Louisville offers model for jump to Power 5 league
No secret: The University of Houston and its fan base desperately want to be in a Power 5 conference.
Take your pick from the Big 12, Big Ten, Pac-12 — it doesn’t matter. The invitation can come on a napkin for all they care, as long as it includes the national relevancy, TV exposure and, most importantly, millions in yearly payouts.
For a blueprint for reaching a Power 5 conference, UH should look no further than Saturday’s opponent, Louisville.
Like UH, Louisville was once a member of Conference USA and the American Athletic Conference. Like UH, Louisville once had athletic facilities in desperate need of upgrades. And at one time, like UH, Louisville had little hope of joining one of the nation’s marquee conferences before joining the Atlantic Coast Conference last year.
“Louisville is the modern-day (model),” UH coach Tom Herman said. “Ten years ago, it was TCU. And prior to that, Boise State. And now Louisville has shown the way that you get what you pay for.”
Louisville-based corporate giants Papa John’s Pizza and Yum! Brands, owner of the KFC, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell chains, have pumped in millions for naming rights. The school has reportedly raised more than $250 million for athletic projects in recent years and has plans for a $55 million expansion — the second in the past decade — that will increase the capacity of Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium to 67,000. The KFC Yum! Center, arguably the nation’s premier college basketball arena, cost $238 million.
“I’d like to find us a Papa John’s around here, too, that can bankroll a lot of those facilities,” Herman said. “We’re working on it. We have a lot of friends of the program that are eager now and willing to help any way they can.”
Relatively small budget
But UH currently is having to make do with limited resources. UH projects its 2015-16 athletic budget to be close to $43 million, according to data provided to the Houston Chronicle, which would rank near the bottom of the 12-member American Athletic Conference.
“You have to be frugal, like most of us in this realm of athletics,” Herman said. “There’s no opulence. We don’t have waterfalls in our locker room and 70 flatscreen TVs.
“You don’t need that to win. You need a great culture; you need a great staff; you need to go recruit great players and sell them on a vision.” The vision is slowly beginning to take shape:
• UH moved into 40,000seat, $128 million TDECU Stadium last season.
• A $25 million basketball development facility opens in November.
• There are plans for a $60 million renovation of Hofheinz Pavilion.
• A $20 million indoor football facility is being discussed.
UH officials continue to cast a watchful eye on the ever-changing college landscape. At a dinner of football supporters last month, UH president Renu Khator said the university has a “short window” and that the next two years are “very, very important.”
It’s not complicated
To become an attractive option to a Power 5 conference, Hunter Yurachek said the Cougars must simply win.
“Right now we have to find a way to dominate the American Athletic Conference,” said Yurachek, UH’s vice president for intercollegiate athletics. “We’re not there yet. We’ve got to get our men’s basketball and football programs nationally relevant again.”
Louisville caught a break and was invited to join the ACC in late 2012 as the replacement for Maryland, which left for the Big Ten. The Cardinals followed with the best athletic season in school history — the men’s basketball team won the national title, the women finished runnerup, the football team beat Florida in the Sugar Bowl, and the baseball team advanced to the College World Series.
“All this talk about Power 5 this and that, going here and going there, doing this and doing that, let’s not forget where we are,” Herman said. “Where we are right now is in the last 25 years, the University of Houston men’s basketball and football teams have won a combined three conference championships. Am I proud of that? No. That’s where we’re at. In order to take the steps we need to take, we have to dominate in the American Athletic Conference and we have to compete for championships in November.”