1. They need to hire a local DJ to get a playlist together to get the music together. Have the band play between downs and music play during timeouts. Nor cal music
2. Get someone to lead the student section in chants.
3. Have the team runout to music and pyrotechnics. Maybe pyrotechnics from water tower after touchdowns and wins? Actually would be cool if a horse led the team out.
4. Have billboards for Davis sports around Fairfield up to Sac. Advertise on TV. Run Facebook/ IG and YouTube adds High school teams and pop warner teams should get tickets. Get young people excited about going to games. Again, the attendance won’t really skyrocket until football is moved to FBS. Only die hard fans care about FCS football. As you can see how bad attendance drops in the playoffs. Can’t depend on students to fill the stadium.
5. Get better food options. I like Woodstock’s but there needs to be more. When they expand the stadium they need to add permanent concession stand.
6. Update the stadium store. It is bad. (I see Davis had been upping their game on apparel tho. Need more alumni gear. I only buy sweatshirts if they’re embroidered. Screen printing is cheap)
7. Do some cool video board graphics

I’m sure many others will have other suggestions on what Davis can improve on their game day experience. It would be good for others to share their suggestions as reply.

Mountain West teams 2026 :Air Force, Hawaii, Nevada, New Mexico, San Jose State, UNLV, Wyoming, North Dakota State, Northern Illinois.

Big Sky: Cal Poly, Eastern Washington, Idaho, Idaho State, Montana, Montana State, Northern Arizona, Northern Colorado, Portland State, Southern Utah
Utah Tech, Weber State

All MW schools are bigger brands than the FCS schools. As I said sports are just entertainment at the end of the day. And people want to see big brand entertainment.

In the mountain west we can schedule up to 12 FBS teams ( maybe 1 or 2 FCS teams but gotta pay them to play). So not only will we play bigger brands in the Mountain West but we can schedule other teams too. Imagine hosting San Diego State or James Madison in Davis. Or Fresno State. People would come out to watch that.

How long have you been following Aggie athletics?

- the community helped fund Rec Hall, which had a larger capacity for both hoops (8,000?) and concerts ($10,000?). ($120 million today at 15,000 a seat x 8,000 mixed use field house design)
- donors helped fund and build Dobbins Stadium, which would have been nicer except the campus dithered w gender equity politics while construction prices rose
- donors helped fund Aggie Stadium
- donors just funded a $50 million top-notch high-performance facility
- a single donor (?) funded the new field hockey facility
- Etc.

After just a year, UCLA and others are tired of cross-country travel. Twenty teams travel to the East Coast bc of football and USC?

If the rent-a-player model continues, FBS has bigger problems for non-marque programs. What happens if the Aggies lose not just Pinnick, but Larison, Buchanan, and others? That's another FCS advantage. Continuity, emotional attachment.

Exactly who will come out? The single parent in Fairfield, the farmer from Dixon, the international student in Davis who's been to two games in their life?

The Davis fan isn't the Cal fan, Fresno fan, or Ohio State fan. People here have unlimited options.

The UC Davis student-athlete model isn't designed to sell t-shirts.

What is your end goal? More TV, more $$, lower academic standards, millions for rotating coaches and players, so casual fans come to a game once a year, so we can build more facilities, cut more sports, hire more Assistant ADs who don't know our school or traditions, to hire more staff, who tell us we're not doing it like USC? The Aggie doesn't even cover every FB and BB game?

UC Davis fees to join Mountain West

UC Davis already has the entry fee and obligation to increase Men's Basketball Expenses for first three MWC seasons.

Also appears UC Davis is getting a pro-rated share of MWC media rights deal (starting at 1/6) and will get full share 2031-2032. Men's Basketball gets 25% of new MWC media rights deal ($3.5 mil per team?)

So if UC Davis did MWC football like North Dakota State at this very moment, they'd pay $17 mil entry fee, would have to increase football expenses, limited media rights...

And like others have mentioned, you have the super league proposal lurking in the background which means everything is going to change anyways in a few years.

Keep the Powder Dry!

Really good point. Get bball ducks in a row before taking on another major (and costly) athletics project. In a way, I could see bball being a test case to help determine whether or not the economics of a conference upgrade are really worth it.

"* UC Davis agreed to spend a minimum figure in men's basketball game guarantees for "winnable home games;" that benchmark was redacted"

It will be interesting to guess which home games are considered winnable next season.

