We have championships coming up in women's swimming, track and field, wrestling and basketball and wish all of those athletes the best of luck in our quest to bring home more MAC titles.

I also want to set the record straight about some reports that have recently surfaced about the Athletic Director's job at Rutgers. Yes, I was contacted to gauge my interest in the position, but I declined to be interviewed. While humbled by the interest in talking to me, I did not interview and I wish them well in their search.

Now to a couple of your questions:

Question: Buffalo and ice hockey = perfect match. Frozen Four, World Juniors. When will UB field varsity ice hockey teams?? Given the success of Niagara, I believe UB would have an outstanding chance to succeed at Division I hockey. School size, proximity to Canada, natural rivals in New York (Cornell, Niagara, Clarkson, St Lawrence, etc) and regional powers Vermont, BC, Boston, etc. lead to exciting prospects and a strong chance of a winning program.
Tom White (Washington, DC)
Class of '85

Question: Do you think UB will move any sports that are currently club up to Division 1? For example, Men’s Rowing, Hockey or Volleyball ?
Jim (Buffalo, NY)

Tom and Jim,
At this time we are not looking to add any sports, but we will continue to examine this in the future at the appropriate times.

As it relates specifically to hockey, I have a great deal of respect for hockey after being the administrator for that sport at Michigan. Know that I have heard and respect the numerous arguments for UB adding hockey back as a varsity sport.

There are several factors that cause some hesitation as it relates to adding hockey at this time. Given the economic conditions that we are currently in, and the expenses that we would incur by adding the sport of hockey, the timing is difficult. As many of you know – hockey is one of the more expensive sports to operate, particularly without an on-campus rink. The second difficulty is that conference affiliation is extremely important in hockey and based on many conversations with administrators in collegiate hockey, those affiliations are very stable right now. Should that change in the future it would clear up one of my major concerns for adding hockey in the future.

Lastly, I won’t add any sport without absolute assurances that in the future any sports won’t be dropped by any future athletic administrations as the stability of our sports offerings is extremely important to me and UB. This in no way defines all the factors to consider but I at least wanted to share three of the issues that are front of mind.

Question: Would you ever consider putting a UB Bulls football game in Ralph Wilson Stadium? 2009's opener against Pitt may be a good candidate. The Bills season does not begin till a week later. Pitt is a nationally-ranked BCS opponent whose fans will travel. This could be a good opportunity to expose UB football to many Bills fans who never considered the local college team. It could also be a windfall for the Athletic department if you can sell a decent number of tickets. Keep the price reasonable and I think you can draw a decent crowd.
Harry Kozlowski (Hooksett, NH)

Harry,
Excellent question. My answer is yes and no – yes, we have considered putting a game in Ralph Wilson Stadium and would do so in the right situation. The biggest reasons would be: 1. If it could assist us in drawing a team that might not otherwise play us in Buffalo; 2. Knowing that we can draw the type of crowd that would go well beyond a sellout at UB Stadium to make up for the costs we would incur in moving the game off campus.

That said, we have no plans of moving the Pitt game out of UB Stadium. When we get to the point where we can consistently sell out our venue this might be of more serious consideration because we lose many other things (students, concessions, parking, etc.) as well as some home field advantage when we take a game off campus.

I sincerely hope needing to play in a bigger football venue becomes a problem for us in the future!!