Athletics Director Greg Byrne's weekly email discussing Wildcat Athletics
Oct. 10, 2012
PAC-12 AD MEETINGS I am writing and editing this week’s Wildcat Wednesday on my flight back from Pac-12 AD meetings in Berkeley, CA. I had the opportunity to tour the new Pac-12 Network studios. While I don’t have any new information to share regarding negotiations with DirecTV, I encourage you continue to communicate to DirecTV your desire for them to carry the Network. We know they are hearing you. I can tell you that the Network is producing and airing a quality broadcast benefiting our conference. I’m pleased with how they are representing and helping to promote Arizona Athletics and The University of Arizona. FOOTBALL REFLECTIONS I began the weekend by traveling to San Francisco with several of our Diamond, Platinum and Golden Wildcat Club members who joined us for the Stanford football game. After the tough loss I spent time with many of them reflecting on the game. I thought I would share some of my thoughts with you. Even though our record is not where we want it to be – we all know how close we are to being 5-1 right now – I can tell you I am very pleased and excited for the rest of this season, and for the future of our football program. I have watched our team buy into Coach Rodriguez’s leadership. I have watched his staff unite on the practice field, in the meeting rooms, in recruiting, with our compliance office and most importantly in their commitment to a strong academic foundation. Our strength and conditioning staff and our training staff have also done a great job with the team. We have been exciting, to say the least, from an offensive standpoint, and our defense has given great effort. Coach Rodriguez and I talk regularly about many things. One of the constant messages he tells me, and I agree with 100%, is that he is building a “program.” A program is most widely measured by wins and losses, but in order to maximize your number of victories a plan and commitment must be enacted and you must stay focused everyday on that long-term goal of building a complete program. As you know, while you are building a program you will have your peaks and valleys. After watching and working with Coach Rodriguez over the last 11 months I can tell you that I have tremendous confidence that he, his staff, our support staff and your support will allow us to have sustained long term success as a football “program.” Bear Down! JOIN SOCCER IN THE FIGHT AGAINST BREAST CANCER If you live in the Tucson area, please join us tomorrow night for a special soccer match. Head coach Lisa Oyen and her Wildcats host Stanford, ranked 2nd in the nation, at Mulcahy Stadium. It’s “Think Pink” Night. We always talk about wearing the colors at our sporting events, but for this night we’d like to see everyone in pink to show their support in the fight against breast cancer. The first 500 fans will receive a free pink pom pom. Soccer is one of the few sports that play their home events off campus. Mulcahy Stadium is just a short drive from campus, located off of Plumer and 15th. Get your tickets now by calling 520-621-CATS or click here. RECRUITING PARTICULARS You won’t get many particulars about recruiting here or elsewhere in our official messaging. The rules and guidelines for recruiting of prospective student-athletes are extensive and in a nutshell prohibit institutions from discussing or publicizing the visits, prospects’ abilities or in any other fashion commenting on the process. So, at our major events on recruiting weekends, most of our sports can have high school stars on campus for official or unofficial visits in hopes of influencing their eventual decisions about enrollment. Some of these visits are high profile enough to be known and pointed to ahead of time by various agencies that track this sort of thing. Some are not. In either case we’re not at liberty to do anything other than what we normally do at big games – put our best foot forward and represent our university in our best, enthusiastic manner. Please do not try to help our coaches recruit in any other way. This can be particularly important with several big weekends looming – Family Weekend, the McDonald’s Red/Blue Game, Homecoming, etc. Remember this does give us another opportunity to remind you that one of the great impacts our fans can make on recruiting for all of our sports is filling up Arizona Stadium and wearing the colors on Friday when our recruits come to town….passion and enthusiasm is critical. VALUE PACKS ADDED FOR THE REST OF THE SEASON We received some good feedback on the Family Packs that were available for the football game vs. Oregon State, which included a game ticket and a voucher for food and beverage. We’re going to offer the same special for each of the remaining home games on the schedule (though they are now called Value Packs, you don’t have to be a family to buy). We also have two-game mini-plans available. The Washington and USC games are the red plan. The blue plan is Colorado and that school from up north. If you don’t have tickets for the last four home games definitely take a look at the discounts available with