By JONATHAN BAGLEY
Most university sports live off how hard their football team’s defense hits and how far the quarterback throws.
How much money Western Athletic Conference football teams make for their schools depends largely on how well WAC Commissioner Karl Benson markets the teams.
Now that the Bowl Alliance controversy is resolved, Benson can return and focus his energy on negotiating deals that will bring millions of dollars to the WAC.
“I’m putting the alliance issue behind,” Benson said. “It has dominated my time the last year. Now I can mastermind marketing the WAC conference. We got as much as we could possibly get (from the Bowl Alliance) and we should be proud of what we accomplished.”
Benson said though the WAC does not command an invitation until 1998, he is confident that a WAC team will receive the at-large bid should that team finish in the top six.
“We need to follow up on last season to convince some of the naysayers out there about WAC football,” Benson said.
Benson said other conferences criticize WAC team’s strength of schedule. But Benson counters that the WAC non-conference schedule matches the strength of most other team’s schedules.
Benson said the WAC made an enemy last year of the BIG 12 conference, or at least a competitor. The rivalry stems from the split of the Southwestern Conference (with the powerhouse teams headed for the BIG 12, and the patsies for the WAC), competition for the Texas market, and BYU finishing higher in the rankings than any BIG 12 team.
Benson also said the WAC received the afternoon time-slot for its conference championship game, which was the slot the BIG 12 wanted, and felt it deserved for the Nebraska/Texas showdown.
Benson said last year’s championship game exceeded his expectations.
This year the WAC championship is slotted for 10:00 a.m. on December 6. ABC will continue to broadcast the game through the year 1999. Benson said he is working on a deal that will continue through the next century; a deal that will include regular season games.
To enhance the WAC’s share of the Texas media market, Benson held the 1997 WAC football media conference in Dallas. (Though the reporters were disappointed the conference was moved from Las Vegas, where there is more to do than order pay-per-view movies to their hotel room).
Benson said the PAC 10 and BIG 10 are also competitors. Benson said his negotiating strategy with ABC will be to examine what the PAC 10 schools bring home in order to set a market value price. Benson said the WAC partnership with ABC has helped both institutions.
“We had resounding success last year,” Benson said. “We spent 10 straight months in the limelight.”
Benson’s future plans to market the WAC include a FOX TV show, a weekly radio show and a WAC CD ROM. Benson hopes the WAC will eventually land a deal with the Aloha and Sun Bowls.
