A Sea Of Red

Since the first question was about football, I put the thread in this section, and here's JB's first response:

http://www.libertyflames.com/index.cfm?PID=13195

One question?

On a side note, Gabe's an awesome kid.

Well, being an AD is JB's day job; he just moonlights as a columnist.

Funny thing is, most everything he mentioned was already "scooped" by fans of this board, so I'm giving credit where credit is due.

I wish the author of the question chosen got a T-shirt, cap, or gift certificate, though (or maybe a red parking pass for the week!).

it would be cool to give a promotional item for the person who's question was used.

The new question and answer was released the other day.

Mr. Barber,

What is the status of expanding the football division of the Big South other than Presbyterian in 2008? How many years with six football schools are needed for an automatic bid and will Gardner Webb join the Big south for the other sports?

Dr. Charles Hughes
Lynchburg, Va.

Dr. Hughes,

The Big South Conference is currently looking at adding one, and possibly two, "associate" members which would only participate in football. If things work according to plan, this new team(s) would come into the league in 2008 but because the NCAA mandates two years of participation before they can count towards automatic qualification for the FCS playoffs, it would be 2010 before our conference champion would receive an automatic birth in the playoffs.

Gardner Webb will be coming into the league in all sports for the 2008-09 athletic season.

Jeff Barber

Let the rumors fly.

He can't mean the Albany/Stony Brook scenario, can he?

Whoosh!

I was under the impression that if that were to happen, it was going to start this season. 2010 doesn't give us much help unless CCU were to suddenly get that SoCon invite they've been drooling over. Otherwise Presby's presence gives us auto-bid eligibility shortly thereafter.

the yankee schools will invade!

ride that train

2 questions for this week

Mr. Barber,

Why do the hockey team and the basketball team have games at the same time? Why can't one play an afternoon game and one an evening game? It is hard to go attend and support both teams while they are playing at the same time.

The time was changed for the wrestling match the other day so there would be a good attendance at the basketball game. I am sure if promoted there would be good attendance at both sporting events.

Thanks for your time.

Jim Lott


Jim,

No one is more disappointed then we are when there is an overlap between our games and other events on our campus. When this happens, both events are being hurt and we are continually working on this so it does not happen in the future. Hockey is not part of the athletics department but rather a club sport. Our schedule is dictated by the Big South Conference and hockey makes their own schedule and they set their times for matches. We do try to keep them separate which works sometimes and sometimes it doesn't. Changing the wrestling times was easier because both sports fall under LU Athletics. Start times are often determined by the travel time for the visiting teams. As you can see, there are a number of factors that go into this, but again, we are constantly working to keep there from being conflicts in this area.

Jeff Barber

Mr. Barber,

Larger schools always offer official looking jerseys from their various athletics teams. Is there any chance Liberty will be offering these in the near future?

Paul Boyce
Matoaca, Va.

Paul,

In the past our bookstore had football jerseys available for both adults and children. There were several complications that occurred that made it not possible to have them this year. The bookstore is continuing to work on this and we do expect to have football jerseys available prior to the 2007 season. In addition we hope to have basketball jerseys available before next season.

Jeff Barber

actually some pretty good questions. Though most could be answered if everyone added FlameFans.com to their favorites list and spend 2-3 hrs a day on here

PAmedic wrote:...and spend 2-3 hrs a day on here

Only 2-3 hours? You're slacking, Medic.

I know, right?

crazy-busy lately at work.

no time for the important things in life

I submitted 2 questions to the AD last week but I have not seen anything posted and/or have not gotten a response from anyone. Either there is a backlog of questions or maybe he didn't quit agree with my comments, I don't know.

He may only be answering the one or two questions that we all see publicly.

Stevev gets in there this week.

Mr. Barber,

I have two concerns about the direction of the football program. With all of the good things that are happening to the program right now, including the overall performance on the field, better recruiting, facilities, and attendance, there are two areas of concern going forward.

