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Arizona football a top 20 coaching job? New facilities, money helps

by on Jun. 06, 2011, under Arizona football

Mike Stoops says Arizona Stadium has the second-best atmposphere in the Pac-10 behind Oregon. Photo by Chris Morrison-US PRESSWIRE

Arizona has one of the top 20 coaching jobs in college football, according to Sports Illustrated.com’s Andy Staples, which seems a little strange considering the Wildcats haven’t fielded a team that finished in the national rankings since 1998.

But the program, based on the past three seasons, has improved … and the job is getting better. That reasoning has to do with improving resources — a new, mammoth video board for this season, and expected construction after the season on the north end zone project, featuring a new locker room, new offices, new weight room and all those sorts of amenities.

And all that new money from the Pac-10 media rights deal sure looks good.

Staples rated the Arizona coach job No. 19 (one spot behind Arizona State) and wrote on SI.com:

It seems as if Wildcats athletic director Greg Byrne tweets every other day about a new, anonymous multimillion-dollar donation to the program. The figures have been so impressive that Bryan Fischer of CBSSports.com wondered aloud whether Mr. Anonymous has any unmarried daughters who wouldn’t mind supporting a sportswriter. The Pac-12′s new TV deal should boost Arizona into the top half of the AQ revenue bracket, and the same emerging set of players that should help Arizona State also should help stock Arizona. Just as in Tempe, this influx of resources will make the coach’s job easier and more difficult at the same time.

Stoops talked recently with TucsonCitizen.com about the facilities plan, and how he and the coaches are able to show recruits — and boosters — the designs that soon will become reality.

“The pictures speak a thousand words,” Stoops said.

“It shows a desire to compete, and that is the message that players need to understand — that our university is here to compete. We’re not here to win six or seven games; we’re here to compete on a national level. That is the message that you send out.

“We haven’t really done a great job sending that message out over that last … how many years? I don’t know if anyone has been in our locker room, but it’s not really fit for a program of our stature. So that sends a wrong message.”

Construction is under way on the installation of the 5,356-foot video board on the south end of Arizona Stadium. It is expected to be ready for the Sept. 3 opener against Northern Arizona. (You can follow the progress at the UA’s webcam.)

“I think it will have a huge impact on the atmosphere,” Stoops said of the new video board.

“What’s neat is that, outside of Oregon, we may have the loudest stadium of anybody (in the Pac-10). When we’re in there playing right, I think it’s as good as an environment as I’ve played in outside of Oregon in this league. Our fans have done a great job.”

This entry was posted on Monday, June 6th, 2011 at 9:45 am and is filed under Arizona football. Tags for this post: . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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  • Mark B. Evans

    I would rather have stadium seating than a new scoreboard. The only reason they don’t is that it would drop the number of tickets they can sell. In the early 90′s, UA “expanded” Arizona stadium by reducing the number of inches assigned to a “seat,” meaning they added another number to the unforgiving aluminum benches.

    Now, so many fat asses (like mine) spill over their allotted inches that if you have a seat on the end (like I did) you get pushed out into the aisle. To avoid it, you have to buy a foam seat or rent a wire one and defend it like the Marines on Wake Island less the fat-assed fans push it, too, into the aisle.

    I gave up my season tickets after 10 years (and after inheriting them from my father-in-law, who had the same seats for 20 years), because I got tired of spending money to sit on hard benches, one cheek out in the aisle getting soda and nacho cheese spilled on me by people bumping into me going up and down the aisle, while watching awful to mediocre teams get their butts kicked by Oregon et al year in and year out.

    It is much easier being a Wildcat football fan at home on the couch watching the game on 46-inches of HD glory than actually going to a game and dropping a C-note or more on tickets, food and drinks.

    Improve the fan experience at Arizona Stadium and they’ll sell out more games, be able to charge more for tickets and make more money.

    That will go a lot farther in  improving the “atmosphere” than some big-ass jumbotron scoreboard.

    IMHO.

    • UA

      Bigger seats doesn’t grab recruits.

      • Mark B. Evans

        But a big scoreboard does? It’s all about the money. Money for coaches, money for weight rooms, money for cardio training equipment, money for coaching technology, money for chartered flights, money for cool uniforms, money for everything. Who provides the money? Fans. Fans who buy tickets, fans who watch games on TV and buy beer and cars and who buy team jerseys and t-shirts and hats. No fans, no money, no cool stuff, no cool coaches, no recruits.

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  • Mike

    Since the north end zone project will expand stadium capacity, I think this can more than help offset loss of capacity from making the seats a bit wider and more comfortable.  Make it so!  I agree with the points made about improving fan experience.  For myself, I wouldn’t care if I stood the whole game.  But if I want my wife to come along, my older parents, etc., it’s a pretty tough sell as it stands right now (based on how uncomfortable they’ve been at past games)…and this often means its harder for ME to make it to the games as well.

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