Part I: David Horning Q&A
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David Horning is in his 21st year in Wolfpack athletics and his fourth year as Senior Associate AD. Horning serves as the senior administrator for all men’s sports with particular emphasis upon men’s basketball and football. He oversees the daily operations of compliance, video services, Murphy Football Center and equipment room, as well as ongoing capital projects and facility renovations for the department.
During his tenure, Horning has participated in the design and or the construction of the RBC Center, the Murphy Football Center, Doak Baseball Complex, JW Isenhour Tennis Complex, Weisiger Brown Basketball Practice Facility, Derr Track, Soccer and Softball Stadiums, and the renovations of Carter Finley Stadium, Reynolds Coliseum, and Case Athletic Center.
Mr. Horning took some time out of his busy schedule to answer questions from Pack Pride. In part II of this exclusive interview, Horning discusses future schedules, budget issues, and the possibility of playing Duke and/or South Carolina in the future.
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Does the athletics department have
goals regarding financial operations? For example, does the department seek to
make a profit each year or simply break even in its
operations?
Our goal is to make a profit each
year and to take that money and put it back into our facilities,
student-athletes, and our programs.
Obviously, you have a branch of the department, which is the Wolfpack
Club. They like to go out and raise
money for endowments, for example, and things like that.
Basically the goal for athletics is
to be substantial at the end of the year and not be in the loss column as far as
money. Hopefully the revenues that
we generate we can put back into our programs, for example the baseball complex,
the tennis complex, the track complex, and a lot of the office complexes for our
sports. So that’s our goal. It’s not to really save money, but to
take the money and put it back into tangible things that can help the experience
of a student-athlete.
With the increased seating capacity
at C-F.... how much revenue does an "average" home game (tickets, concessions,
parking) generate for NC State's athletics
department?
When you run the ticket numbers,
the concessions and things like that, a home game could generate roughly close
to a million dollars. Then you also
have expenses, and then you have a revenue stream from the conference for
football, TV and everything else.
It’s very important. I think it’s very important to generate
revenue for our local businesses when we have home games too. There are certain times of the day when
businesses can do better, and we talk all those things into
consideration.
In years where a
deficit is run, how is the deficit funded? Reserves? Wolfpack
Club?
The Wolfpack Club
funds our athletics scholarships, an endowment, and they also fund some of our
capital projects. We’ve never
experienced a deficit. Our donors
have been gracious and really have stepped up. Our scholarship contributors have
stepped up and sponsored a lot of our student-athletes.
The past five years,
while the economic times have been difficult across the country, our donors have
really stepped up and contributed to allow us to build some of these
facilities. The extra revenue from
basketball by being in the [RBC Center], we realized close to two million
dollars a year difference than being in Reynolds Coliseum. That money was put into our programs to
supplement our non-revenue sports programs, and we put 800,000 dollars of that
money aside for capital projects.
We carefully place our revenues to where we can allow our programs to
grow.
A
lot of sports programs end up being in the red. Fortunately, with the interest that we
have in basketball and football, and the ticket sales have allowed us to be in
the black. To be fiscally
responsible, I think that’s a key word.
We have to be fiscally responsible.
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Our goal is to make a profit each year and to take that money and put it back into our facilities, student-athletes, and our programs.
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How
would you characterize how the department measures
"return?"
I think the first
thing with return on a given year is that you’re graduating your players. You’re increasing enrollment in the
Wolfpack Club, that’s return - the amount of facilities that you see being
built, and the services that you provide.
If we’re able to purchase new computers, new furniture, and upgrade our
facilities, that’s how we measure return.
That really is the only way.
You can measure other returns like increase in ticket sales, etc… but
your ability to continue to fund all the programs by scholarships, allow them to
compete and practice at the highest level with facilities, and continue to
supplement the departmental personnel through state raises, that’s how we
measure things.
After accounting for
direct football expenses - salaries, equipment, game day operations, etc - how
much "profit" does football generate for the
department?
Well, it’s hard to say
a set number because whether you go to a bowl game or not generates a little
profit. Factors differ each year so it is hard to give a set number.
In comparing football
and basketball as far as profits, would it be safe to say basketball would
generate more profit in a given year because of lower
expenses and more home games?
Correct, but it can
change pretty quickly too. If you
go to a BCS Bowl, if you have that seventh extra home game, etc… all of that can
affect your budget quite a bit.
Are there any big names on the
horizon that Wolfpack fans can get
excited about?
We’ve signed a contract with
Pittsburgh, the University of Pittsburgh.
We still have Tennessee on the schedule. Louisville’s going to play, and the
home-and-home’s with East Carolina.
