June 2, 2008

Numerous Tiger fans have posed questions to Director of Athletics Mike Alden via the "Ask the AD" feature on mutigers.com, and Mike has answered several of them here in his first set of answers.

To ask a question of Mike, please visit the "Ask the AD" page. Mike answers each question, and several are posted each month.

Q: Later in the '07 football season and apparently now for all of the '08, the athletic department started charging people for parking. As a student who pays endless amounts of money I don't have to the university, I was a bit perplexed. The support of students is essential for the future growth of the athletic department, but charging them $10 per game to park/tailgate is unnecessary. Has the department thought about what might happen if students decide to tailgate in other locations off-campus because they don't want to pay for parking? Have other options been submitted for exploration, i.e. a lot specifically for students or a parking pass available for purchase when students sign up for their all-sports pass?
- Christina, Columbia, Mo.

There is a new parking plan for this year. In doing that, we tried considering all of our constituent groups that we work with, in particular: our students, our faculty, our staff, as well as our donors and general public. We determined that in order for us to provide a much better experience for folks coming to our games, we were going to have to charge for that parking in order to support the costs associated with maintenance, parking attendants, port-a-pots, etc. While we want to make sure that it's always an affordable product for our fans, especially our students, to come and see, we have to make sure that it's not only affordable, but also clean, safe, and a positive experience. We're the last school in the Big 12 to implement something like this, which I think is a common occurrence in college athletics and professional sports. Those students that choose to park in another location are certainly welcome to do so, but we want to make sure that fans that park in these lots are going to have a positive experience as far as cleanliness, safety, and the patron services that they'll be expecting. So, it's a good question, something we considered, and hopefully something that won't negatively impact our students.

Q: What are the next improvements slated for Faurot Field/Memorial Stadium? Any plans for more seating? If so, where?
- Robert Robidoux, Fenton, Mo.

The first improvements are ones that folks won't see, and that will happen this summer. We're going to go in and do a facelift of the game-day locker room for our football team, which will include the post-game media interview room. Those improvements won't cost too much, but they will improve the game-day experience not only for our football players, but also the media. The second thing our fans will see for the 2009 season is the planned improvements relative to our video board and sound system. Those systems are at least 12 years old, and not necessarily state-of-the-art anymore. Some might argue they're even archaic by today's standards. That's the plan today, and we're staying the course on that. As for the question of seat additions, we have considered through our master plan where we would increase the size of Memorial Stadium at the point that we wanted to do so. However, folks won't see us move forward on that until we show consistently that we can sell out Faurot Field at 68,000, no matter who we're playing, whether it's Nebraska or Nevada. So it's important that our fan base continues to show up in force, and once we see the demand for that, we'll look to make those changes.

Q: Will the Tiger Caravan be coming to the Springfield area this spring?
- Jeff McClelland, Springfield, Mo.

The Tiger Caravan will not be making a trip to Springfield this year. We originally had tentatively scheduled a trip to the area, but scheduling issues precluded us from making this trip this year. Springfield is certainly a priority for us for future opportunities with the Caravan.

Q: Any chance MU could play a high caliber non-conference opponent in the near future in between the next possible set of games at Arrowhead against KU? A Notre Dame or Purdue in the next couple of years at Arrowhead would be outstanding.
- Mike, Kansas City, Mo.

On the non-conference games, we've made a conscious decision for the four games that we play, to have 1) one BCS opponent, which at the moment is Illinois, and I hope that that continues for quite some time; 2) we want to continue to play one I-AA [Football Championship Subdivision] opponent, which we will continue to do - this year it is SEMO, last year it was Illinois State; and 3-4) we will most likely play two additional games against schools that will come from primarily the Sun Belt, WAC, or perhaps Mountain West conferences. That's the conscious decision we've made. So I don't think you're going to see us schedule an additional game against a BCS school, either at Arrowhead or on-campus, in the near future. We're focused on that one non-conference BCS game, which right now is Illinois, and then getting prepared for playing in what we think is one of the strongest leagues in the country.

Q: Thank you for your hard work at MU. I am glad you represent the University and our state. My question is, with the growth of Baseball are there any future plans to expand Taylor Stadium or build another stadium on campus?
- Phil Griffin, Lee's Summit, Mo.

I would direct your attention to the baseball section of mutigers.com to see the renderings of our planned improvements to our baseball program at Mizzou. We continue to be tremendously grateful to Ralph and Debbie Taylor for their commitment towards jump-starting this project, and building the facility we have today, about nine years ago. But certainly we have a plan for continued improvement, and those are featured on our web page.

