Cut Men’s and Women’s Ice Hockey Programs

Yet another self-inflicted controversy at Bobby Mo. They've really gotta re-evaluate how they arrive at decisions. These are just the ones I can think of going back a few years
- cutting men's track mid-season along with XC, tennis, and women's golf
- 4 rounds of layoffs in 3 years
- Chris Howard publishing a Post Gazette article saying there's no student loan crisis (really)
- Buying & renovating a very large house in Sewickley for the president
- Charging RMU departments to use UPMC Center meeting spaces
- Changing meal plans to "all you can eat" and downgrading food
- Cutting the Office of Multicultural Students in the middle of all the race issues of 2020
- Taking majors off of diplomas
- Cutting hockey & that terrible press release

The detail that make this one hard to swallow is the timing. Its really late to enter the transfer portal and a bunch of players have said they have off campus apartment leases they don't know if they can get out of.
 
I certainly feel bad for the coaches, players and everyone else closely involved with the hockey programs. This is terrible news for those losing their jobs or those losing their opportunity to continue to go to their chosen school while playing their sport, on scholarship, and for all others who are passionate about the programs.

I am not shocked by the decision. I believe it was inevitable. Operating a D-1 hockey program is extremely expensive. If it was not, a lot more schools would have teams. RMU was one of only three schools in Pennsylvania to have D-1 programs, Pitt does not, Duquesne does not, no school in Philadelphia, in fact, no school east of Penn State in this State has D-1 hockey programs. The high cost of operating a program is the primary reason so few other schools offer the sport. RMU has had five high-cost athletic programs, men's and women's hockey, men's and women's basketball and men’s football. There are very few schools that offer all five sports on the D-1 level. A lot of mid and low-level D-1 basketball schools do not have football, and the vast majority do not have hockey. I suspect there are no more than ten schools in the Country that are non-P5, D-1 schools that offer all five programs. The reason, once again, is because they are expensive programs to operate. For a school with a relatively small enrollment and not being in a conference with a significant TV contract, supporting all five programs is unsustainable. In the past, when college enrollments were growing, schools had more luxury in fitting various nonessential programs in their budgets. Today, colleges across the Country, especially in the northeast and midwest, are facing challenges in keeping enrollment up. As a result, they do not have the luxury of keeping everything in their budgets that they would like to. Does this mean that RMU is in financial trouble, no, but it could wind up there if its leadership does not take proper action to work within a realistic budget. Hard, difficult decisions have to be made in changing and challenging environments.

Basketball has always been the sport that RMU has chosen to be its marquee sport. D-1 basketball is expensive, no doubt about it. RMU does generate revenue from basketball, I am sure it is not nearly enough to cover the costs, but as mentioned, it is the sport RMU has chosen to be its marquee sport. Football is also extremely expensive, at RMU it can generate some revenue, but once again, not enough to cover costs. College football has long been part of Americana, and certainly, football is deeply loved in western Pennsylvania. If RMU had chosen to eliminate football the outcry would be substantially more significant than eliminating hockey. Unfortunately, maintaining all five programs was not sustainable, something had to give, and what gave are the two hockey programs.
 
Question from a Duquesne fan. This fund raising drive to keep hockey IMO would be at the expense of the football and basketball programs. I am viewing this as a limited amount of alumni and a limited amount of sources. If they raise $10m to fund hockey for 5 more years, I believe that comes at a cost to more donations to football and basketball.

I think the school made the right decision, as GoRmu listed above. A horrible press release but the correct decisions.

If this fund raising drive is successful, you may have robbed Peter to pay Paul. Not being negative but there are only so many fundraising dollars available for smaller schools. Do any of you view that this could come at the expense of football and basketball funding from the donor level?
 
I'm not sure it will come at the expense of basketball or football. This saga may drive more of a wedge between supporters of the various sports - If they save hockey, are hockey supporters really going to show up to an RMU football game or basketball game any time soon?

But as far as donors, a lot of the deep-pocketed ones were pretty isolated as it was. Basketball has the most, as evidenced by the various sponsorships attached to the arena. Football has a few specific donors who prefer to only donate to that program.

There are surely a few donors who give to the general fund for athletics, but a lot are sport specific it seems.
 
I can see the wedge you are speaking of. A lot of people are referencing the football teams lack of recent success or building the new arena as screwing hockey. They all seem to be mutually exclusive events to me.

I do know that DU went through same thing cutting wrestling and baseball. With the same media firestorm. Cutting the sports allowed reallocated funds which produced A10 championships for the DU women in VB, soccer, xc, and multiple swimming and diving A10 winners. Success followed through to football. And with Dambrot still hopeful for the promised land. And Dan Burt has done a great job with women’s bb.

long winded point is more sports doesn’t mean better sports. Good luck to you all.
 
