In the constantly shifting landscape of collegiate athletics, conference affiliation often denotes a source of strength, camaraderie, and identity — not to mention financial security. The current state of the NCAA makes it abundantly clear that independence, for the most part, has morphed into a precarious stance. Amid the dwindling number of Independent football teams, an alarming example is the University of Massachusetts at Amherst (aka “UMass”). In contrast to the lone wolf stature enjoyed and preserved by Notre Dame, UMass’s position as an NCAA Independent football team has proven to be less a beacon of liberty and more a signal of isolation and struggle. An outcast. The community leper.
In 2023, only four schools remain in this Purgatory: Notre Dame, Army, UConn, and UMass. The stark contrast between the successful football programs (and popularity) of Notre Dame and Army, the potential of UConn, and the ongoing struggles at UMass is a case study in the perils of NCAA football independence.
UMass football’s struggles have turned them into a pariah on the national collegiate scene, with no conference seemingly willing to open their doors. This unfortunate circumstance is the result of a combination of factors, including a historically sub-par performance on the field, a lack of sustained success, general ambivalence and absence of a fanbase (including students on game day), and the University’s own history of mistakes, misreads, and gross miscalculations.
Conference affiliation offers several benefits that UMass is currently missing. From shared resources and media contracts to recruitment advantages and scheduling stability, these are the lifeblood of a successful football program. Conferences also provide a built-in identity and rivalry network, fostering a sense of belonging and promoting competitive spirit. For UMass, their current independent status means these advantages are largely absent, resulting in a noticeable impact on their athletic performance and national reputation, not to mention a big reason for lack of give-a-shit by students, alumni, Massachusetts residents and casual football fans.
Further exacerbating the issue, UMass’s struggles aren’t confined to their football program. Their basketball program, once a force to be reckoned with in the 1990s, is now mired in mediocrity. Their Atlantic 10 conference, a shell of its former self, struggles to maintain its status even as a mid-major. UMass’s baseball team has failed to make any significant impact on a national level. The only silver lining in this rather grim scenario is the UMass hockey program, which has managed to carve out a niche for itself in the Hockey East conference.
I’m sure someone can point to a successful season here or there by the school’s non-income generating sports, but let’s be realistic: they aren’t driving the bus. It’s football #1, basketball #2, maybe hockey #3 since it’s Hockey East. Lacrosse, baseball, soccer, track-and-field, swimming & diving and everything else is pretty far back.
This lackluster performance across sports, especially in football, is likely affecting the university’s reputation, and potentially even impacting the quality of applicants it receives, particularly from out-of-state. These students bring higher tuition payments, vital for maintaining and improving university facilities and programs. State universities NEED a healthy pool of out-of-state applicants, but you don’t want the kids who can’t get accepted into their own state U’s either.
According to US News & World Report (the de facto authority in college rankings, let’s face it) for 2022 UMass ranked as #67 in National Universities, tied with Texas A&M, UConn, WPI, and Yeshiva. Not terrible, but it’s 8th highest in their own state behind MIT, Harvard, BC, BU, Northeastern, Tufts, and Brandeis. Education is competitive in Massachusetts, and big business. UMass has a lot of work to do to keep competitive in all-things-university-related. Fortunately the only other FBS-level football program is BC. More about them in a minute.
Eternal optimists will argue that it’s not all doom and gloom for UMass. At this crossroads, they have a significant opportunity to reconsider their athletic identity and reposition themselves for future success. Do they continue striving to compete on a national level, risking further damage to their reputation and finances, or do they reassess their goals and reallocate resources to become a strong regional competitor?
If UMass genuinely wishes to compete on a national level, they must take bold steps to elevate their athletic programs, starting with football. This would likely involve leaving their independent status behind and seeking a conference affiliation where they can build a new identity. This path, though challenging and costly, could start to bring the recognition they desire and they security they absolutely need.
College football conference alignment (and re-alignment) has already created multiple tiers within the FBS level, which is supposed to be the top tier of football.
The Big Ten and SEC conference are running away from the pack in terms of both on-field performance and financial success.
They are followed by the ACC, the PAC12 and the Big 12. Together with the Big Ten and SEC these schools were the upper echelon known as the “Power 5” but today there’s a clear line of demarcation between the Top 2 and the Next 3.
