SE: Ask the AD – Facebook Live Edition with Gene Taylor
Jun 12, 2020 | Football, Women's Basketball, Sports Extra
K-State Director of Athletics Gene Taylor joined K-State Senior Director of Broadcasting & Video Services Brian Smoller for another Facebook Live edition of Ask the AD this week.
Here are a few of the most interesting quotes and soundbites from a discussion that covered student-athletes and their fight for racial equality, COVID-19 testing procedures for K-State football and questions from Wildcat fans.
The conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.
BS: Black Lives Matter has been a social movement within our society, from folks across the country to a couple of our women's basketball players, Christianna Carr and Peyton Williams, speaking out. AJ Parker also had a great, very thoughtful post on social media. From your perspective as an AD, as we've gone through this period of turmoil but also reflection, evaluation and assessment of where we are as a country, what's your takeaway so far?
GT: I'll say this, it's been a very difficult time for our black student-athletes, our black coaches and staff going through the full range of emotions from anger to sadness to frustration from the racism and police brutality that they've seen. The death of George Floyd didn't start this movement, it's been going on for many years, but I think the frustration and the anger really came out after that.
The thing I'm learning is listening to our black athletes and staff, learning from them what they face and what we can do as white Americans to help. We had a tremendous effort between the University of Oklahoma and Kansas State, we had over 600 people from across the country on a Zoom call, probably 400 student-athletes from across the country and other staff. From those opportunities, we're going to start creating some action plans and steps. Julian Jones is our Assistant AD for Student-Athlete Development, and he's really taken the lead on this with our student-athletes. He's done a really great job. He and Anne Weese, our Sports Psychologist, have reached out to a lot of our student-athletes both individually and as teams and have let them share their frustration, share their voice and talk about how this upsets them.
We're going to create a student-athlete driven Diversity and Culture Group that's going to talk to us and our department. And then on campus we're doing a lot of great things under Dr. Bryan Samuel's leadership. So, my hat is off to our students and our staff, their leadership and their ability to step up. Chrissy Carr said, "I'm learning to find my voice" and that's very impressive to see. We're going to keep talking and find ways to make things better.
BS: Speaking of students, student-athletes are back in town and there was the announcement here, just a couple hours ago, of student-athletes being back and tested. It sounds like, for the most part, testing has gone pretty well?
GT: We tested just over 90 football players and we'll continue to test the rest of them. They have to be in town for a certain number of days and some of our freshmen are just getting into town. We're very pleased that we had all negative test results, which means that the athletes were following the necessary medical procedure to not get the virus. As other student-athletes come back, we'll test them before they're allowed to get into the facilities. Again, our goal is to keep them safe and keep them from getting the virus. We're going to do everything we can.
BS: Here's a fan question from Scott McFarland who is part of Boscoe's Boys and a friend of the show. With the overwhelming popularity of the 'Cats' script logo, will that or any other alternate decals make an appearance this season?
GT: I don't know about alternates, but I do think we will see the 'Cats' logo. I know the players liked it and the coaches liked it, so I hope we see it again. I haven't heard of any new ones for this year, but again sometimes they like to spring that on me once they get it all figured out.
BS: Well I should say the Cats script logo wasn't quite the same font, but the word "Cats" was involved in the retro baseball uniform that got quite a bit of run on social media earlier this week, what did you think of those?
GT: I saw that, I like them. Again, for a lot of reasons, I was sorry we didn't get to play our spring baseball season. They had some pretty cool uniforms that they were going to unveil this spring, so hopefully we'll get a chance to see those next spring.
BS: Usually around Thanksgiving, the men's and women's basketball teams take trips to the Caribbean, has there been any talk about those tournaments being in jeopardy at all because of COVID-19?
GT: We still plan on attending. Both men and women have various trips around the Thanksgiving time period. I think there was one team that pulled out on the women's side, but they were still going to have the tournament. Miami's athletic director called me, they're in the men's tournament, and asked if we were still planning on coming. As far as I know, unless we have a spike or something serious, both teams are planning on those trips.
BS: As far as travel goes, we talked recently about more regionalized travel coming up for some of the sports, maybe trimming up their schedules a little bit, has there been any movement on that front?
GT: We're getting closer to announcing the volleyball schedule with that in mind - both in trying to save cost and taking less trips, instead of multiple trips. The soccer schedule is pretty well set, I don't know if there will be any changes there. We're getting close and I think it's coming to the ADs next week to approve. There will be some changes with volleyball.
BS: Well we do appreciate your time. Is there anything else you want to say to the fans? We didn't talk about the south end zone at all?
GT: It's been fun. I've been in the office quite a bit and I've seen the progress. There's a lot of steel up for the structure for the new premium seating, and the video board is up and they are working on the other one, so it's moving right along. According to our general contractor and our architects they feel good, and we've had no delays and good weather recently. They have a lot of safety measures for their work which is good. No delays, and it's coming right along. The goal is to have the video boards and the sound system ready for this year. It's been fun to watch.
I want to thank our fans for their patience. We are so used to rolling right into June and having our season tickets and then single game sales. We just don't have all the answers and are trying to get those answers to them. But I appreciate their patience, understanding and working with us. I hope, in the next couple weeks, we'll have a really good idea of what kind of capacity we'll have to work with. Our goal is to have as many as we can, but we want to make sure we are safe when we do it.
Here are a few of the most interesting quotes and soundbites from a discussion that covered student-athletes and their fight for racial equality, COVID-19 testing procedures for K-State football and questions from Wildcat fans.
The conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.
BS: Black Lives Matter has been a social movement within our society, from folks across the country to a couple of our women's basketball players, Christianna Carr and Peyton Williams, speaking out. AJ Parker also had a great, very thoughtful post on social media. From your perspective as an AD, as we've gone through this period of turmoil but also reflection, evaluation and assessment of where we are as a country, what's your takeaway so far?
