9/6/2023 0 Comments Tulane conference realignmentIn hindsight, of course, Tulane made a major mistake. “Tulane is a national university,” then-Tulane football coach Tom O’Boyle said at the time. In addition, Tulane leaders were trying to attract the best and brightest students from across the country and felt becoming an independent and playing a national schedule would help their longterm admissions approach. Isn’t it amazing that in those bygone days of yesteryear before billion-dollar TV contracts that Tulane’s leadership felt it could not afford to stay in the SEC? Now, 56 years later, every Group of Five team in the country would sell its soul to be an SEC member and collect the projected $100 million annual check the league will soon be dispersing to each of its members.Īt the time, Tulane seceded from the SEC, university administrators also felt that the school’s growing academic reputation would be helped if Tulane – unlike many others in the SEC – actually required its football players to pursue a legitimate degree. Longenecker announced that Tulane would leave the SEC in June 1966.” After over a year of consideration, on Decemthen-Tulane president and SEC Vice President Herbert E. …ĭe-emphasis and its succeeding cutbacks led to the most consequential decision in the school’s athletic history - its decision to leave the conference it once chartered. In the 1964 season, Tulane athletics spent $260,000 in tuition alone for football scholarships, not including the cost of housing and meals, and it was reported that the university was losing a half million dollars per year on the sport. In SEC play, Tulane posted a dismal 16-71-5 record and the university’s scholarship restrictions were so tough that there were just 38 players on the varsity football roster one season. The program had just two winning seasons and cycled through four coaches during that time. During the 14-year de-emphasis period from 1952 to 1965, Tulane football went 37-95-8 overall, averaging less than three wins per season. The new parameters set by Harris proved to be problematic for the Wave’s SEC prowess. Tulane also reclassified physical education as a minor, and athletes were required to follow tracks leading to bachelor’s degrees. In 1951, Harris reduced the number of football scholarships to 75, cut the salaries of staff and coaches and limited its coaches’ ability to scout talent. Tulane’s downward trajectory started when then-president Rufus Harris scaled back the university’s intercollegiate athletics. At the time, Tulane had about 100 athletes on scholarship - a typical number for an SEC program - and most football players studied physical education, which required no academic major and allowed 50 hours of P.E. “Following the 1949 season, several decisions led to the downfall of Tulane football.
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