March 8, 2006

Dear Gamecock Family:

What does it take to develop a nationally prominent athletic program at the Division I level? The answer is multi-faceted, but some key ingredients include strong leadership, excellent coaches, top recruits, supportive fans and state-of-the-art facilities for all programs.

Where does USC stack up with other nationally prominent programs, both in and out of our conference, in those key ingredients? In some areas we compare quite well, but in other areas, quite frankly, not so well.

Overall, we have good personnel and leadership at Carolina and definitely have the most loyal fans in the country. The university has an excellent reputation and makes a wonderful presentation to attract top-quality students world-wide with the new fraternity and sorority houses, the beautiful Horseshoe area of campus and top-of-the-line facilities like the Strom Thurmond Wellness Center. However, the same cannot be said for the recruitment of student-athletes to USC. They are attracted to the university, the faculty and the coaching staff, but the athletic facilities fall short of expectations of a program striving to be nationally prominent.

This past fall, several USC administrators, board members and athletic department staff members visited the athletic facilities of several SEC schools to see what our recruits see when they visit other institutions. We saw athletic facilities that were incredibly impressive and state-of-the-art. In comparison, it was obvious we are light years behind with the majority of our athletic facilities. It was easy to see why a prospective student-athlete may skeptically interpret our words of striving for national excellence when our actions, in terms of providing the facilities expected of a SEC school, do not suggest sincerity in our goal.

With much work to do to improve our facilities, we had to develop a list of priorities. One of our first priorities is to build a new academic learning center, which would impact all of our student-athletes. Many of you are aware of the new and very stringent academic standards that are strongly impacting every NCAA Division I school across the nation. To provide our student-athletes with the assistance they need to keep up with the new academic standards, we must have an academic center that meets their needs. The building we are currently using is extremely outdated in terms of technology, tutoring space sessions and computer stations. Also, we do not have an appropriate setup for those with learning differences. We have many more teams and student-athletes now than we did when the building was built 30 years ago, but we have not made any adjustments to accommodate the increased number. We have simply outgrown our current facility.

Other athletic department priorities include the building of a new, much-needed baseball stadium and the addition of another women’s sport in order to be in compliance with Title IX (a cost of $500,000-plus). Increased tuition costs continually decrease our scholarship funding, our administrative offices are cramped, outdated and inadequate and many of our varsity sports are lacking appropriate first-class facilities.

How do we address these issues to become one of the most prolific schools in the Southeast? We must start by evaluating our current budgeting practices, increasing our revenue and increasing our fundraising efforts. There are many ways to secure the funding needed. The first way is to be good stewards of the money we currently have. I have asked the entire athletic department to look at ways we can save money. Some examples of the cost saving measures we have taken include: consolidating jobs, centralizing the ticket office in the Colonial Center, not filling all personnel openings, putting our athletic travel budget out to bid (a savings of over $100,000 next year alone) and implementing zero-based budgeting. I do not believe in asking for money if we are not willing to make sacrifices within the department to maximize our available funds. I do not believe in waste.

Another way to raise funds is to have an athletic facilities development campaign, which we will implement over time.

The quickest way to get some of the immediate funding for our most critical needs is to raise football ticket prices to be in-line with other SEC schools. This is where, for many years, our competition has been getting some of their funding for improved facilities and we have not kept up. For example, in 2005, a football season ticket cost $210 at Carolina, compared to $268 at Tennessee, $280 at Alabama and $295 at Auburn. That translates into millions of dollars of lost revenue that could have been used to help us compete at the highest level. In addition, many schools, including Clemson, charge more for premium games. Had Carolina charged more for premium games last year, it would have meant a substantial amount of additional revenue.

Knowing that each and every loyal Carolina fan wants to field nationally competitive teams year in and year out, I am asking you to sacrifice a little also by supporting our raising of football ticket prices. When we begin our campaign drive, I will be asking again for your support as we all work together toward our goal of being among the best in the country.

Thank you for supporting the Gamecocks!

Eric Hyman

Director of Athletics

University of South Carolina