Then you have conferences such as the American and Mountain West. These are conferences who, each year, somehow get a team into the Top 20, a New Year’s Day bowl game, and even discussion for a CFP berth. Cincinnati, Central Florida, Boise State, Tulane come to mind. SMU hopes to be in the mix this year. Same with San Diego State.
And then you have “the rest”. This includes the MAC, Conference USA, and the Sun Belt. Some great schools and promising programs, but they don’t have the strength to compete with the Big Boys. Some are ambitious, however, and trying to work their way up.
Finally, after “the rest” is the left-behinds. The “Independents”. Sure, this includes Notre Dame and Army who have a national following and choose to not split their financial haul with others, or more importantly be told who to play each year, when to play each year, and where to play each year. They are survivors in a changing world. But, to be honest, I still don’t see them lasting as independents for much longer. The money will convince them to change eventually.
UConn is a special kind of stupid. They are $50 million in debt from their athletics investments, despite winning a national championship in basketball. However their ego is so massive based on their men’s and women’s basketball success that continue to believe they can succeed at the national level in football too. Maybe they will in the right conference, but they definitely will not as an independent. The Big 12 has reportedly made overtures but nothing solid. UConn plays in the Big East in all sports other than football (because those schools don’t play FBS level football). The Big East is a huge part of UConn’s identity from an athletics perspective. They have tried to get into the ACC before and failed. They floundered for a few years in The American conference. And then found their way back to the Big East and settled right back into winning basketball games. But football? Over the last 10 years they’d be considered the worst FBS program in the country if it wasn’t for…
You guessed it — UMass. By far the cellar-dweller of all FBS programs. In 11 full seasons at the FBS level, UMass has won a total of 21 games. That averages out to “not good, folks” status. Five times they won only 1 game in a 12-game season. In the COVID-shortened season of 2020 they won zero games. In reality, they may not have even eked-out one win that year. They have never been to a Bowl game. Never even been bowl-eligible (need to win six games for that). Their highest win total has been four wins, accomplished twice under coach Mark Whipple, who ended up parting ways with UMass after he was suspended without pay in-season for equating officials’ calls with rape during a postgame radio interview. He never recovered from that. Both on-campus and across the state, there was really no chance to overcome that comment so both Coach and Team moved on from each other.
Anyway, similar to UConn, UMass also has a big ego when it comes to their athletics. Unlike UConn, however, it’s not even remotely deserved. I think UMass looks at UConn to its south and Boston College to its east and thinks “oh yeah, we belong with these guys.” They don’t. At least UConn basketball keeps that program on the sports radar. And while Boston College is absolutely horrible trying to compete in the ACC (they haven’t been above .500 in conference football play since 2009 when they went 5-3; similarly they haven’t been above .500 in conference basketball play since the 2010-2011 season), BC is still in the ACC Conference playing the likes of UNC, Duke, Florida State, Miami, Syracuse, Pitt, Virginia, etc. and on the national stage. They are losing, but they are at least losing with style. UMass is losing against losers. Ouch.
Fortunately for UMass and current Coach Don Brown, they appear to have had a successful recruiting year with many 3-star recruits coming from both the high school ranks and current college transfers. This was desperately needed because the number of players who left the program (transferring to other FBS or FCS schools) was high. I want to say 19 players since the season started last year transferred out of UMass to play for other teams. Let the “fact-checkers” check my work. Barring situations where there is a coaching change or the NCAA levies penalties or puts a team under investigation, that is a high number of transfers. What do the players know that we don’t. They see what’s happening every day. They’re living it. And they’re getting the hell outta Dodge.
Anyway…
Despite UMass winning the Frozen Four a few years ago and having the Hobey Baker Award winner (college hockey’s version of the Heisman Trophy) in Cale Makar, a once-in-a-generation talent, unfortunately college hockey just doesn’t get much notoriety nationally. It’s football and it’s basketball. And financially, really, it’s football.
UMass thinks its success from 1990s basketball has kept its name on the national radar. It hasn’t. Maybe it has also miscalculated in believing its affiliation with the Atlantic 10 Conference (for all sports except football and hockey) has kept them relevant. It hasn’t. The “A-10” as its known has been a dying brand for decades. Its top programs have moved on to other conferences where they make more money or gain more exposure (or both). UMass has stubbornly stuck with the A-10 at a time when everyone else was leaving. While you can admire their loyalty, you have to question their decision-making. It has cost them dearly.
