Tim Leonard Q&A (Part Two) — "I would love for our future to be led by Coach Hill"

CARBONDALE, Ill. — Southern Illinois University AD Tim Leonard confirmed that SIU is in contract extension talks with football head coach Nick Hill.

Hill recently completed his 10th season at the helm of his alma mater, guiding the team to a 7-5 record and a Top 25 national ranking throughout the season.

READ PART ONE

In Part Two of our in-depth Q&A with Leonard, he talks about the topic of revenue-sharing, ticket sales, and how he hopes to fund a major, new investment in Saluki Football.

StrongDawgs conversation with AD Tim Leonard

AD Tim Leonard

SD: Give us your thoughts on the job Coach Hill has done with the program.

TL: I like Nick a lot. I think everybody associated with the program likes Nick a lot. We're in talks about his future here. I would love for our future to be led by Coach Hill. Football's a very expensive venture, and if you're gonna have football, which we 100 percent do because, like it or not, it's how the vast majority of Americans identify a university is by their athletics department, specifically football. Do you have football or do you not have football? Are you FBS or FCS? So if we're going to have football then, by God, we better be good in it.

SD: So you're hoping to extend Coach Hill’s contract?

TL: The Chancellor and I have talked about that, and we feel like Coach Hill gives us the best chance to get to where we want to be. So, yeah, we definitely want to do that. We're going to have to figure out, too, what's going to be our long-term strategy? Again, we feel like Nick can get us there. Let's evaluate, let's find out what we can do to get better. And then we're going to have to jump into the game more than we have when it comes to revenue-sharing for football.

SD: We’ll go in-depth on the rev-share topic in a minute. What do you think has kept Coach Hill here 10 years? That's rare for a head coach in today’s world.

TL: I think lot of it has to do with who he is as a person and as a southern Illinois native, an alum, a great player when he was here, a great person, great family man, and we have had some success with Nick Hill. The Nick Hill brand is very strong.

SD: During an interview last week, Noah Fenske expressed interest in sharing his thoughts about the program with you. Will you have exit interviews with any of the seniors?

TL: Yeah, I really wanted to do that. Yeah, absolutely. I haven't done a ton of that in the past, other than through surveys and that kind of stuff. That's one of the things Nick and I talked about. I want as much data, as much information as possible to try to figure out what we're missing. What's that one or two things that we've got to get, to get over the hump? I would like to hear from the players and see if we can't learn. I'm just wanting data. Let's do almost like a SWOT analysis. From a player's perspective, what are strengths, what are weaknesses, but what are opportunities and what are threats to those things? I would love to hear from a lot of those guys.

SD: What’s your sense of how much revenue-sharing is going on at the FCS level and within the MVFC?

TL: Everything that I've heard is you've got about a half-dozen schools that have really jumped in, all-in, in football. Obviously, North Dakota State and South Dakota State, in terms of their investment, obviously, the Montana schools and Tarleton State, those are the ones that have really jumped out. Then you've got a bunch that are trying to do some things, and then there's everybody else that I don't know how much they're gonna jump into it.

I think we'll see next year how many really jump in. We're trying to figure out, where can we come up with the resources? What’s our level? Then, what's gonna be your long-term play? Because I don't want to just jump in for one year and then jump out. That means we also have to figure out, how are we going to monetize all this? Because it can't just be donor-driven. We need football to start generating revenue like it's never generated before here. I mean, 10 times what we're making now, and that's gonna be difficult. But it starts with winning at a consistently high level.

SD: Outside of the schools you mentioned that are “all-in” on football, is there an FCS school that has been able to win at a consistently high level, absent those resources? One that’s able to sustain playoff-level winning year-in and year-out?

TL: If you look at James Madison, when they were in FCS, you look at Appalachian State when they were in FCS, you look at a lot of those schools that when they were in FCS, yes, they achieved that.

SD: But both those teams left the FCS before rev-share and relaxed-transfer rules began. Is there an example of a team winning consistently without a sustained investment?

TL: Well, it depends on who you ask and what the circumstances are. Look at Indiana right now. They’ve always been a bottom-feeder in the in the Big Ten, one of the lower-resourced programs in the Big Ten. They weren't investing like Ohio State or Michigan. Curt Cignetti comes in and flips the script, wins the Big Ten, and I'm pretty sure from here on out, as long as he’s there, Indiana is gonna have as much resources as Ohio State and Michigan. So in that case, was it putting up the resources that allowed Indiana to win? Or was it a coach who came in and said, “I can win with what I've got?” And then the resources came.

We're probably in that same boat. We've got a guy that we believe in, so let's go get him the resources he needs and let's see how far we can take this. And yes, I do believe that if you win, and win at a high enough level, how many times was Indiana’s stadium sold out in November? I get it that Indiana is Big Ten. How many people were coming out to watch Indiana football in late October and November? And it did not take long to flip that script, and they're sold out now. That's what I'm looking for here, is that we're going to have to win at a high level. Indiana went from being an afterthought in the national landscape, to now playing for a national championship and winning the Big Ten. And now that place is sold out.