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I can see the wedge you are speaking of. A lot of people are referencing the football teams lack of recent success or building the new arena as screwing hockey. They all seem to be mutually exclusive events to me.

I do know that DU went through same thing cutting wrestling and baseball. With the same media firestorm. Cutting the sports allowed reallocated funds which produced A10 championships for the DU women in VB, soccer, xc, and multiple swimming and diving A10 winners. Success followed through to football. And with Dambrot still hopeful for the promised land. And Dan Burt has done a great job with women’s bb.

long winded point is more sports doesn’t mean better sports. Good luck to you all.
You're right, but RMU already went through that process by cutting several sports about 8 years ago. That was during a period of growth and they clearly stated how they were going to reallocate the saved money. It was also done a lot more fairly, with ample time for students affected to transfer.

This was done in the dark of the night and it hasn't been made clear how any savings will be utilized to benefit the university.
 
I am sorry to see the hockey programs cut and certainly feel bad for the coaches and players. However, RMU without hockey will not make it unique, RMU with hockey was unique. Taking a look at the Atlantic 10 and Big East conferences, conferences with member schools that generate substantially more revenue from sports than RMU, conferences in which nearly all of its members have larger enrollments and much larger endowments than RMU, only one out of fourteen Atlantic 10 and only two out of eleven Big East schools have hockey programs. The majority of the schools in those conference also do not have football programs. I wish RMU could keep its hockey programs, I also wish RMU could add baseball and a few other sports, but that is just not reality in today's world of college athletics.
 
Really shocked that Colbert stepped down.

IMO, I bet this was a last-minute rash decision to cut a couple million from the budget. RMU's fiscal year I believe starts June 1. They've already cut expenses several times over the years without much hurt to athletics. The press release said that the trustees just had a retreat before - it seems like a big strategic decision like this wasn't shared there? Maybe the directive to cut expenses came then. The great expansion of club sports doesn't seem to make sense though. Its to the point now that they're basically running two athletic departments - one NCAA and the other out of Student Life.

Did anyone notice that the DK Pittsburgh Sports article was written by an RMU alum? That stings.

I agree that there's a wedge being driven between RMU alumni. The students are basically done with Howard. Hockey was their sport. They'd choose a Friday night hockey game over an ESPN3 basketball game. Younger alumni (under 40) all seem to support hockey over basketball and def not football. Those younger alumni were already wary of Howard. I've had a few younger alumni tell me they've stopped donations. Granted, not a lot of money in total but it will be hard to get them back on board in the future. How long until RMU's working and middle class alumni tell Howard to go away? He just seems so out of touch with typical RMU people. The Cadillac & Sewickley mansion compared to Dell'Omo's Moon rental and Camry are good examples of the shift.
 
Assuming that all of this is accurate, it certainly would have been wise to inform the entire board in advance and to have some reasonable discussion. However, I do not believe it is the type of decision that requires a vote by the board. The board hires the President/CEO and entrusts in him a lot of responsibility to manage the University, including the authority to make significant decisions. The President and the leadership team make significant decisions regularly, hiring, firing, adding or eliminating academic programs, etc. All of that is within the President's authority and is usually done with little interest from the media or people on twitter. Whenever a University eliminates a sports team there is a firestorm. That situation is not unique to RMU. The RMU president apparently discussed this matter with the board chairman, and I suspect the executive committee of the board. Kevin Colbert may not have been on the executive committee, I don't know, but I assume not. In hindsight, Chris Howard should have sought the advice of the entire board, even though board approval, via a vote, was not required. I am sorry to see Kevin leave the board, he is a distinguished alum and has been very good to the University. Serving on a board can be frustrating at times, board members have very limited authority individually, they have authority as a group, that is, as a board. Board members often do not agree, there can be times when a board member wonders, why am I serving on this board, I don't seem to have any authority. Kevin apparently enjoyed and cared about the hockey team and the University. I would have preferred that Kevin stayed on to fight the good fight, but apparently he has chosen to step down, since he is a well known public figure in Pittsburgh, and in a high level sports management position his departure is resulting in this issue getting a lot more attention than it otherwise would have gotten.
 
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Tim Benz is reporting that there has been communication between RMU and an Ohio businessman who specializes in regional ice facilities. The Penguins are also interested. Too bad this didn't happen before the Pens built their facility in Cranberry. I was always hoping that the proximity to the airport, PPG, and Mario & Sid in Sewickley that the ISC would be an ideal facility for them. I guess the whole superfund site thing probably scared them away. According to RMU's tax filing, this might help. It costs $4.5 million a year just to run the place. That seems unusually high considering there are only a few full-time staff down there. Hockey team staffs fall under athletics or club sports.