When UMass first made the leap from the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) to the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) they began playing in the Mid-American Conference (the MAC). It wasn’t bad for a school just getting started. They played schools such as Buffalo, Toledo, Akron, Bowling Green, Ohio, Ball State, and Central/Eastern/Western Michigan. No one that you’d consider a traditional rival nor a perennial powerhouse, but every now and then you’d get a program to crack the Top 25 and make a name for themselves.
After a few seasons playing MAC football, plus A-10 sports for nearly everything else, the MAC conference asked UMass to join for all teams. UMass balked. They wanted to cling to the A-10, whether it was because they enjoyed playing against Rhode Island, Fordham, St. Bonaventure, George Washington, Duquesne, LaSalle, et al, (the list reads like a line-up of National Powers, doesn’t it?) or they truly believed that their bread was best-buttered in the A-10, or because they completely and entirely misread the college conference realignment crystal ball and thought they had a chance at getting into a bigger conference, whatever the reason they turned down the MAC. As a result the MAC said “see ya” and they and UMass parted ways after the 2015 season. UMass has been on life-suppor—–er, I mean, Independent since.
One might think that Independent football would bring some flexibility to scheduling and some amount of autonomy. Well, it does, but it also makes it harder to schedule games when all the other conferences are trying to schedule their games against each other. Many conferences require their members to play 8 or 9 games each year against teams in their own conference. That only leaves a few games to schedule out-of-conference opponents.
The really big programs such as the Clemsons, Floridas, LSUs of the world take those opportunities to play “cupcake” games. These are games often against local rivals but significantly smaller programs (often FCS programs) just to secure the wins. They play such difficult schedules against in-conference opponents that these are considered like a week off where you can play your 2nd and 3rd stringers and still win 54-6. They usually pay the cupcake team millions of dollars to come to their home field and get destroyed.
UMass has been a cupcake team ever since they went to FBS. And now that they have no conference affiliation and no required teams to schedule they just have their hand out. They go lose at Michigan, at Tennessee, at Mississippi State, at Georgia, at Northwestern, at Florida State, at Pittsburgh, at Texas A&M. This season (2023) UMass will play at Auburn and at Penn State. Brutal.
All to get paid, like football prostitutes, so they can support this albatross of an FBS football program that costs millions and millions of dollars and doesn’t make nearly that much. They don’t make much because they don’t have a conference TV contract, they don’t win bowl games, they only get probably 3,000-4,000 attendees in their antiquated and awful stadium that seats 17,000. Can you imagine that??? An FBS program in 2023 that wants to be considered a legitimate program and their stadium only seats 17,000. They say it’s expandable to 21,000. I think even at 21,000 they would be ranked in the bottom few of all 133 FBS teams in the country — exactly where they sit from a record and performance standpoint. Yuck.
Despite that, for whatever reason, you’ll find me in Section 5 or 6 several times each year. It’s like I’m just asking for trouble.
Consider the alternative… UMass could accept a change in trajectory and focus on becoming a regional or even national powerhouse at the FCS level, akin to universities like the University of Rhode Island, UNH, UVM, and UMaine. This path would involve reshaping their budget and expectations to fit a more regionally-focused model, but it could also yield a higher success rate and stronger regional reputation.
In fact, before college football had tiers known as FBS and FCS they were simply 1A and 1AA with the larger programs being 1A and smaller programs 1AA. UMass was very competitive in 1AA, winning the national championship as recently as 1998 against Georgia Southern. In 2006 they returned to the National Championship game, losing to Appalachian State and finishing the season 13-2 and ranked #2 overall in the newly rebranded Football Championship Subdivision.
Little did we know those were the good old days for UMass football.
Bottom line — UMass’s current independent status in NCAA football is a massive barrier to their athletic success and national reputation. While independence may work for some institutions (precisely two out of 133), it’s clear that it is more of a hindrance than a boon for UMass. The university stands at a critical juncture and must reassess its future. Whether they choose to aim for national glory or to redefine success on a regional level, the status quo is untenable.
It’s time for UMass to wake up, look in the mirror, and make a definitive choice about their future.
**NOTE** In an entirely appropriate and telling coincidence, when I tried to go to UMass’ Athletics site today to get some data, images, etc. for this article, the site was completely frozen. Dead. Unresponsive. It’s still down. Maybe it’s down for the count, just like it’s football team.
Go.
Go U.
Go U-Mass.
Go. U. Mass!