GT: I'll say this, it's been a very difficult time for our black student-athletes, our black coaches and staff going through the full range of emotions from anger to sadness to frustration from the racism and police brutality that they've seen. The death of George Floyd didn't start this movement, it's been going on for many years, but I think the frustration and the anger really came out after that.
The thing I'm learning is listening to our black athletes and staff, learning from them what they face and what we can do as white Americans to help. We had a tremendous effort between the University of Oklahoma and Kansas State, we had over 600 people from across the country on a Zoom call, probably 400 student-athletes from across the country and other staff. From those opportunities, we're going to start creating some action plans and steps. Julian Jones is our Assistant AD for Student-Athlete Development, and he's really taken the lead on this with our student-athletes. He's done a really great job. He and Anne Weese, our Sports Psychologist, have reached out to a lot of our student-athletes both individually and as teams and have let them share their frustration, share their voice and talk about how this upsets them.
We're going to create a student-athlete driven Diversity and Culture Group that's going to talk to us and our department. And then on campus we're doing a lot of great things under Dr. Bryan Samuel's leadership. So, my hat is off to our students and our staff, their leadership and their ability to step up. Chrissy Carr said, "I'm learning to find my voice" and that's very impressive to see. We're going to keep talking and find ways to make things better.
I found my voice @chrissycarr4 pic.twitter.com/HVSoopL5y2
— K-State Women's Basketball (@KStateWBB) June 11, 2020
BS: Speaking of students, student-athletes are back in town and there was the announcement here, just a couple hours ago, of student-athletes being back and tested. It sounds like, for the most part, testing has gone pretty well?
GT: We tested just over 90 football players and we'll continue to test the rest of them. They have to be in town for a certain number of days and some of our freshmen are just getting into town. We're very pleased that we had all negative test results, which means that the athletes were following the necessary medical procedure to not get the virus. As other student-athletes come back, we'll test them before they're allowed to get into the facilities. Again, our goal is to keep them safe and keep them from getting the virus. We're going to do everything we can.
BS: Here's a fan question from Scott McFarland who is part of Boscoe's Boys and a friend of the show. With the overwhelming popularity of the 'Cats' script logo, will that or any other alternate decals make an appearance this season?
GT: I don't know about alternates, but I do think we will see the 'Cats' logo. I know the players liked it and the coaches liked it, so I hope we see it again. I haven't heard of any new ones for this year, but again sometimes they like to spring that on me once they get it all figured out.
BS: Well I should say the Cats script logo wasn't quite the same font, but the word "Cats" was involved in the retro baseball uniform that got quite a bit of run on social media earlier this week, what did you think of those?
GT: I saw that, I like them. Again, for a lot of reasons, I was sorry we didn't get to play our spring baseball season. They had some pretty cool uniforms that they were going to unveil this spring, so hopefully we'll get a chance to see those next spring.
Q: Coach Hughes major inspiration behind the new retro CATS jerseys?
— K-State Baseball (@KStateBSB) June 10, 2020
A: Bass Fishing
📄 https://t.co/jCDNxs6KKM #KStateBSB x Sports Extra pic.twitter.com/yC3xWIYe9N
BS: Usually around Thanksgiving, the men's and women's basketball teams take trips to the Caribbean, has there been any talk about those tournaments being in jeopardy at all because of COVID-19?
GT: We still plan on attending. Both men and women have various trips around the Thanksgiving time period. I think there was one team that pulled out on the women's side, but they were still going to have the tournament. Miami's athletic director called me, they're in the men's tournament, and asked if we were still planning on coming. As far as I know, unless we have a spike or something serious, both teams are planning on those trips.
BS: As far as travel goes, we talked recently about more regionalized travel coming up for some of the sports, maybe trimming up their schedules a little bit, has there been any movement on that front?
GT: We're getting closer to announcing the volleyball schedule with that in mind - both in trying to save cost and taking less trips, instead of multiple trips. The soccer schedule is pretty well set, I don't know if there will be any changes there. We're getting close and I think it's coming to the ADs next week to approve. There will be some changes with volleyball.
BS: Well we do appreciate your time. Is there anything else you want to say to the fans? We didn't talk about the south end zone at all?
GT: It's been fun. I've been in the office quite a bit and I've seen the progress. There's a lot of steel up for the structure for the new premium seating, and the video board is up and they are working on the other one, so it's moving right along. According to our general contractor and our architects they feel good, and we've had no delays and good weather recently. They have a lot of safety measures for their work which is good. No delays, and it's coming right along. The goal is to have the video boards and the sound system ready for this year. It's been fun to watch.
3️⃣ Videoboards Complete, 1️⃣ To Go
— K-State Athletics (@kstatesports) June 8, 2020
LIVE 🏗🎥> https://t.co/LcE3Ww5vj6#KStateFB x Building Champions https://t.co/61i2KJe7Nh
I want to thank our fans for their patience. We are so used to rolling right into June and having our season tickets and then single game sales. We just don't have all the answers and are trying to get those answers to them. But I appreciate their patience, understanding and working with us. I hope, in the next couple weeks, we'll have a really good idea of what kind of capacity we'll have to work with. Our goal is to have as many as we can, but we want to make sure we are safe when we do it.
Players Mentioned
G
/ Women's Basketball
F
/ Women's BasketballK-State Men's Basketball | Postgame Press Conference at Colorado
Thursday, February 26
K-State Rowing | Media Day
Tuesday, February 24
K-State Rowing | Weights Practice
Tuesday, February 24
K-State Tennis | Weekend Recap vs Old Dominion & Minnesota
Tuesday, February 24
