What to Add?

 In this second post of what is really a two-parter, I analyze a statement soon-to-be-former UT Arlington Athletic Director Jim Baker said to the Shorthorn on a story they ran about his retirement. 

UTA Athletics has been pursuing an athletics master plan that will address current and long-term needs, improvements and facility expansion for most Division I teams. It will also help revitalize the west side of campus. 
Baker said UTA is 95% done with the plan and wants to ensure that it gets passed down to the new administration as a road map. But any decisions regarding the plan will be up to the new Athletics director and UTA president. 
“I won’t have a say in it, nor should I,” he said. “I just wanted to make sure they have all the information.”

The first entry mentioned what is obvious, the facility renovations. However, reading between the lines, along with what I've heard in the background, I suspect the department is once again eyeing an expansion of sports, even if preliminarily.

Return of the WAC

Like Mark Morrison sang (using a small play on words), the Sun Belt is breaking up with the UT Arlington Athletic Department, prompting UTA to rejoin a familiar conference, which contains some familiar faces. 

How'd we get here? Plain and simple. UTA lacks a football program. This move was not initiated by UTA, but rather by discontent within the Sun Belt Conference. As the Sun Belt changed leadership and direction, they elected to focus their strategy on growing revenue through football. 

Of course, that's the one thing, the one, that UTA in its current form could not help with in accomplishing.

Next New Sport?

I've been hearing some interesting rumors and wanted to wait until the summer to begin the discussion out of respect for the sports in play, as well as give me some fodder for the summertime lull.

The UT Arlington Athletic Department will begin women's golf intercollegiate play following this coming academic year. The sport will be the first addition since 1983. By all accounts, that will not be the last sport as the department is in the very preliminary stages of looking at another sport.

I thought about creating a tease indicating something else, but thought that just might be a bit cruel, so I'll just come out and say it. It is not football. But before the reveal, let me give some context to the thinking in UTA land.