1. Poor conference affiliation - Even though I see improvements to the teams that are currently in the Big South Conference it is way behind the Southern and the Colonial conferences in terms of scheduling and performance. Also the Big South Conference does not give the winner an automatic berth in the playoffs. I would think that we would want to be on the same "playing field" as James Madison, Richmond, or William and Mary as opposed to teams currently in the Big South. Are we currently looking into the possibility of joining a more competitive conference or hope that the Big South performance improves?

2. Poor scheduling - This is related somewhat to the first point. Last year, we scheduled two Division II teams and likely to schedule two more in 2007. This is in addition to other teams of poor caliber in and outside of the Big South. My question is what is being done in the area of scheduling to at least give us a chance in getting into the playoffs. I feel that we need to schedule more teams such as Appalachian State, Furman, James Madison (teams that compete year-in and year-out for playoff berths and the national title). If we don't schedule these types of teams, we have no shot of making the playoffs. The Big South just doesn't carry much weight for the selection committee to get us in unless we can beat teams like the above. For example, the only reason Coastal Carolina got into the playoffs last year was with the win over Furman. If Coastal loses that game or doesn't schedule them then they have no chance of making the playoffs. I feel that the team (LU) deserves at least a chance right now of making the playoffs.

Steve Vandiver
Wilmington, DE

Steve,

The Big South's RPI for football continues to improve. We are a much younger conference than the Southern Conference and our teams are fairly young in football versus other teams around the country. There is a strong commitment from the leadership of the Big South to grow in our football so that we can compete with any Football Championship Subdivision (formerly Division I-AA) conference in the country. A conference must have six teams as playing members before you can receive an automatic berth in the playoffs. Since we currently have five teams, the only way a member of our conference can get into the playoffs is to finish high enough at the end of the regular season that they would get one of the 16 spots available after all the Automatic Qualifier (AQ) spots are filled. Our conference is currently involved with two other schools about the possibility of becoming an associate member (football only). If that were to happen by 2008, then the Big South would get an automatic bid for the playoffs in 2010.

A general rule of thumb for getting into the playoffs is that a team must have seven wins over teams from the Football Championship Subdivision and the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS and formerly Division I-A). It is not so much playing a high-ranking FCS team as it is winning those seven games. Coastal Carolina got in the playoffs as they had the necessary seven wins, won our conference and was ranked 16th at the end of the season. Scheduling is very difficult for teams in the Big South because we have only four conference games; therefore, we need to schedule seven non-conference games where most conferences are only scheduling three non-conference games. September is a difficult time to find games because everyone is trying to find games that precede their conference schedule. We will begin playing Presbyterian College next year which will help with scheduling and if we pick up two more conference teams for 2008, then that will be a big help as well. We have started working on scheduling games for the next ten years or so which will help us down the road.

Jeff Barber

Nothing earth-shattering but he does acknowledge what we've been talking about over the course of the past several months. I feel safe in saying that the Athletic Department is every bit as frustrated with our difficulty in scheduling up as we are.

I like the commitment to looking forward as well. It's frustrating now but the commitment to looking forward will ease some of those frustrations.

I disagreed somewhat with his comments that he posted especially the Coastal playoff situation but I am sure that he knows what he is talking about. He has been in this business long enought to be in the know. Some of his responses were not specific enough in most areas but I respect the fact that he responded at all since the questions that I sent were pretty difficult to answer and somewhat on the negative side. But it is how I feel based on what I know. I tryed to focus my attention on the program's weaknesses since I think that they are areas that need to be addressed in the near future.

Thanks for taking the initiative to write, steve.

Here is the question that I asked JB this week...I hope he answers it, because I have wondered this for awhile...

"Can we not close off various sections of the Vines Center during Basketball games in order to try and move the students closer to the action, and in turn create a louder environment? Currently, you have small groups of friends scattered all throughout the Vines making it difficult for the fans to chant in unison, our fans can not collectivelly chant something as simple as "D-Fense." If you close off certain sections and bring the fans closer to the court it will make the gym louder as well as help the fans cheer together. Last week 50 Keydets made more noise than all of us."

Gabe,

I really like that idea. Let's hope they do it next season. Depending on who is hired, if the student body gets behind them like they did Rocco, it will be an incredible atmosphere.

That's what the Student Flames Club was intended to do, but we all saw how well that went over.