We’re still constructing the
schedule. We are in the process of
nailing down 2006 and 2007 with the 12th game added. We’re working on that part of it. The next thing would be finishing up on
2008, and I’m already well on the way with some of the other games down the
road.
You mentioned earlier that you were
happy that Ohio State kept their end of the contract and returned their game to
NC State. Tennessee is another team
on the schedule and they are similar to Ohio State in that they have a huge
stadium and generate a lot of revenue through home games. Do you think Tennessee will do the same
as Ohio State and return the game to Raleigh when it is
time?
They should… I think they
would. I think most schools
do. I think most schools do unless
something comes into play. The
first thing you try to do if there is a scheduling conflict is to make it
work. You try to move the date of
the game, as we did with Louisville, instead of a straight
cancellation.
I would think whenever you sign a
home-and-home with a team that has been in a league for a long time and not
jumping conferences, they are pretty faithful. If not, they have to send you a
guarantee.
Steve Spurrier recently made a
public comment that intimated that he would welcome a series with NC State. Any
thoughts or movement on that front?
I don’t know, I didn’t see that
comment. I just don’t know.
Well he can do that. We have a history with the University of
South Carolina. We used to have the
Dick Christy Award. We used to play
South Carolina on an annual basis.
We’d have to see how it worked with
TV, the schedule, and everything else.
The first thing I would do is talk with the head coach, the athletics
director and sit down and make a joint
decision.
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We have a history with the University of South Carolina.
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Some fans have made the suggestion
that playing Duke as an out-of-conference game in the years that they are not on
NC State's schedule would be a good idea. It keeps dollars local, keeps a traditional
foe on the schedule, and provides another opportunity for State fans to see the
Wolfpack live. Do you have any thoughts on
this?
We’ve had discussions of possibly
scheduling Duke. I’ve had
discussions with the athletic director and their senior associate over
there.
You never know because that is a
beautiful game. You throw the
records out and you go to Wallace-Wade or you come to Carter-Finley, you fill it
with red and blue and anything can happen.
With expansion, the negative part
is you don’t play historically-driven games like Duke-NC State. It was pretty cool. There’s nothing like being at both
places on a sunny day in the fall.
You never know, and we’ll keep you
posted.
So the league would be open to that
as a non-conference game?
Oh yea, I’ve already talked to the
league about it. They are fine with
it. We would just treat it like a
non-conference schedule.
I’ve talked to both Lee [Fowler] and Chuck [Amato] about it. The upside to that is you save about
100,000 dollars in travel costs, play a 1-A opponent and get the community
involved.
ECU is a perpetual issue whenever
NC State football scheduling is discussed. The department's attitude towards
playing ECU has changed dramatically from the days that Jim Valvano was AD, even
from when Todd Turner was AD. For example, an extension of the series has
recently been announced. Why do you think the administration is more willing to play ECU than in the past?
We’ve had ECU scheduled since
2002. We had the Charlotte thing…
we’ve always played East Carolina.
I think the big question was the 1986 episode where they knocked down our
fence. We have a safer stadium now,
but they kind of suspended play for a while, because of the acrimonious feelings
that were involved in that episode.
In 2002 I discussed with (former
ECU AD) Mike Hamrick, Lee Fowler was involved, that a lot of folks in North
Carolina were interested in us playing again and we established the four-game
series.
What do you think about the
upcoming basketball schedule?
They are working on it
still. I think we are going to have
some great home games for the fans.
I think it will be interesting having Boston College in the
conference. Certainly Miami and
Virginia Tech have surprised a lot of people. I like our chances. We’ll see how that plays
out.
Again, the object is to be in the
postseason and have a chance to [win] a national championship. We’re looking forward to
it.
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Again, the object is to be in the postseason and have a chance to [win] a national championship.
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How does scheduling football and
basketball differ?
Football is usually two or three
years out that you try and solidify everything. With basketball you sometimes have to
wait and see when the conference schedule comes out so you know when you can
play.
You also want to make sure that you
don’t have your football and basketball games on the same day for fans to avoid
conflict. Sometimes that just
happens.
There’s a lot to scheduling. What are you here for? You are trying to teach kids some
lessons, and you’re trying to give them an enjoyable experience. Winning and having success is part of
that experience. With that success
and winning you continue to build on winning, sometimes. At the end of the day, you want that to
be a positive experience for them.
You want them to experience a bowl game and not be at home watching them
on TV. You want your alums and
everybody else to be proud and participate in that experience. There is no question about it.
The Q&A with Senior Associate AD David Horning will be published in the September issue of Pack Pride.
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