I’d love to make the move to MWC but the reality is we are years behind NDSU (and the Montsn’s) to be in that position. Someone brought up their revenue of around $30M - what’s ours? We average probably 8000 paying customers to there, what, 15000. And they bring in a ton with their suites.

Another issue, I believe, is the number of sports we’re hoisting. We have 24 vs 14 at NDSU. They gives them much more ability to focus cash on football.

I also read their ATHLETIC endowment is over $110M - that’s the only endowment that matters. Dont know ours, but if it eclipsed $100M we’d have heard about it. Our Ascent program allegedly has something like $250M committed…but that’s just for facilities.

Will be interesting to see if NDSU plateaus as a solid football member of MWC or if they excel to the point of seeking larger pastures in the next re-org. I believe their challenge was different than ours though. While they certainly have a dedicated fan base, some described a growing apathy of the FCS title becoming too common to be interesting. Deep home playoff runs in the Dakotas at night also have icy roads and fundamentally prevent ls the Fargodome from booking events Nov/Dec just in case. There’s a lot of upside. New, theoretically tougher opponents drive up demand and at some point maybe a bowl game in a sunny locale that they travel well to.

I don’t think their seat at the table mean we won’t have one at some point. I have no inside knowledge, but from interviews I think MWC is interested in stability. Presumably they saw us as a bet worth investing some time. There were other options with immediate availability that they did not entertain.

usa today college athletics finances

This is 2023 data. Davis at #76 - $44 mil in revenues and $40 mil in expenses then.

overall UC Davis 2025-2026 budget (intercollegiate athletics is in here)

Budgeted 2025-2026 for expenses is now $48 mil.

Hopefully revenues end up linear from 2023 and keeps things net positive.

Couldn't find anything on total endowment $$.

UC Davis Aggies website mentions athletics has a total of 77 specific endowments contributing to scholarships, coaching positions and team operations.

1. They need to hire a local DJ to get a playlist together to get the music together. Have the band play between downs and music play during timeouts. Nor cal music

- College sports is not Pro sports. College emphasizes the band. How much are you willing to spend for this DJ?

2. Get someone to lead the student section in chants.
- this is already being done. However, you need to find a way to bring more students to games.

3. Have the team runout to music and pyrotechnics. Maybe pyrotechnics from water tower after touchdowns and wins? Actually would be cool if a horse led the team out.

- Although this sounds cool, you have to remember the city of Davis is really hard to work with. City hall already gets complaints about UC Davis football being too loud now (I know...) but if we put fireworks on the water tower you can bet a bunch of old people are going to sue the school with noise complaints...

The other factor you have to consider is cost. Where are you getting the funds to cover this expenditure?

4. Have billboards for Davis sports around Fairfield up to Sac. Advertise on TV. Run Facebook/ IG and YouTube adds High school teams and pop warner teams should get tickets. Get young people excited about going to games. Again, the attendance won’t really skyrocket until football is moved to FBS. Only die hard fans care about FCS football. As you can see how bad attendance drops in the playoffs. Can’t depend on students to fill the stadium.

- This i can agree with. Our marketing dept needs work. You are correct we should have a much better marketing plan for UC Davis. But his costs money. What are you solution for funding this?

5. Get better food options. I like Woodstock’s but there needs to be more. When they expand the stadium they need to add permanent concession stand.

- Agree 100%. What would you like to see at Davis?

6. Update the stadium store. It is bad. (I see Davis had been upping their game on apparel tho. Need more alumni gear. I only buy sweatshirts if they’re embroidered. Screen printing is cheap)

- 100% agree here. There is no excuse of not having a stadium store stocked with new items every game.

7. Do some cool video board graphics

- Not sure how this helps but if it can be done with within a budget I'm sure you would find support.

Great suggestions! The more the better.

I agree. We now have a small 3-4 year window to win a championship before with probably move up to FBS/mountain west. Our path did get slightly easier w/o NDSU.

Here we go! Nice job Akiltopmack99 of providing some tangibles. I think this is a great starting point. Dealing with the City might be an issue, but we can at least continue improvements on the water tower (it was nice this season but nothing too spectacular). With some of the technology I've seen on TV games and by visiting other stadiums, they can turn that tower into a disco ball, they can turn it into a football, they can basically show highlights on it. Let's juice that thing up!