I still fear that RMU will never admit that they're in a financial downturn. They've cut costs in consecutive years in many ways - now its getting into the bone. But Jonathan Potts is a good spinmaster and Howard seems like he has an ego that doesn't admit defeat. On top of the academic consolidation last year and layoffs, cutting the Pittsburgh Speaker Series saves them over a half million dollars. They seem to have roughly $30M in reserves but what looks like almost $100M in debt, probably all construction debt including the events center. I believe the UPMC deal covers most of that over time - same with dorm construction with housing fees.

An interesting piece about Howard's compensation is that RMU also pays over $100k a year for a life insurance policy. At a $450k salary with free car & house, I wonder if that's standard and necessary.
 
RMU's financial wellbeing is all tied to enrollment. Keeping up enrollment for RMU, as with so many schools has become a challenge, especially in this part of the Country, the northeast and midwest. There just are not as many kids turning college age as there used to be. RMU's enrollment has dipped some in recent years resulting in the need to tighten the budget. The good news in the press release is that it appears that RMU's freshman class will be larger this coming year. There have been colleges that have closed in recent years, and there are reports that there will be many more. RMU seems to be doing well in competing for students against its peers. RMU, as with most schools, took a financial hit from the pandemic. As long as RMU can avoid a significant drop in enrollment, I believe it will be around for a long time. I don't believe Howard's compensation package is out of line in comparison to other University presidents. The benefits of being provided a house and a car are quite standard for the position. It's a challenging time to be a college or university president, difficult decisions have to be made, and when they are made the decision maker is always going to take the heat.
 
Sound like president is looking out for number 1, more than he is for the school, athletes and coaches. Having Kevin leave is just awful. Don't blame him a bit, he is a good man and a man of integrity. Bad, bad look.

If the finances are so bad, talk to the pens, talk to alumni, try to save it. Just not impressed with Mr. Howard on this or other moves as mentioned above.
 
If Howard, with his credentials and contacts, were "looking out for number 1" he would be working at a business where he could be making millions. If he were looking out for number 1 and not interested in the school or its students, he would not make difficult decisions that subject himself to such criticism. Frankly, whenever a college president decides to cut sports teams, that president knows he is going to take a lot of heat, more so than with just about any other decision. To say the finances are "so bad" is a mischaracterization. I have no inside information, but I do not believe that RMU is in bad financial shape. As previously mentioned, this is a challenging time for many colleges and universities due to a shrinking number of people turning college age, resulting in shrinking enrollments. It was a much easier time for college administrators prior to ten years ago when college enrollments were increasing. Here is western Pa. California, Clarion and Edinboro are being merged together to cut costs as a result of shrinking enrollments. RMU's enrollment has dropped, but is still holding its own. Regardless, RMU's budgets needed to be adjusted with shifts in revenue, and when enrollment drops, revenue drops. When revenue drops, expenses need to be reduced. Apparently, hockey cost the University a million dollars a year even without consideration of any future facility improvements. RMU spends more on sports than probably most any other school of its size. Basketball, hockey and football are expensive sports, very few schools in the Country have all three. Although RMU does not generate a lot of revenue from basketball and football, those teams can generate a lot more than hockey. There are only about 60 men's and 40 women's D-1 hockey teams in the Country, that's it, very few schools offer the sport, Pitt, Duquesne, WVU do not offer the sport. It is an expensive sport, with low revenue and low attendance. Rather than cutting expenses from the athletic budget or any other parts of the University, RMU could just keep increasing tuition to try to increase revenue. Certainly, a large percentage of students would say that's unfair, in addition, it probably would be counter productive since higher tuition would result in lower enrollment. Considering the costs, and considering that so few schools have hockey teams, the question should not be, why is RMU cutting hockey, but why has RMU carried the costs of having hockey teams for so many years. With regard to fundraising, RMU does a great job of trying shake as many money trees as possible, the truth is, there are only so many dollars out there to raise. It sounds as though the Pens were interested in doing some facility sharing arrangement in Cranberry, a locations that is at least a half hour away from campus and likely would not result in much decrease of the million dollar operating deficit of the teams. A guy who is in the business of buying smaller hockey facilities says he would like to buy Island Sports Center, but how does that save the teams? I doubt he is willing to pay millions above fair market value. He is just interested in buying and operating the facility, that is the business he is in. I guess he would provide some favorable rent to RMU, but RMU still would have the bulk of the costs of operating the teams each year. I wish RMU could keep the hockey teams. I am not here to defend Chris Howard, I feel bad for the players, coaches and everyone passionate about the programs. This topic is very emotional for a lot of people. I do believe this was a very difficult and thought out decision for Howard, it is one he surely would have preferred not to have had to make. The press release, no doubt, could have been better, possibly the timing could have been better, possibly advanced notice to those involved could have been better, however, I am just trying to point out that, to me, there are obvious rational reasons why the decision to end the hockey programs was made.
 
