Ask the AD | April 1, 2021 - Kansas State University Athletics

Brian Smoller (BS): Welcome to another installment of Ask the AD brought to you by Mammoth Sports. Brian Smoller with Director of Athletics Gene Taylor, socially distanced again. We both have been vaccinated, soon it will also be the same room because we're both in vaccines, so get those shots. Get your vaccines so we can actually do shows and do games and all that stuff in person. We'll talk more about that coming up. Lots of questions from you, the fans to cover here on Ask the AD. Although, as we get into spring here and turn the calendar over into April, Gene, I guess with March Madness beginning to wrap up, let's put a bow on basketball season. The men's team and women's team both did not have the seasons they both hoped for, different circumstances for both. One commonality was COVID-19, I guess. What's your evaluation of both basketball programs?

Gene Taylor (GT): Yeah, Brian, thank you very much and yeah, obviously very disappointing. I think we both knew and I say both I think both coaches and we all knew that because of COVID it was just going to be unique. They didn't get to have their typical summer practices. On the men's side they had a very new team with a lot of different faces and really didn't get together until the season and then obviously having COVID interrupt between shortage of players for practices. Obviously the women were shut down for about a month. All those things being said, I think it was much more challenging than we thought and certainly during the season, I think those victories did not come that we thought we could get early on. I was probably, maybe as frustrated as we all were, including coaches and players that we didn't go that way, I was just as pleased as how well both teams finished. When a young team like the men's get beat as badly as they did against Baylor, a lot of teams would have packed it in and yet they turned it around and won several their last few games. I thought they were much different team defensively. And I think they closed out very, very strong and obviously won a game in the Big 12 Tournament and took Baylor to the end and here Baylor is in the Final Four. On the women's side, same thing. I thought they fought very hard during the course of the Big 12 Tournament, came close to getting into the semi finals and I was pleased at how it finished and how they fought and how the coaches brought the team together, and I think both coaches have similar expectations for these teams next year and that's to be a lot more competitive and be in a position to put themselves in the NCAA Tournament next year.

BS: Well said and with basketball, of course the one big thing that they have to deal with now is the transfer portal. We expect announcements. We've seen announcements from players leaving but also expect announcements from players coming in via the portal coming up, and that kind of dovetails into our first question as we jump into the questions today. With the constant changes in today's college sports, and he didn't spell them out, but transfer portal is one of those. NIL legislation coming along soon. Do you foresee any major changes in recruiting or eligibility requirements for athletes to even participate in college sports?

GT: Very interesting and a very good question, and I had another similar question directly via email. Is this the world we're gonna live in, and I said yes, the transfer portal is not going away, and the NCAA hasn't even allowed for transfers to transfer without penalty yet but we know that's coming. And I think you're gonna see coaches, let's say football for example. They get 25 scholarships a year that they can give out. I would say that in my conversation with Coach Klieman, he's talked about having 15 or so set for high school athletes, and then another seven or eight to go into the transfer portal, and then another couple that to be held for late transfers and transfer out of the program maybe after spring ball and that's going to be a normal process. I think basketball coaches the same way. I believe there's 1100 athletes currently in the men's basketball transfer portal so it is a different world and we're just all gonna have to learn to deal with it and live with it. Coaches are going to have to recruit differently. You know before transfers always came with kind of a negative kind of connotation because maybe challenges at their other school. That's not the case anymore. Between graduate transfers, these athletes are transferring to either look for better opportunities or whatever the case may be. So, yeah, it's gonna change and like you mentioned, name, image and likeness is coming down the path. The Supreme Court, we argued in front of the Supreme Court the NCAA yesterday and today, and we're going to get a decision about that and how that's gonna affect us so it's going to be different and we're going to have to learn to live within it and how to manage it and still be competitive like we always have been.

BS: One thing also that's up for discussion is the inter conference transfer, and whether that will be abolished or not and I would suspect that that would be talked about soon on the horizon, if it hasn't been already.

GT: A couple of conferences have come out and said that they're gonna get rid of their inner conference. The Big Ten, they're gonna allow inter conference transfers. We are currently discussing it as ADs in the Big 12, but we haven't made a final decision as of yet.

BS: Let's jump back into football. As you mentioned, there are references a couple of times to Coach Klieman, they're going through spring practice thankfully for the first time in over a year trying to get everything built and they're doing so in the shadow of some construction that's wrapping up. Shamrock at the South endzone is almost complete. With that project almost done, when can we expect construction to start on the volleyball and Olympic facilities?

GT: Well hopefully soon and what we're doing now is we've gotten back together with our architects. Our Ahearn Fund staff has been able to hit back on the road to get back on the road and and talk to donors about those projects and we're trying to reach a certain goal of fundraising that we have set for ourselves, and we're getting close to that. So our hope is that sometime by the summertime into the fall that will have reached that fundraising goal, and we can begin to put that project out for construction bid and documents, maybe sometime in September with construction to start in 2022. That's our plan right now. We still have to hit some fundraising goals to make that happen. We want to get that project started as soon as we can and 2022 right now looks like a realistic goal for that to happen.

BS: I hate to throw you a curveball here but as a follow up to that does volleyball continue to play in Bramlage or do they go back to Ahearn until that facility is built?

