Acting Marquette Athletic Director Mike Broeker joined 1250 WSSP's "Chuck and Wickett" program this morning to talk about Marquette's place in the shifting landscape of college athletics. It's a very good interview, and well worth a listen. I'll transcribe a couple of the highlights here in case you're at work (or otherwise indisposed and can't listen right now), but make sure to listen to the whole thing, if only to hear the shot that Broke takes at the leadership of the defecting Big East schools at the end of the interview.
Asked when the "musical chairs" process of realignment started:
Probably when we entered the Big East. Our whole enterprise needs to be -- I was reading something this morning, someone suggested blowing it up and starting over. I'm not sure that's a bad idea. I worked in the NBA for four years, and people took shots at our business and the way we do things, but I'm a lifelong college sports fan and I was a college athlete myself, and I'm not sure I've ever seen anything like this.
The feeling is that Marquette might find itself without a conference. Where does Marquette stand?
I'm not a subscriber to the doomsday right now. I know our league is focused on moving forward, the basketball schools have pledged their support to our football schools to help improve their product, and we're committed to moving forward as the Big East. We know we're going to be less two members, but I think there's some viable options out there for us. We have to sit and wait and watch things play out a little bit, but more than anything people have to know -- I've only been at Marquette for eight years, but I don't think you can question our commitment to our programs and our commitment to running our programs at a national level and the success we've had. So conference affiliations may change -- and I don't want our fans to take that as I have some insight on something that's going to happen today -- but if conferences affiliations change, that's going to happen, but our commitment will never waver.
Do you expect something to happen with Marquette's conference affiliation in the next couple of weeks?
I don't know, the way it's happening, it could happen before we get off the phone. If you hear me crash my car, that means somebody texted me or I read something on Twitter. It's moving so fast. It's sad. It's an indictment on what we're doing here, and what we should be about. You're starting to hear some coaches speak up on that, and I think it might be too late. It's not what college athletics should be, and it's not what we should be about. I know the kids we have on our campus and the things they do every day, and that should be our focus. And where our industry is going now -- as I said before, I have three kids under six: I think we all collectively need a timeout right now.
The big revenue generator in college athletics is typically the football program. Is there any interest in the Marquette athletic department in starting a football program at MU?
No. And quite honestly: I understand that question, but that wouldn't solve any issues right now. That football proposition is too far gone, and we're focused on the programs we have. We like the programs we have. We've added men's and women's lacrosse, we think there's great opportunity there. We're going to continue to resource those programs we have so they can have constant success on a national level. That's our focus from a programatic standpoint.