Q: Are any sports being considered for addition to MU Athletics? If so, how do you and your department identify such sports? If not, what are the barriers preventing expanding MU's athletic opportunities? Thanks!
- Kurt Austin, Columbia, Mo.

There are no sports that are being planned to start at Mizzou in the foreseeable future. Our focus is to be the best that we can be in the 20 sport programs that we currently have, and we've seen tremendous improvement in all of them, but until we can get a program where we have 20 programs competing for Big 12 Championships, I don't think you'll see us take a look at adding any sport programs.

Q: My question is this Mr. Alden is why doesn't Missouri play other Big Ten schools in football besides Illinois in St. Louis? That would generate a lot more interest for the Missouri fans. I used to Live in eastern Iowa and my family and I have had season tickets to Iowa football for 30 years Iowa City is a wonderful college town and the Iowa fans are truly devoted to their football program. Eight years ago I moved to southern Illinois because of a different job. I missed going to Iowa City so I decided to order season football tickets at Columbia and it was like a mirror image but there are 3 things you should know about Iowa football: All the players use gold pants either at home or away; second is the entire football team comes out together - that was called the Iowa Swarm - and the last one is the visitor's locker room is painted pink. I mean everything is pink.
- Roger Newman, Belleville, Ill.

I appreciate your question and thank you for relating your experiences. We will focus on playing one BCS opponent in football in the non-conference season. I think any opportunity we have to consistently match up - in any of our sport programs - with the Big Ten is a good thing for us. Because I think the people in the Big 12 relate to the people in the Big Ten. The schools have a lot of similarities, and I think there's a lot of interest on both sides for interconference play. I also think that Mizzou stacks up very well academically as an institution nationally with regards to the reputation of schools like Iowa, Wisconsin, Ohio State, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and so on.  So I think there's a commonality in that, and I think folks will see us continue to have good matchups in all of our sport programs, but we won't add more than one BCS opponent in the non-conference schedule per year.

Q: Have there been any discussions on what measures might be taken to make getting to the men's basketball games for ticket holders (particularly for older folks) a little easier? For example, more close parking lots, shuttle service to the arena, etc. I believe that is one of the reasons that accounts for poor attendance in bad or extremely cold weather. It's easier to just stay home and watch on TV.
- AJ, Rocheport, Mo.

That's a great question, because that's an issue that we've seen not only internally, but our fans have let us know that as well. Our first approach on all of this was to be able to address our football parking issues, which we think we've done for this year. And now this summer, as we analyze our basketball parking, I think that our fans will see improved efforts, in all of the areas you cited, with regards to the 2008-09 season. We need to make it easier, and more efficient for our fans to get to the games, not only in their cars, but on foot traffic after they park. My hope is to have a plan in place to roll out this fall.

Q: Hi Mike. Thanks to a friend, our annual golf tournament, the Connor's Irish Classic, secured the autographs from Coach Pinkel, Jeremy Maclin, Chase Daniel, and Carl Gettis. This was a total surprise and we are very appreciative. Because of these fellas, we raised a surprising amount of money for our veterans. Though we are a small affair, MIZZOU came through. I am so thankful for the unselfishness of these members of your organization. If there is an address I can send a letter of thanks and appreciation it would be great. I can send it to you if you'd prefer. We're just very thankful. Thanks for your time Mike, GO MIZZOU!!
- Tom Connors, St. Peters, Mo.

We appreciate any opportunity Mizzou has to be able to help organizations to generate support for those organizations, particularly worthy causes, and we're honored to be associated with those. Any letters of thanks absolutely should be directed to the head coach of that sport, and hopefully a copy to not only our Chancellor, Brady Deaton, but also to myself. Our head coaches do a great job of coordinating those efforts, and I hope they would be recognized for them.

To send mail to any member of the athletic department, please use this address:

[Staff Member or Department Name]
Mizzou Athletics
Mizzou Arena
One Champions Drive
Columbia, MO 65205
(573) 882-6501

Q: Hi, I met you at the Country Club today for the Tiger Caravan. I heard that Tommy Saunders has quite the vertical leap and I am playing high school basketball and I want to know some secrets on increasing my vertical leap. Thank you... see you next year.
- Reed Schneider, St. Joseph, Mo.

This is pretty simple, and I don't mean to trivialize the question, I'm being serious: Work hard. If you work as hard as Tommy Saunders works, I can assure you that all of your physical capabilities will improve, because he is the hardest working player we have on our entire football team, according to Coach Pinkel - bar none.