Stadium Size, Football Droppers, and Deemphasizers: Catholic U.

An earlier Tidbit profiled some colleges that dropped football, and others told stories about individual schools that later dropped or deemphasized football. Schools that dropped or deemphasized football tended to be private, urban, independent schools, though we have had droppers among state schools in California.

Based on the Concorde Fallacy, one would expect schools that significantly invested in their football program to have more difficulty dropping the sport. The Concorde Fallacy operates when individuals or organizations allow sunk costs to justify continued investments in a struggling venture. The investments can be financial or emotional, so looking at droppers and deemphasizers based on their stadium size seemed appropriate. Since stadium size is a surrogate for money spent on the program, only college-owned stadiums count for this analysis.

Schools like NYU, which once packed Yankee Stadium, or Santa Clara, which did the same with Kezar Stadium, don't get credit for rented stadiums, only those they owned. I'll include such schools, rank them based on their owned stadiums, or drop them as appropriate. I'm also including and excluding schools based on my perception of whether they played the equivalent of today's Division I football, and I will modify and rerank the list as we move along.

I'll review one or two schools at a time. Below is the alphabetical list of schools I plan to look at, using this Wiki list as a starting point. Use the comments to suggest other candidate schools, but include links to stadium sizes and competitive schedules.

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Catholic University

We'll start with Catholic University since it covers many of the issues we will see elsewhere. As the name suggests, it is a Catholic university and was the first among them to drop football. It is also a school that most do not associate with big-time football.

The Catholic U. program started in 1895, playing a regional schedule for decades before opening the 30,000-seat Brookland Stadium in 1924. The stadium was to push Catholic U. into the Eastern Catholic college football conversation with BC, Fordham, Holy Cross, and especially Georgetown. The stadium sounded more impressive than the reality, and while there were lower standards for stadiums back then, Brookland appears to have been built on the cheap.

Brookland Stadium hosted a Mass in 1932. (Bygone Brookland)

Nevertheless, the program reached its heights in the 1930s under former Minnesota assistant Dutch Bergman, highlighted by its victory over Mississippi State in the 1935 Orange Bowl.

1936 Orange Bowl champion team (1936 Catholic yearbook)

Catholic also played Arizona State to a scoreless tie in the 1940 Sun Bowl, but a change in the school's athletic philosophy was in the offing. Several months later, the school announced plans to add baseball, tennis, and swimming while dropping from big-time football. Bergman, the football coach and athletic director, resigned, and the school later canceled the 1941 schedule. Of course, WWII meant there was little reason to return to football until 1947 when they did so at a nonscholarship level. Uncertainty about male student enrollments during the Korean War led them and others to drop football.

Football returned in 1977 at the DIII level, which they continue playing today.

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Ranking by Stadium Size

Below are the schools reviewed to date, ranked by stadium size. The stadiums’ opening and demolition years (if applicable) are also noted.

1. Catholic (Brookland Stadium): 30,000 | 1924 - 1985

2. Denver (DU/Hilltop Stadium): 30,000 | 1925 - 1971

3. Marquette (Marquette Stadium): 24,000 | 1924 - 1977

4. Xavier (Corcoran Stadium): 15,000 | 1929 - 1988

5. Gonzaga (Gonzaga Stadium): 12,000 | 1922 - 1949

6. California State University, Fullerton (Titan Stadium): 10,000 | 1992 - TBD

7. Boston University (Nickerson Field): 10,000 | 1915 - TBD

8. Vermont (Centennial Field): 10,000 | 1923 - TBD

9. NYU (Ohio Field): 5,000 (est.) | 1897 - 1947

10. San Francisco (St. Ignatius Stadium): <5,000 (est.) | c. 1909 - c. 1930

11. Carnegie-Mellon (Skibo Bowl): 4,500 | 1960 - 1987 | Gesling Stadium: 3,900 | 1990 - TBD

12. Sewanee (McGee Field): 3,000 | 1891 - TBD

Schools to Review

California State University, Long Beach | University of California, Santa Barbara | Case Western | Chicago | CCNY | Creighton | DePaul | Detroit | Drake | Loyola (Chicago) | Nebraska-Omaha | Pacific | St. Louis | Santa Clara | Tampa | Washington University in St. Louis | Wichita State

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