The decision to drop both hockey is a very tough decision to make. But the big issue with all of this is how this was all handled by RMU as an organization. RMU really dropped the ball on how they dealt with this decision. RMU has gone dark on social media since the announcement. I use to get so many notifications from the athletic department and RMU on posts on Instagram or Twitter...but now...its very quiet.

I'm sorry for those young players, coaches, alumni and fans that had the rug pulled out from under them with no roadmap or update on the status of the program. Gone just like that.

This hurts RMU was a whole as a university and athletics. Recruiting for other sports just became a big challenge now. You know other programs are using this bad press against RMU. And then you are start thinking "Who could be next?"

Could football be the next big program to be the booted? Who knows? Could this lead to some current coaches starting to look at other opportunities because of how this was all handled? Perhaps?

Whether enrollment is up or down. Whether the cost of a piece of paper from a university continues to go up should not determine the lifecycle of your athletic programs. Yes, football was brought to RMC to increase enrollment and that worked.

But a too common of a theme I hear on all sports is the lack of students at the games. RMU can't rely on students in the seats to save the sport. They must market their programs more. RMU is not strong in their marketing of their programs outside of Moon Township. They need to grow and right now RMU has a culture issue to deal with. No more Frozen Four in Pittsburgh for RMU. Yes I'm sure COVID hurt RMU just like other schools but hopefully with this new arena and the chance to host summer concerts and other events will bring in money for RMU.

If RMU athletics is going to overcome the hockey program PR nightmare, then RMU has to change their culture to rebuild their brand.
 
Perhaps RMU will not engage in any discussions with Mr. Gunty because he has given no indication that he has anything worthwhile to offer. What he has indicated is that he is interested in buying the RMU ice facility, and he wants to buy it quickly. Buying and operating small ice facilities is what his business does. If RMU wants to sell the facility, it can put the facility up for sell, accept offers from potential competitive buyers and sell it at fair market value. Mr. Gunty seems to be making himself out to be a hero on social media by saying he wants to help save the D-1 hockey programs by buying the facility quickly. Buying quickly would be a benefit to him since it would eliminate RMU’s opportunity of seeking competitive bids. Would he be paying fair market value, or since he seems to be trying to pressure RMU into a quick sale, without completive bids, would he be offering less than fair market value? I don’t believe he has indicated that he would pay more than fair market value. Mr. Gunty has indicated that he would make wonderful improvements to the facilities. I believe he made similar comments when he purchased the Southpointe facility. Maybe he has made improvements, it looks to be the same old facility to me. With regard to saving the hockey programs, how does selling the facility help save the programs? There seems to be an assumption by some that RMU would be obligated to use the proceeds from the sale to benefit the hockey programs. The hockey programs do not own the facility, RMU owns the facility. RMU could use the proceeds for scholarships, it could use the proceeds to help keep down tuition, or to make improvements to academic buildings or dorms, that is, the proceeds could be used in any number of ways that would benefit the general student population. Possibly, Mr. Gunty is sincere in wanting to save the hockey programs, but I believe if he truly was offering something that would eliminate the University’s ongoing financial burden of supporting the teams out of its general operating budget, the University’s leadership would be eager to meet with him, apparently, they are not, likely because he has not indicated that he has anything worthwhile to offer.
 
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Maybe he has nothing to offer, but how do you not at least engage and discuss with him? Or anyone?

It's not just Gunty. The Penguins reportedly had a scenario in the works to expand their practice arena. Maybe both options are ultimately unfeasible. Or maybe the discussions lead to a different solution.

People are upset because the university made this decision without feedback, blindsided coaches and players with a brief meeting where they didn't answer questions, issued a terse press release and then refused to answer questions for a week, and now appear to be resisting any overtures to try to reverse the decision.

It's one thing to make an unpopular decision that's backed by vigorous debate and analysis. It's another to handle it the way RMU has.
 
ColonialInsider, I always respect your point of view and your good insights. When colleges, especially at the D-1 level, cut sports teams it always creates a firestorm. That's the case in western Pa. and across the Country. I certainly remember when Duquesne announced they were cutting four sports in 2010. It created a lot of bad feelings and outrage, especially among the Duquesne baseball loyalist. Had twitter and other social media, back then, been as popular of a place for people to air their grievances as it is today, it probably would have been ten times worse for Duquesne and their administration. A lot of D-1, high, mid and low level, athletic programs have cut sports teams in the past 15 years. Although it is always a bad situation for student/athletes, coaches and others involved, and from a p/r standpoint, RMU's leadership certainly could have/should have studied the right moves and the wrong moves others have made in order to minimize the hurt. I wish it made sense for RMU to continue hockey, but I still believe for a school the size of RMU that has limited sports revenue, that had a limited number of people actually show up to the RMU hockey games, that very few other D-1 schools have men's and women's hockey in addition to football and men's and women's basketball and the costs involved with operating the programs, the decision to discontinue the teams is a correct one.
 
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