SD: This past season, was Saluki Football in the top-half or bottom-half of rev-share in the Valley, and where do you want it to be, aspirationally?

TL: Here's what I would tell you based off of all the data that I've seen, conversations that I've had. There's two schools, North Dakota State and South Dakota State, that have separated themselves in terms of their investment in football. Then you got this next group that's Youngstown State, North Dakota, South Dakota, Illinois State and us. I feel like we've always been in this next tier down, which quite honestly, is better than probably 80 percent of the FCS, but it's in this next tier down. The good news is that the gap between us and North Dakota State is not that far off, compared to the last place I was at. At Towson, you had James Madison and Delaware who were 100 percent greater than everybody else. I mean, it was insane. You were never going to catch (James Madison), and then look at them now, they're in their third year in FBS and they're in the college football playoffs. Our delta isn't anywhere close to that.

If we're going to get into this game, I don't want to just get into it with trying to get to 5-3. Let's be the best. Let's figure out how we're one of the top-3 schools in the country in the FCS. Let's go win a freaking national championship. If that's not the goal, then you're just throwing away good money after bad. So if we're gonna do this, let's commit. Let's do it right. Let's go kick North Dakota State and South Dakota State's butt. Let's go get a program that is similar to Montana in the sense that they've got a massive following by FCS standards. Let's be the biggest and the best in our league and in our in the country.

SD: So aspirationally, you would want to be at the top of the league in overall investment and rev-share?

TL: We're only a couple-million dollars off of what those guys are investing. So it's not like the last place I was at, where we were $25 million behind. You were never gonna catch that. We're a couple-million behind. Now, that's a lot of money, and I don't ever want to downplay that, because we don't have that money. If we're gonna get there, we're gonna have to go find that money. Let's see how great we can become. What I want Nick Hill to do is lead us to that Promised Land.

SD: Illinois State just announced what they're calling a Competitive Excellence Fee on next year’s football tickets, with all of the money going to rev-share. Are you familiar with it and is that something Southern would consider doing?

TL: I’m not familiar with it. I don't know that that's the route I want to be a part of. If we're gonna clear that delta, we're gonna need a handful of people to really come in and invest, and then we branch it out from there and get the masses involved. We're gonna need to start at the top, and then we'll backfill it with, how do we get more people buying club seats? How do we get more demand in there? At some point, we're going to have to start investing in our facilities so we have more premium opportunities so that our tickets can generate a lot more money. It's kind of hard to go out and sell that right now when there isn't that demand. We need built-up demand for that.

SD: SIU finished ninth in the Valley in attendance. You spoke about premium seating, but are you satisfied with where you’re at in overall ticket sales?

TL: No, heck no. Again, if we're gonna do this, we want to lead the nation in attendance at some point. Now, we physically couldn't do that right now because we don't have a stadium big enough to do that. I get it, that football has never really done that. We hit November and people just stay away. It's still my goal that by the time I'm done at SIU, whenever that is, I want to have a sellout in November. That's the dream. If we do that, that's because we're nationally relevant and all of our games are meaningful and impactful. I do think this is the type of school that could someday average 25,000 a game.

SD: This year’s team was 3-1 in non-conference with a competitive loss at Purdue, was nationally ranked every week and competing for the playoffs, so the games were meaningful and impactful.

TL: Well, I think there's probably a little more to it than that. We've never really invested in it at the level we truly need to, to get to the point where we're good every year. It wasn't that long ago South Dakota State wasn’t drawing anybody in November.

SD: You referenced Indiana earlier. They brought in Fernando Mendoza, who many feel will be the top pick in the NFL Draft. Quarterbacks are obviously hugely important. Can SIU keep a player the caliber of DJ Williams?

TL: Yeah, absolutely. Nick and I have talked about that. He's got my commitment of what we're willing to do, and we've talked about what's the sweet spot of how much can we offer versus if we offer too much, then you don't have anything to put around the guy. We're ultimately always going to be outbid, but yeah, I'd love to support Nick for that. My job is to help out, give Nick the resources he needs. Yeah, I know he wants to keep him.

SD: Between high school, junior college, Division II and now portal recruiting, does Saluki Football need to add positions to its personnel department?

TL: Nick and I talked about, if we're really gonna get serious moving forward, we're going to have to really step it up. To your question about recruiting, I do believe there's three things that we need to do. We need to really invest in our rev-share for our team, basically, player-personnel costs. We need to really invest in our staff. We haven't jumped in and hired analysts and all these other specialists, and I think we need to now. If the goal is to be elite, then that's part of being elite. I think we're gonna need to add a handful of people on the offensive side of the ball, the defensive side of the ball. We need an off-the-field recruiter, somebody who all they're doing is evaluating rosters and what do we anticipate is going to be available in the portal, all those types of things. And then I think the third thing is nutrition and food service that we provide.

SD: How quickly can these staff positions be added?

TL: It would be much easier to create these positions if they're privately funded. If we're talking about using resources we already have, it'll be near impossible and it won't happen. We don't have the money to expand our staffing positions now. I feel like if we've got private resources that will fund this, I don't anticipate it's going to be that difficult.