Grand Canyon moved to DI this season, in the WAC, making them the only for-profit school in DI.  They are a publicly traded company with stockholders.  

 Arizona State was very much against accepting them. Consequently, they've cancelled all future games with any Grand Canyon teams and, reportedly, urged the rest of the PAC-12 to follow suit. 

Man, I can only hope this means coach Viddy (Phelan) has to take his talents to the D1 level. 

The Arizona State president is worried that a group of wealthy investors, wanting a championship football team, will invest $150 million in a for-profit school and dominate football.  Therefore, he won't play Grand Canyon.

That's rather hypocritical of him, considering he still plays Oregon in every sport. 

Oregons new $68 million Football Performance Center, paid for by Phil Knight and Nike, features;

1) hand-woven rugs from Nepal;
2) couches made in Italy;
3) hardwood in the weight from from Brazil that is so dense that it's believed to be fire-resistant. 
4) a barbershop with utensils from Milan
5) a duckpond
6) a locker room that can be accessed by biometric thumbprints
7) chairs upholstered with the same leather as a Ferrari interior
8) walls covered with Nike leather
9) garbage cans so opulent that the University refuses to release the price
 

Also - Didn't the PAC 10 go after Texas? 

Posted by ll316 on 9/22/2013 3:39:00 PM (view original):
Also - Didn't the PAC 10 go after Texas? 

Yep.  But Texas stayed where they were because they can write their own ticket in the Big XII, including their own school-run athletics channel.

Posted by ethan66 on 9/23/2013 12:32:00 AM (view original):

Posted by ll316 on 9/22/2013 3:39:00 PM (view original):
Also - Didn't the PAC 10 go after Texas? 

Yep.  But Texas stayed where they were because they can write their own ticket in the Big XII, including their own school-run athletics channel.

Oh, I get that.  Just that it's a little hypocritical to hold it against Grand Canyon U if you're going to court a school like UT.

I've been following this as well because Dan Majerle is coaching the men's basketball team after getting shafted by Suns management for the head coaching job after they fired Alvin Gentry. Majerle is one of my all-time favorite players. Majerle has done a very good job recruiting, especially in the signing of 6'4 Joshua Braun.

http://vimeo.com/38402917

“Josh is the type of player I’m looking for,” said Majerle. “He reminds me of myself when I was younger. He is a hard worker and more importantly he is a winner. I am excited to have a player of Josh’s caliber be my first signing at GCU.”

Nice bit of hypocrisy from ASU.

is that just one single campus? market cap of 1.8 billion right now, seems on the high side... even in a market where just about everything is on the high side. i guess they do turn a decent profit, and maybe investors are thinking the same thing as ASU? doesnt forbes or someone put out a valuation on football programs? i feel like the big ones can break the billion dollar mark but i doubt its more than the select few...

edit: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324391104578225802183417888.html

wall street journal has a ranking, texas tops the list around 750 million... but the mid range BCS programs are only around 150 million. seems that expectations, in the next 5 years or so, even 10 years, cant possibly be beyond the average BCS program. and who the heck is pricing in success that far out anyway? unless you are a tesla investor, of course... but that is a dramatically different situation...

Considering that Harvard owns an endowment that could give every student at the school free tuition on just the interest it earns but still announced at $5.6 billion fundraising campaign in the last week or so, I have a hard time seeing any college as anything but "for profit" these days...

Agree with everything said here.  I recently became a Grand Canyon fan and now have season tickets to basketball (mid-court, 10th row, not expensive).  The arena is nice but with no BS, parking is easy, there isn't advertising being pushed down your throat (except maybe promoting the school itself).  Basically, it is a more "pure" athletic experience that you would get at any of the PAC-10 schools.  Plus, they refuse to sell the naming rights to the arena: "Grand Canyon discussed putting the naming rights for its new arena on the market. But Mueller decided that if it has value to another company then it has at least that much value as Grand Canyon University Arena."

Yeah. I agree with Rednu.

I think it's been a LONG time since any D1 college was anything but for profit, whatever their "official" stance or listing may reflect. Anyone been on a Major D1 campus lately? Did you actually SEE any American kids there? Or was it 90% Chinese nationals? Once they start pricing American kids OUT of an educational opportunity and start catering to foreign nationals who get a free ride from their government, I think it's safe to say where your interests are and I don't think it's the business of education, but more the business of profiting off of Education.

This is well off topic, but is there any reason a private university SHOULD preferentially take an American student over a more-qualified foreign student?  Because I don't see one.  If they aren't associated with any government but just happen to be located in this country, they owe no allegiance to the United States or its people.  As an educational institution, they should be attempting to bring in the best students, not the closest ones.

Similarly, I see no reason why state schools should favor domestic out-of-state students over foreign students.  However, the schools who do take significant amounts of money from the federal government might need to look at things a bit differently...

should people, organizations, and companies give preferential treatment to their country and their country's people? a country gets its money from its people, and spends it on its people - so a country certainly gives its people preferential treatment. the stronger the country and the country's people, the more preferential treatment said country's people, organizations, and companies get.

YES seems like a no brainer to me, dahs

I don't see a particular reason to worry about Grand Canyon. It won't be a big enough player in D1 to be relevant when the post-NCAA reorganization of college athletics starts in the next decade.