these ticket specials. Call the McKale Ticket Office to purchase at 520-621-CATS or click here and buy online. MEN’S BASKETBALL SEASON TICKETS ON THE WAY The McKale Ticket Office is putting 2012-13 men’s basketball season tickets in the mail this week. Look for your tickets to arrive sometime next week if you purchased season tickets this year. And if you didn’t, there are still a limited amount of seats available. These seats will be marked at the October 21 McDonald’s Red/Blue game. We’ll have staff on hand to assist those looking to purchase some of the available seats. You can also purchase season tickets online at ArizonaWildcats.com. Please note, men’s basketball parking permits will be mailed separately from your season tickets. Look for parking permits to arrive in two weeks. If you have any questions or concerns regarding parking, please call 520.621.CLUB (2582) A-CLUB LETTERWINNER UPDATE Arizona letterwinner Marygrace Colby ’51-’55 (WAA/WRA), was hired in 1963 at the University of Santa Clara to “direct and instruct female students in various recreation and athletic pursuits”. She had no parameters, equipment or budget, Marygrace didn’t even have printed materials on how to proceed. Less than 20 years later she was recognized for her efforts as a pioneer for women’s athletics at Santa Clara and was inducted as the first female coach/administrator into the all-male Santa Clara Athletic Department Hall of Fame. In true Wildcat spirit Marygrace was passionate and cared for her student-athletes, and for 32 years she was a mentor to hundreds of University of Santa Clara student-athletes…Bear Down! A NEWS REMINDER People sometimes write and say “you missed this or you missed that” in these weekly messages. Not quite true. We have a news-oriented web site (www.arizonawildcats.com), a Facebook site (http://www.facebook.com/ArizonaAthletics, various twitter feeds including my own (http://twitter.com/Greg_Byrne) and plenty of coverage by www.Pac-12.com, local newspapers and television – all accessible here on the Internet – to spread news about the Wildcats. Yes, occasionally we can be remiss in not bringing up every accomplishment, but we do appreciate everyone who takes the time to read Wildcat Wednesday. THAT BEING SAID… While I have spent some time here trying to influence attendance soccer, football and men’s basketball, it’s not gone unnoticed that our women’s cross country team, at No. 2 in the national poll, is having a superlative year, winning a third meet last week behind a very deep squad. Meantime, Lawi Lalang and Stephen Sambu continue as national contenders on the men’s side. This week Coach James Li takes both teams to the Adidas Invitational in Madison, Wis., in a final tune up before the Pac-12 Championships later this month in Los Angeles. COMPLIANCE CORNER It is an NCAA violation for Wildcat Wednesday readers to "tweet" congratulatory messages to prospective student-athletes in reaction to verbal commitments, or to “tweet” messages encouraging an eventual enrollment at the University of Arizona until AFTER they have first signed a National Letter of Intent. Verbal commitments do not lift the ban against recruiting by anyone other than our coaching staff members, nor do verbal commitments allow for Wildcat Wednesday readers to publicly comment on prospective student-athletes. The same is true of any comments on any social media account. Our coaches already have a great sales pitch. As always, please visit our compliance webpage for more information. NOTES… Fall moves on and more teams are getting seriously involved. Men’s basketball starts its official 2012 team practices Friday evening, with an eye toward the McDonald’s Red/Blue game nine days later (October 21)…..not many tickets remain so you better hurry if you want to attend. Click here to purchase tickets at ArizonaWildcats.com. (Our women’s basketball team has been practicing as a unit since the first of this month, and opens its exhibition season Nov. 5… The Wildcat swimming and diving teams will open their fall campaign next week with a home weekend meet at Hillenbrand Aquatic Center… The NCAA hired its first-ever medical officer this week, a move anticipated to enhance the health and well-being of student-athletes. Dr. Brian Hainline will assume duties in January as chief medical officer (CMO) for the Association. He’s a neurologist who has worked closely with the U.S. Open Tennis Championships and the USTA. We spend quite a bit of time and effort on the care and overall well-being of University of Arizona student-athletes and it’s nice to see the NCAA make a move with a professional medical practitioner to spearhead focus on a very important aspect of our trade... DROMEDARIES AND JAWS Below, Jen Evans on a camel outing in Israel followed by Danielle (from left), Aaron, Avery and Alex Irwin, and Greg Irwin and Laura Rios with a cinematic shark at Universal Studios. At bottom, our friends at Mercedes-Benz of Tucson show off how to tailgate indoors. Wear the colors when you’re out and about. Bear Down! Continue to do what you can to help Arizona Athletics and:
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