Game 34: CBI Game, Loyola University, Wednesday, March 15th, 7 PM, NO TV

[Mason2005]

In attendance, perhaps, but there's no reason with our alumni that we can't match, or exceed, what they do. There's more money in Fairfax County than Richmond.

Our cost of living is also much higher and we are only one small part of anyone's sports entertainment budget as oppose to vcu being 100% to those cross eyed freaks down south.

Sent from my XT1575 using Tapatalk

 

[GreenLantern]

Time to put OT away until November. Tough loss but still a season that beat expectations!

 

[Dawgs99]

Fair enough. I think we should look at what other schools in the A10 are doing, and if we want to be at the top of the league then we should be at the top of the league with facilities.

If our new facility is half as nice as this I'll be happy....Really nice facility up there in Dayton. Locker room is badass. I'd love to see a rendering for phase 2 of the practice facility....then I'll actually believe its in the works.

 

[Vurbel]

Our cost of living is also much higher and we are only one small part of anyone's sports entertainment budget as oppose to vcu being 100% to those cross eyed freaks down south.

Sent from my XT1575 using Tapatalk

True. It is a different world and a different market.

 

[Vurbel]

If our new facility is half as nice as this I'll be happy....Really nice facility up there in Dayton. Locker room is badass. I'd love to see a rendering for phase 2 of the practice facility....then I'll actually believe its in the works.

I want it to be twice as good. I want us to be the gold standard. With that said, I don't have a spare $10million to build one.

 

[Vurbel]

vcu basketball is the main attraction in Richmond since Richmond has no other major sports. Even if Mason ranked in the top 25 every year I still don't think we could sell out EBA every game. I don't think we can ever match their revenue numbers.


Sent from my XT1575 using Tapatalk

As far as attendance goes I wouldn't argue with you. Now sponsorship's may be different, but at the same time sponsors want to know how many people will see their ads. If vcu has twice as many people go to their games it would make sense they could charge twice as much to sponsor their product.

 

[TweederGMU]

That's a pretty embarrassing loss on our home court. Other A-10 teams are probably laughing at us. The goal is to win no matter what. We are in the 2016-2017 season Paulsen! Wait until summer or next year to see what you have with line-up changes and shit. Moore and Jalen deserved better last night. I could see it in Moore's face after 10 minutes that something was not right. He looked pissed off and checked out. When you have your team's best player and "unofficial" captain with this type of attitude it will reflect upon and trickle down to the young players. Half the team looked like they didn't want to play. Jaire was the only one really giving 110% on every play and Otis woke up in the 2nd half.

It was pretty disgusting watching this happen to our team. Darrell Green was sitting 5 feet in front of me and he kept leaning back in his chair, shaking his head, and trying to liven up the game with one gentleman and his family that looked like he was entertaining. Pretty embarrassing when your main Mason Fundraiser/Donor Ambassador has to explain this horseshit performance to fans. Hope that guy was not a huge donor, that check would be out the door after that poo poo performance!

 

[gmu05]

As far as attendance goes I wouldn't argue with you. Now sponsorship's may be different, but at the same time sponsors want to know how many people will see their ads. If vcu has twice as many people go to their games it would make sense they could charge twice as much to sponsor their product.

vcu is a brand that attracts a lot of people. Sure winning created it, years of winning, but it's that brand that separates them from our program. How would you describe Mason basketball since 2012?

 

[MasonSAE4]

If our new facility is half as nice as this I'll be happy....Really nice facility up there in Dayton. Locker room is badass. I'd love to see a rendering for phase 2 of the practice facility....then I'll actually believe its in the works.

They've shown it at games

 

[Dawgs99]

They've shown it at games

No, They've shown renderings for phase 1.....basically just sprucing up the Cage gym area. There are no renderings yet for phase 2.

 

[TweederGMU]

Just saw a Kevin McNamee retweet on Twitter that said vcu spent $5.7M on Men's Hoops with $8M in revenue (not sure if it was referencing this year, last or an average). No matter how much we hate vcu (which is a f*** ton), their people know sports marketing down there and how to build a brand.

Pretty simple..... Richmond has no other sporting events or teams to get behind during the winter in the city. The school recognized this and marketed and built around this. They target the suburbs with their marketing.... getting families and building a community/family type atmosphere is their mission and it worked. That vcu community is tight and they built this over 10 years with the Final Four fueling their movement.

They built a brand and we did not. Now we are light years behind thanks to losing years and the school not doing shit to build upon and after in making Mason a Basketball school.

 

[Vurbel]

vcu is a brand that attracts a lot of people. Sure winning created it, years of winning, but it's that brand that separates them from our program. How would you describe Mason basketball since 2012?

