In the most recent edition of Cougar Sports Weekly, I explored just why it is that Bill Moos is pushing donations to the Cougar Athletic Fund so hard -- and what kind of a difference those donations could make. Here's an excerpt:
It appears that some Cougs have started to tire of Bill Moos' seemingly unending mantra about the need for donations to the Cougar Athletic Fund. ...
But what if WSU had received enough donations to the CAF to cover the cost of scholarships over those six years? What if Jim Sterk and Bill Moos had instead been able to use that $37 million -- or $6.1 million a year -- on facilities? Here's where WSU would have ranked, relative to its peers:
That's right: WSU would essentially have been on par with Oregon -- OREGON! -- for spending on facilities over the past six years if the CAF had already met its stated goal and the revenue that had previously been designated for scholarships could be shifted solely to facilities.
This is why Bill Moos won't stop asking you to give. When you look at that first table, the deficit seems insurmountable. But when you look at that last table, it suddenly doesn't look so impossible. Could WSU fans give, in total, $7 million a year? That really doesn't seem like a ridiculously high number, and it would allow WSU to be more than competitive in terms of building and maintaining facilities relative to its peers.
There were a lot of other pretty graphs in there too, examining WSU athletics spending in general. I also spent some time rounding up what WSU's baseball players -- both current and former -- are up to, and checked in with Cougars attempting to qualify for the Olympics. Subscribe here.