The academic funding at Tech is a much bigger deal and is much bigger money than the athletic money (that’s not the case at most of our surrounding schools).
The catalyst was really the optics of the Notre Dame and the UGA games last year. Cabrera took notice of some of the problems of the AA then. It’s not something he’d directly spend a lot of calories on since he has an all-consuming day job.
The only point that Cabrera had to make is that this problem is taken seriously at the top and that Neville is in charge and has support from the top. After that, Neville is the leader at the AA and gets all the questions because he’s the LEADER.
I’ll turn that question back on you—did you get the point I was making and the point of the meeting?
You can read my response to bke1984 where I say that Cabrera’s mission in his speech was to lay out that the situation at the AA is taken seriously at the top of the organization and that he’s appointed his best person to lead the AA while we fix it. At that point, Neville owned the room and all the questions. If Cabrera takes the questions, he’s saying “ask me and not Neville” which counters what he was doing at the meeting.
Schultz could have asked a ton of interesting questions if he had any antenna for organizational dynamics. He showed up ready to ask Cabrera a question and he wasn’t ready for anything else. Neville was the guy to ask.
Look at the timing. Cabrera sees an embarrassing situation at the AA at the Notre Dame and UGA games last year—especially the UGA game. The AA had been a functional but not welcoming front door to the university, but now it’s an eyesore. Stansbury is respected in the business community around Atlanta—he won “executive of the year”. While Stansbury was being given a chance to fix the football and AA problems, the administration evaluated the situation and dug in.
Neville is obviously the “fixer” from Cabrera for the AA problems. Schultz could have asked when Neville started looking into the AA and the football team. He could have asked how long the Board of Trustees has been discussing the state of the football team and the AA finances. He could have dug in on the need for someone who can handle the “new and shifting NCAA landscape”.
My bet is that Neville has been examining the AA dynamics since at least November. Cabrera doesn’t have time to fix the AA personally, or even dig into all the problems. Neville didn’t have that free time either, but Cabrera could rearrange responsibilities enough for Neville to fix the AA dumpster fire. Schultz or Suguira could have found out and confirmed by digging in with good questions yesterday. Neville is on the Board of Trustees and has been this whole time. Schultz misread the press conference and dynamics and wasn’t ready.
(Why didn’t Collins get fired in November? 1. Stansbury said “we can fix this” and 2. Cabrera and probably Neville preferred to use the offseason to gauge and plan their response and see what needed to be done at the AA. When no improvement was visible after 3-4 games and there were other issues at the AA, Cabrera and Neville acted)
Suguira wasn’t really prepared either, but he was more prepared than Schultz.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Schultz had his story mostly written before the press conference, and had pre-filled spots for Cabrera’s answers.
I’d say that was a pretty energetic speech for a university president.
But, we were always going to be in a “wait and see” situation unless he showed up and said the wrong things. He said the right things. Now it’s time to wait and see.
He put a big gun in charge of the AA. So far, the actions look right.