Slow. Unexciting. Basically, the opposite of havoc. Now when Otis and Jaire get out on the break you can see it's there, but at the end of the day we are a blue collar, defensive team. Outside of the Green Machine, right now we don't have any reason for people to be like "EBA, that's THE place to be!" With that said, Westhead scored lots of points and was exciting. What was he, 8-296?

 

[Vurbel]

That's a pretty embarrassing loss on our home court. Other A-10 teams are probably laughing at us. The goal is to win no matter what. We are in the 2016-2017 season Paulsen! Wait until summer or next year to see what you have with line-up changes and shit. Moore and Jalen deserved better last night. I could see it in Moore's face after 10 minutes that something was not right. He looked pissed off and checked out. When you have your team's best player and "unofficial" captain with this type of attitude it will reflect upon and trickle down to the young players. Half the team looked like they didn't want to play. Jaire was the only one really giving 110% on every play and Otis woke up in the 2nd half.

It was pretty disgusting watching this happen to our team. Darrell Green was sitting 5 feet in front of me and he kept leaning back in his chair, shaking his head, and trying to liven up the game with one gentleman and his family that looked like he was entertaining. Pretty embarrassing when your main Mason Fundraiser/Donor Ambassador has to explain this horseshit performance to fans. Hope that guy was not a huge donor, that check would be out the door after that poo poo performance!

I give Kier credit. And Kam played hard. Tate was great in warmups. Our managers were on-point last night!

 

[MasonSAE4]

No, They've shown renderings for phase 1.....basically just sprucing up the Cage gym area. There are no renderings yet for phase 2.

Isn't Phase 1 just the hardwood? Those renderings at games look like a much more complete facility. Maybe I'm wrong with where Phase I ends exactly. But you're right in that they haven't shown a weight/film room.

 

[GMUgemini]

2015 vcu finances:

Ticket sales: $2.4 million
Contributions: $4.9 million
Licensing Fees: $2.9 million
Student Fees: $19.0 million

It's interesting to see that their win in the conference championship against us in 2007 (and win against Duke) was actually the launching point, not the Final Four. Before 2008, their donations and ticket sales were just as crappy as ours. But they went from $58,244 in donations in 2007 to $408,842 in one year and it has increased every year since 2008.

In both instances, 2007 and 2011, had we beaten vcu in the tournament, we could have held them down, instead the opposite has happened: vcu has held us down. They wouldn't have gotten an at-large in 2011 without beating us in the conference championship.

 

[GMUgemini]

I will say, the one bright spot for us in 2015 was licensing fees, which were $3.3 million.

We have also refused to increase our student fees like vcu did after the final four run, so we get $5 million less in student fees.

 

[ephoops]

Boyd, Kier and Newman were freshmen playing spot minutes behind three very good guards. Given that, I would say all of them showed enough to have me excited for the next three years.

Not concerned at all about their shooting, which will improve dramatically as they continue to acclimate to the speed of the game.

I also think we'll be able to get a truer read on our guards when one of them isn't constantly having to defend an opposing team's PF and forcing all sorts of crazy adjustments.

After an offseason in the weight room and working on individual skill development, I think we have a chance to have one of the deepest and best backcourt groups in the A-10.

Just my $.02.

I agree.

Also, Paulsen has a history of developing players in his program who are willing to put in the time and effort to improve.

Paulsen is an excellent basketball coach and also a great teacher of the game. I saw it at Williams and Bucknell. I did not see Moore or Jenkins play earlier in their careers but both players certainly improved from their junior year to their senior year. I expect Livingston and Grayer to continue to improve as well as this year's freshmen.

Players get better under Paulsen's tutelage.

 

[GMUSig03]

Watch your mouth! Did you see 32-4? That was the most humiliated I've been as a Mason fan. That's including the Nestor and Westhead years.

I was there for 32-4, I stand by my statement. We cut 32-4 to a... 6 pt lead at one point? And that was against vcu in the coliseum, not at home against a team with a losing record. Well, they used to have a losing record.

 

[Dawgs99]

Isn't Phase 1 just the hardwood? Those renderings at games look like a much more complete facility. Maybe I'm wrong with where Phase I ends exactly. But you're right in that they haven't shown a weight/film room.

Phase 1 is the hardwood, new paint, mason branding, and graphics. The locker rooms, lounges, film room, and offices are all part of phase 2. I will say that the renderings of the updates Cage gym look nice. Also I love the drawing of the new locker room space in EBA. I really hope that gets under construction this summer as Brad said earlier in the season. We will have a few monster recruiting classes coming up in just a few years.....need all the amenities as possible.

 

[GMUgemini]

I was there for 32-4, I stand by my statement. We cut 32-4 to a... 6 pt lead at one point? And that was against vcu in the coliseum, not at home against a team with a losing record. Well, they used to have a losing record.

Yeah, we were a Jon Arledge 3-point rim out from cutting that to 3. It was the one time I think I can remember Hewitt actually making adjustments mid-game that worked.