U of Illinois AD & NHL joint press conference

[BC/HE]

Re: U of Illinois AD & NHL joint press conference

Looks like LIU flipped UIL on this one.

[slowe]

The Athletic Director, Josh Whitman, will be holding his annual media round table meeting on June 16th. It’s usually a pretty thorough end of year type review with a look ahead. I have to imagine hockey will be addressed in some fashion. Not saying I’m optimistic, but hopefully there will be something insightful.

[slowe]

The Daily Illini reported an update that the Champaign mass transit center expansion project is progressing.

https://dailyillini.com/news/2021/06...nsion-project/

As a reminder, a private developer is working on hotel and retail space next door. The two projects will share mixed use space and a parking deck. This private developer is also the one pitching the hockey arena next door that U of I would use.

The small nugget of interest from the article is that the city is still receiving funding from Core Champaign Hockey LLC for the mixed use space and parking deck. Renderings on the environmental impact still show the neighboring arena. Small things, but they hint at the arena is still in the planning process.

[slowe]

Ah crap. Nothing definitive. The school and its community partners (i.e. the private developer) are just restarting conversations now to see if they have better “financial clarity.” So basically wait some more and who knows.


https://247sports.com/college/illino.../#166631767_10

On the hockey project, Whitman said the athletics department and its community partners decided to halt those discussions when the pandemic hit and just started to re-open discussions about the expensive project, which he said they were very close to green-lighting before the pandemic.

"We’ve had a few emails and back and forth with people about getting the band back together, so to speak," Whitman said.

Whitman added that the Illini and its partners will need financial clarity but that "we'll come back and see where we're at," though he didn't want to put a timeline on the project. Whitman said he feels obligated to figure out if the project is still feasible after the pandemic but not obligated to complete the project.

“We had walked it so far down the road, that we can’t just walk away from it," Whitman said.

[Split-N]

...Whitman said the athletics department and its community partners decided to halt those discussions when the pandemic hit and just started to re-open discussions about the expensive project..."We had a few emails and back and forth with people about getting the band back together, so to speak," Whitman said.

So neither the University of Illinois nor any of its "community partners" managed to discover Zoom/Slack/Microsoft Teams during the pandemic, as did the rest of the world? The only thing this thread is good for is material for amateur night at the Improv.

[JohnsonsJerseys]

So in short, we just received further confirmation that the Big could care less about hockey. I see zero pressure being exerted from the other Big schools for IL to get their butts in gear.

[Split-N]

So in short, we just received further confirmation that the Big could care less about hockey. I see zero pressure being exerted from the other Big schools for IL to get their butts in gear.

Spot on, sir. The B1G could make Illinois (or Iowa/Nebraska/Indiana/etc.) hockey happen in a New York minute, as witness its strongarming of supposedly powerful state universities Maryland and Rutgers to leave their entrenched places in their respective conferences a few years back.

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Spot on, sir. The B1G could make Illinois (or Iowa/Nebraska/Indiana/etc.) hockey happen in a New York minute, as witness its strongarming of supposedly powerful state universities Maryland and Rutgers to leave their entrenched places in their respective conferences a few years back.

Could they make it happen? Force them to adopt a financially risky sport (or any sport, frankly)?

And how do you figure Maryland and Rutgers were “strongarmed” into leaving their old conferences?

[Hockeybuckeye]

And how do you figure Maryland and Rutgers were “strongarmed” into leaving their old conferences?

Agreed! No one was strongarmed but the money of shared sports revenue was a carrot stick. The B1G wanted to expand it's sphere of influence and coverage of the Big Ten Network coast to coast and those two schools gave the a huge market increase along a very densely population section of the east coast.

[Split-N]

...No one was strongarmed...

Maryland was indeed strongarmed. Maryland had very deep roots in the ACC and the overture from the B1G met with significant opposition, especially from the hoops interests. When it appeared that Maryland might be waffling, Delany gave it an ultimatum: Commit now or forget it. IIRC, the vote to leave the ACC was not unanimous and residual hard feelings persist in some quarters to this day. In the end, it was all about money.

For the record, I have no ties to Maryland but live in the area and followed the story closely when it was happening.

[Ralph Baer]

Tomorrow it will be four years since the press conference. Things seem to be moving rapidly. :-)

[davyd83]

Tomorrow it will be four years since the press conference. Things seem to be moving rapidly. :-)

Apparently this little Covid thing may have tapped the breaks a bit. It may have had a slight effect on that fundraising portion.

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Maryland was indeed strongarmed. Maryland had very deep roots in the ACC and the overture from the B1G met with significant opposition, especially from the hoops interests. When it appeared that Maryland might be waffling, Delany gave it an ultimatum: Commit now or forget it. IIRC, the vote to leave the ACC was not unanimous and residual hard feelings persist in some quarters to this day. In the end, it was all about money.

For the record, I have no ties to Maryland but live in the area and followed the story closely when it was happening.

How is that being strongarmed? They had a decision to make, it was tightly contested and controversial, but… there’s no reason they couldn’t have just said “no”.

[JohnsonsJerseys]

Tomorrow it will be four years since the press conference. Things seem to be moving rapidly. :-)

And let's not forget, Illinois has already hung their banner as 2022 National Champions... If my math is correct, that would be next season. Better get that team started soon.

(Sorry this will be huge to show the details...)

[Sean Pickett]

And let's not forget, Illinois has already hung their banner as 2022 National Champions... If my math is correct, that would be next season. Better get that team started soon.

They hung 2 banners. Maybe one is for their women's team.

Sean