BOWLING GREEN — When the Bowling Green men’s basketball program moved into the Stroh Center in fall 2011, it was easy to let the imagination to run wild.
The Falcons had a gleaming new $30 million arena on the edge of campus, and, thanks to a bombshell gift from one of their biggest fans, money to spend.
That same year, Bill Frack created an endowment that would give the BG men nearly $1 million per year in perpetuity. He wanted the program to be able to attract marquee nonconference opponents, provide coaches with all the bells to go with their whistles, and have one of the biggest budgets in the Mid-American Conference.
What was possible? What wasn’t?
Then-BG president Carol Cartwright called the pledge “transformational,” suggesting it could help the Falcons become a mid-major power.
“If Butler and Gonzaga can do it,” Frack said at the time, “Bowling Green can do it.”
Well ...
Flash forward a decade, and it’s fair to ask: Is Bowling Green getting its money’s worth?
To whom much is given, much has not been delivered, as the Falcons remain in pursuit of not just their first trip to the NCAA tournament since 1968, but a consistent place among the top MAC programs.
In the Stroh Center era, BG is 92-103 in league play and, despite the success of the previous three seasons, its current trend line is beginning to resemble the stock price of Peloton.
While the win over Ohio on Tuesday was an inspired flicker, the program, by and large, appears adrift.
The Falcons (13-17, 6-13) have lost eight of 10 games, play defense like there is tomorrow (BG is 345th out of 358 Division I teams in scoring defense), and are ranked 280th in the NET and 279th by KenPom, the latter of which is their worst mark since Ken Pomeroy began his ratings in 1997.
Further, coach Michael Huger recently dismissed his second and third-leading scorers — transfers Myron Gordon and forward Joe Reece — without explanation.
“It made zero sense,” said Reece’s father, James, “other than he’s trying to use our kids as sacrificial lambs to save his job.”
I don’t know about that — and Huger is not sharing his side of the story — but the frustration around the program is real.
And we’re told Bowling Green’s top basketball boosters have made their concerns about its direction clear to president Rodney Rogers.
What will that mean? We’ll see.
Huger is under contract through 2025 at a salary of $415,000 per year. (Thought to be signed through 2024, The Blade learned he was quietly given a one-year extension in November, 2020, in part because of his goodwill — including declining all bonuses for the previous year — during the pandemic.)
If Bowling Green moves on after this season, it would owe Huger up to $1.245 million, though likely much less. Any salary the coach might earn elsewhere the next three years would be subtracted from the buyout.
All I know is everything is on the table.
As long as the money men are willing to help foot the bill, BG just has to decide: Is this year a blip after three straight winning conference seasons? Or is a program that’s started to lean on the transfer portal — the Falcons added five transfers this season — and is graduating its top two remaining players — all-league forward Daeqwon Plowden and guard Trey Diggs — revealing serious cracks?
Is it possible superstar guard Justin Turner was the great equalizer, and the school’s all-time leading scorer masked structural deficiencies elsewhere?
In all, Huger is 59-68 in MAC play in seven seasons at his alma mater, the seventh-best league mark during that span.
While athletic director Bob Moosbrugger expressed support for Huger and excitement about the next wave of recruits, I asked him if Bowling Green is committed to the coach for next season.
“I’ll discuss that with coach Huger, and president Rogers, and I will discuss that after the season is done,” he said.
Fair enough.
Selfishly, here’s hoping Huger stays, because you won’t find a nicer guy in the business.
But, certainly, if we go back to our original question — is BG getting its money’s worth? — it’s fair for the university and its supporters to crank up the bar.
Understand, men’s basketball operates in an ecosystem of its own at Bowling Green.
While most Falcons programs have one of the smallest budgets in the MAC, the men’s basketball program enjoys one of the biggest. In the 2020 fiscal year, BG spent $2.52 million on the program, third-most in the MAC, behind Akron ($2.99 million) and Ohio ($2.82 million), per federal records. (Toledo was fifth at $2.47 million.)
Money will never be an issue, thanks to the generosity of Frack, who died in 2014, and an endowment that continues to grow in value. Records obtained from Bowling Green show Frack’s annual gift has ranged from $841,600 to $1.02 million the past five years.
Now, a lot of you have asked where exactly this money goes.
Good question, seeing as one of Frack’s foremost visions has gone unrealized.
In a donor agreement outlining his wishes, the first directive listed states: “Enhance team and conference competition and enhance local and national visibility by entering into a guaranteed contract or contracts to purchase or otherwise secure ... basketball games with nationally visible competitive teams which may require large monetary incentives to travel to BGSU.”
Clearly, unless that can be interpreted as Bowling Green should host multiple games against non-Division I opponents, the school has not lived up to its end. The Falcons haven’t hosted a team of note since Cincinnati in November 2015.
Here, though, I can’t fault BG.
Trust us, the lack of big-name visitors isn’t for a lack of effort. (Hell, the university has played every angle possible, even writing into Huger’s contract that, if he leaves to become the head coach at another school, his new school would have to play at BG.)
Bottom line: As conference schedules continue to expand, no team that would pique our interest is going to give up a home gate to play at BG or Toledo. Look at the Big Ten. By our count, excluding branded events like the ACC-Big Ten Challenge, teams in the conference played four true road games this season. Four!
But I digress.
As for where the money does go, it’s to the right places.
For the record, Brian Treece, president and CEO of the Findlay-Hancock County Community Foundation — which oversees Frack’s gift — stated: “BGSU has annually provided the appropriate documents for compliance testing per the Frack Fund Agreement.”
Among other uses, the fund provides coaches with competitive salaries and players with the latest gear and technology, pays for one international trip and one warm-weather holiday tournament every four years, and supports conveniences like charter planes for midweek games at distant league schools, namely Buffalo and Northern Illinois.
The idea is to give coaches everything they need to build a consistent championship contender.
“With what they have to work with,” one booster said, “we should have some pretty top-notch people coming in.”
Moosbrugger would agree.
“Not that [money] spells success, but it certainly helps,” he said. “I can appreciate that people have a higher expectation of men's basketball.”
How high? Just go back to when Frack’s unprecedented gift was announced, when then-AD Greg Christopher predicted to reporters: “It’s going to take this program to the next level.
A decade later, Bowling Green is still waiting.
First Published March 2, 2022, 9:47 p.m.