Just about a month ago, there were reports of dwindling student attendance at UH football games.
A Star-Advertiser story was headlined: “UH student attendance at football games falls nearly 90%”.
According to the story:
Athletic director Jim Donovan was asked by Board of Regents vice chairman James Lee on Wednesday why “the last three games the stands were empty (of students)?”
Hawaii News Now reported:
The declining numbers are even more difficult to understand when considering that for the first time, students can attend games for free. Last January, every student had to pay a $50 student activity fee. In return they are eligible for free tickets. There’s even a free shuttle from campus to Aloha Stadium.
“Difficult to understand” the low student interest?
Fast forward to this week.
Item #1. Norm Chow, the new UH football coach, makes his first public appearance to introduce his newly selected coaching staff. And did this first public appearance by the new coach take place in the crowded Manoa student center, where there’s lots of excitement during this first week of Spring semester classes, or perhaps later in the day near the UH dorms and athletic complex, where it might attract students, faculty, and staff of the Manoa campus?
Nope. It took place in a basement restaurant downtown, at a lunch event organized by a brand new booster group, the Downtown Athletic Club (“Coach Chow wows ’em at first public appearance in Hawaii“, Star-Advertiser breaking news).
According to the group’s press release:
The Downtown Athletic Club is a non-profit organization founded by Keith Amemiya, Peter Ho, Kalowena Komeiji, Duane Kurisu, Don Murphy, Raymond Ono and Kurt Osaki. Through monthly luncheons and other events, the club will provide a venue to discuss, debate, support, enhance and raise awareness for local sports. The inclusive club hopes to create a bridge for corporations, community organizations and government to facilitate and promote sports throughout the state.
Hawaii Business Blog reported:
The Downtown Athletic Club is a non-profit founded by Amemiya, Peter Ho, Kalowena Komeiji, Duane Kurisu, Don Murphy, Raymond Ono and Kurt Osaki. (Disclosure: Duane Kurisu is the chairman and CEO of aio, the parent company of ESPN 1420 and PacificBasin Communications, which publishes Hawaii Business magazine.)
Kurisu is also a director of Oahu Publications, owner of the Star-Advertiser.
There’s no mention this morning of whether any UH administrators or faculty athletic committee representatives were present or played any role in the event. Governor Abercrombie is visible, front and center, in a Star-Advertiser photo. UH administrators? Not so much.
To be clear, I’m glad there’s interest and that these folks are organizing to support the athletics program.
But wouldn’t it have been, well, diplomatic, to introduce the coach on campus first and at least maintain the appearance that football is a university activity, perhaps even inviting those downtown supporters to set foot on the campus?
Item #2–also this week, a story in the UH campus newspaper, Ka Leo: “President’s office ignores ASUH request for student inclusion.”
Several interesting bits tucked away here. It seems Anna Koethe, the elected student government president on the Manoa campus, never even got a reply to letter to UH President M.R.C. Greenwood requesting student representation added to the football coach selection committee.
According to Koethe, these arguments found sympathy with Chancellor Virginia Hinshaw, but the issue was not under her control. “Hinshaw was responsive and supportive, but even though it was a M?noa issue, the [UH] System decided to take jurisdiction over it. No one from the System or Athletics responded,” said Koethe.
The difficulty here is that NCAA rules require Manoa Chancellor Hinshaw to have control of the athletic program, and the university has just recently given assurances to the NCAA that this is the case.
In a required self-study submitted to the NCAA in 2011, UH stated:
Specific to the University of Hawai’i at Manoa, Board of Regents policy states that the intercollegiate athletic program shall be administered by the Director of Athletics under the direction of the Chancellor.
And, as I pointed out in an earlier entry, the NCAA’s primary governance rule requires authority over the athletic program to be lodged at the level of the Manoa chancellor.
Once again, the way this selection process was handled directly contradicted the university’s previous assurances to the NCAA, and appears to have been run counter to NCAA governance rules.
So back to the question of student attendance. No mystery. When their representatives expressed interest, they apparently didn’t even got the courtesy of a reply. Isn’t that a clue?