GT: I think Bramlage was a great setting for them. Obviously there's some things that they don't have, a full time locker room, but from practice and participation, it's a great setting and I think we'll try to make that happen as much as we can next fall. But, again with a regular basketball season it becomes a little more challenging but certainly we'll continue to talk about that.

BS: Yeah, it's tough to use one facility for everything when you get into the month of November when we have crossover between all those sports. Speaking of November, that's the crux of football season. This question comes up every year asking about alcohol sales during what they hope full capacity football games this fall?

GT: We are certainly planning on full capacity and making sure that we continue to move forward. You mentioned vaccinations and certainly those things will help. We are planning on regular tailgating, exit and re-entry policy. We're still discussing the alcohol sales whether we're going to have it in all the stadium like we did last fall, or we're gonna go back to what we've done in the past and maybe allow it only in certain areas. We got a lot of feedback from our fans. Some don't want alcohol sales throughout the stadium because of the family atmosphere and some do. So we're kind of evaluating that and talking through and see what the pros and cons of those are but we haven't made that decision. Other than that, full operation, exit and re-entry, tailgating, we're planning on all of that next fall.

BS: You mentioned re-entry, I know that was something that was not allowed last year and now will be back this coming season. Season tickets are on sale, packages can start as low as $20 for games and of course September 11 is the home opener. Spring practice as well, want to shoot out a reminder about that. An open spring practice coming up on Saturday, April 3. Gates open, gate B on the west side open at 11am, from 11 to 12. No autographs, but you can at least watch the last hour of practice for the team and masks and social distancing still required for that. How about using the throwback head logo, the L K-State Willie logo, are they going to move to make this officially a secondary logo for merchandising, branding and broadcast use? This comes up every now and then because a lot of times it's the baseball logo, the KS that's used as the secondary logo by ESPN and some others.

GT: Yeah, what we've decided, the power cat is always going to be the primary logo for us, and we're probably going to shy away from ever selecting a secondary logo, but we're going to talk about our vintage logos or traditions logos and bring those out in certain instances or on certain pieces of material or product and then mix them in various times. Like I said, baseball has the KS and that's primarily for baseball. I think our golfers use the old kind of the cartoonish Wildcat. And so there are limited use but we want to make sure that the power cat is our main logo and our primary logo and that will be what we'll use and then anything else will be kind of entered in and where we can use it from a vintage perspective or traditions type of line.

BS: Not an official secondary logo per se. Soccer as well also has their own crest, that they use for their stuff. From that question to more of a 40,000 feet question. What is the biggest challenge in the coming year and what's your plan to address it?

GT: I think it continues to be the financial piece more than anything, assuming that we're back to normal and in terms of operational and practices and athletes being able to have access to facilities and all the things we didn't have a year ago, is we're not out of the woods on the financial perspective yet and, and that's a big piece and last year we had furloughs and salary reductions and obviously operating expenses reduction, and going into this year we want to make sure that we are financially solvent and able to do the things we need to do and as we ramp things up, but still making sure we're managing the finances as best we can and giving our coaches the things they need you know they're going to go back on the road recruiting we assume and we're going to have recruits coming in. We don't know what our ticket sales are. We're hoping that we're gonna have 50,000 and all those things have an impact on the decisions we make, but for me and as an athletic department we still have to manage our finances the best we can and still do the things we want to do like build facilities and, and these coaches, putting them in a position to be successful and thrive.

BS: And retaining coaches and retaining staff, all those types of things all play into that. Last question is something along the lines of a big picture. Did you ever dream while you were in college that you'd be doing this job with these responsibilities.

GT: Actually, I was going to be in the restaurant business and that's what I wanted to do, restaurant and hotel management and then took a little left turn after I got out of college and found myself in college athletics. But my goal has always been to be a Power Five AD and sit in this chair. It's something I've always dreamt of and every day I come to work I pinch myself and feel like I'm the luckiest guy in the whole world because I get to come to work with great staff, great student athletes. Obviously K-State is a phenomenal institution. This community is awesome. Our donors are phenomenal so I literally pinch myself every day and feel how lucky I am to be a part of this business for one, and then specifically here at K State.

BS: Well, we're lucky as K-Staters to have you as well and locked up for a number of years as well with the recent contract extension. Congratulations on that. Thank you for joining us and anything else you want to say to the fans before we wrap this up?

GT: Again, thank them for their patience last year and as we move into what we hope is light at the end of the tunnel and more normal process that they come back, they come back and cheer on our athletes and that's the one big thing I think our athletes miss more than anything is having those full stadiums and full arenas, and we need you and we appreciate all you did and all you did to support us through everybody going through some very difficult times in the last several months.

BS: The first home events will be in August with soccer but then that family reunion game which we always have as a first football game September 11 may be really special this year, especially if we can get this COVID stuff all behind us. Gene, appreciate the time. Thank you again for joining us. We look forward to doing this next month.

GT: Thanks Brian, appreciate it very much.

BS: That's another Ask the AD. Keep those questions coming on social media and other channels. Until the next time for Gene Taylor, I'm Brian Smoller. Thank you for watching Ask the AD, brought to you by Mammoth Sports.

Kansas State University Athletics

Ask the AD | April 1, 2021

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