Transcript:
JUANA SUMMERS, MODERATOR:
Nearly 65,000 miles — that’s the total distance the universities of Washington, Oregon, UCLA and the University of Southern California are traveling this fall to play football games. They are the founding members of the Big Ten Conference. The reason for these coast-to-coast trips is better chances to make the College Football Playoff, which is expanding from four to 12 teams this year, and money — part of the $8 billion television rights deal the conference is expected to sign in the coming years. Pat Chun did not sign the University of Washington’s conference switch, but he is now the athletic director tasked with leading the Huskies into the Big Ten era — a conference with a whopping 18 schools. Pat Chun, welcome to ALL THINGS CONSIDERED.
PAT CHUN: Juana, greetings from the beautiful city of Seattle.
SUMMERS: To many observers, this conference switch may seem like it was made for televised football and basketball games, which of course will bring millions of dollars to Washington. But I want to talk briefly about the other 20 college sports. How have their scheduling needs and comfort been taken into account here?
CHUN: I would say college sports are unique because one or two sports are the primary revenue generators. Here on our campus, that’s football and our men’s basketball program. And television provides a large portion of that revenue. The young guys that come to a school like ours at the University of Washington, they want to compete on the biggest stage and against the highest level of competition. The Big Ten gives us that in every area. The challenges are going to be the unique journeys. And those are things that we’ll learn as the year goes on with our respective seasons. But the reality is the student-athletes that come to Washington want to compete and win at the highest level of athletics.
SUMMERS: Of course. I mean, there’s obviously going to be some adjustments, both in terms of league competition and the logistics that you just talked about. How long do you think it’s going to take for you and former Pac-12 teams to realign as much as they need to?
CHUN: That will take some time. The things that made us successful in our old conference, the Pac-12, are no longer an advantage in a conference like the Big Ten. Of course, we go into this year with our traditional goals of winning conference championships, developing young people and trying to compete at one of the highest levels of sports. But the reality is that a new conference presents new opportunities and also gives us a chance to examine ourselves, what we are doing right and what we can improve.
SUMMERS: I just want to throw in one data point here. The University of Washington football team will travel more than 17,000 miles for away games this year, and that’s a lot of miles to cover. Is there any concern that…
CHUN: Yes.
SUMMERS: …travel fatigue impacts players’ performance either on the field or in the classroom?
CHUN: We’re taking steps to mitigate that. I mean, you know, at this level, it’s private charters. We charter one or multiple aircraft depending on where we’re going. You know, traditionally, football misses the least amount of classes of all the collegiate sports over the course of a school year, simply because of the number of games and the game times on weekends. So there are often scenarios where young people actually don’t miss any classes in the fall quarter or semester, depending on what school they’re at.
So that’s going to be a little bit of an adjustment. We’re going to mitigate that in part by trying to start a day earlier, knowing that there’s not a lot of lost class time with the sport itself. If that happens, we’ll take our academic content on the road with support staff. We place a lot of emphasis as a football program on nutrition and recovery, which is really one of the hallmarks of player wellness from our head coach Jedd Fisch. And that’s mental health, that’s physical wellness. We’re conscious of what the rigor brings, but also going into this year with a very pragmatic plan to make sure our young guys are performing at their best.
SUMMERS: One more thing I have to ask you is, as someone who loves college sports, I went to a school that is now in the SEC. One of the best things about college sports, and college football in particular, to me is the sense of tradition and those rivalries that we all know and love. They’re disappearing. Those historic games that we all look forward to are no longer there. What are your thoughts on that and what is lost without those traditions?
CHUN: Fortunately, we travel with three of our Pac-12 opponents that we’ve competed against for nearly a century. We were able to defend our Apple Cup with our same-state rival, Washington State, so we did our best to keep it. But the reality is we can’t play Washington State in every sport like we have in the past. And while we can keep our rivalry with Oregon as a conference opponent, that’s just part of the change.
But you know, the bonds that graduates form with universities are very special. College sports are special. It’s special to be in these competition venues with your parents, grandparents, grandchildren or children and watch young people try to achieve their goals and dreams. And our graduates are a part of that. And that’s just the beauty of college sports.
SUMMERS: This is Pat Chun, athletic director at the University of Washington. Pat, thank you.
CHUN: Thank you for having me here.
(Soundbite from the song “Chemical” by Post Malone)
