In an interview with the Cincinnati Enquirer, Xavier AD Greg Christopher said that bringing football to the university was a "definite maybe."
The interview comes on the heels of one of the most successful years in recent memory for Musketeer athletics -- baseball, women's soccer, women's tennis, and women's golf all reached their respective NCAA tournaments and, most importantly, men's basketball reached the Sweet 16 in head coach Sean Miller's first season.
While many within the university community undoubtedly dream of using football to burnish the Xavier brand -- a la North Dakota State, Boise State, TCU, et. al. -- Christopher's explanation and his recounting of conversations with university higher-ups indicate a different motivation for possibly bringing football to campus.
Winning championships and playing on ESPN would surely be great, but the on-the-ground reality is much more intimate and immediate. Above everything else, adding a football team is a way to bring 110 men to campus. In the fall of 2022, Xavier listed 4,860 undergraduates, and only 43 percent of its total enrollment (graduates and undergrads) were men. Giving 100 young men the chance to become Musketeer football players would provide Xavier with what it really needs -- 110 additional male, tuition-paying Xavier students. (Christopher's answer indicates that, if it adds football, Xavier would likely be a non-scholarship program, perhaps in the FCS Pioneer Football League.)
"When (Xavier president Colleen) Dr. Hanycz arrived (in 2021), someone in a meeting said: 'Hey, what about sports helping with enrollment?" The Post-it note goes up on the wall and everyone turns to me and said, 'What do you think?' We were talking about how do we get more men on campus and needing more activities for students. And someone said, 'What about football?' We often compare ourselves to Dayton and Butler, competitively, for students and in sports," Christopher said. "They are using football as an enrollment driver. It's a way to bring 110 men to campus."
For years, the National Football Foundation has tracked the number of football-playing colleges in the United States, and Xavier's reasoning is common among schools that have already joined the fray: in a time where women are out-numbering men on college campuses, adding a football team gives men a reason to enroll. There are other ancillary benefits to adding football: a cheer and pep squad, a larger band, a reason for students to remain on campus over the weekend in September, October and November, and a ready-made opportunity for academic departments to hold gatherings and fundraisers.
"I keep calling it a definite maybe," Christopher said of adding the sport. "The program itself makes sense. The challenge we have is we don’t have a facility. We’re trying to balance the football idea with building a College of Medicine facility. We’ll try to make a decision by the end of the year."
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