Over the past months since I've joined this board, I've heard that we already have a small support staff that works hard and is responsible for everything from fundraising to game experience. I've read that everything costs money. I've read that we need to join the Mountain West yesterday and take on the SJSUs and Nevadas of the world. Well, if we are growing the program, I will assert once again that we need to grow the Department and support staff infrastructure. A few, hard working staffers is the D2/small FCS model. Let's act like where we're going. Hire a small team to spearhead nothing but the 1000 at $1000 campaign. Give them an end date, pay them right, give them an operations budget, and get it done. Create a game experience team, and all they do is sell advertising inside the stadium, run promotions, and focus on the experience. I'd hire Akiltopmack99 as part of that crew. Let Rocco and Flush and Plough handle major donors and corporate partnerships with a small team. Have a special event steam. This is no knock on the people doing the yeoman's work right now, but there are not enough of them! Expand and create positions and teams and act like an FBS program.

Final recommendation: a culinary team responsible for in-stadium vendors and concessions, maybe handle the catering for the new suites and seats, and, wait for it, THE BEER and WINE GARDEN! I'm not just talking about a small patch above the home side 30 yard line. A freaking real-deal beer and wine garden. Exhibit A, once again, is Colorado State's New Belgium Porch. I've been there, I've experienced it, and it is the best investment into the stadium that UC Davis can make.

Details from UC Davis' heavily redacted membership agreement to join the Mountain West

https://nevadasportsnet.com/newsletter-daily/details-from-uc-davis-heavily-redacted-membership-agreement-to-join-the-mountain-west

https://www.scribd.com/document/814204891/UC-Davis-Mountain-West-membership-agreement#from_embed

one thing to keep in mind is many schools have majors in hospitality, sports management, journalism, digital media, advertising, etc. that provide a talent pipeline that drives excellence in these areas. We are unlikely to add those majors and it is difficult to retain experienced talent on the open market in these areas without that academic support. Interns are only so good when the person training them has limited experience.

$44M in revenue must include student fees.

We have so much potential with our academic credentials and access to unique local community businesses, we just need to tap them.

1. We are the worlds #1 Wine school. Think about how unique that is. In my opinion, we should be marketing the heck out of the that. Everyone should think "wine school" when they hear about UC Davis. When you drive on the 80 everyone should see "Welcome to UC Davis the Top Wine Growing school in the world" or "Welcome to UC Davis the gateway to Napa/Sonoma wine"...something like that. A billboard is a cheap way to advertise on a very busy highway that connects the state capital to Silicon Valley....Use it. give people sitting in traffic and opportunity to learn about Davis.

2. Get rid of the Cows campaign. Maybe this was relevant decades ago, but the cows are no longer central to the university. There is still room for cows but it shouldn't be the central thing Davis is known for. I might be alone, but I remember seeing all this stuff about cows when I first came to Davis, but honestly I never saw them again (Although, I'll tell you if we opened up a Chick-fil-a in Davis, and used their marketing alongside Davis...that could work..

3. We should have a wine corner at the stadium. There should be a "Mondavi Corner" or something that provides wine/cheese/tapas etc. Bid this out to local growers. When TV cameras pan on the stadium we want the image of couples drinking win and eating cheese in beautiful weather. You want the national perception to be "I love going to Davis games, you get to drink wine, eat cheese, watch a game"....trust me, Silicon Valley and opponent fan bases will look forward to a "weekender at Davis".

4. We need a bar b q pit at the stadium. The smell of tri-tip, burgers, etc. should be smelled for miles. There are some great meat producers like Buck Horn that could fill this space.

5. Events: We need to entice students and fans to come to not only the games but for events around the games. One of the wasted opportunities would be to create an annual Tomato Fight Festival after one of the day games. We can utilize students to pick up all the wasted tomato's that spill out on the side of the roads. Pick those up. Ask farmers if we can have the left overs that are not needed. Then create a giant enclosed area around the stadium, where kids wear goggles and people pay $5 to enter. This tomato food fight would pick up steam. In Spain, this event is wild and a ton of fun. Let's copy their idea and deploy it here.

6. Music. We need to tap into the local music scene again. When I went to Davis there were a ton of rock bands you could watch perform here (deftones, etc). So lets build them a stage and get them back to play. Now when you want to decide to go to a Davis football game it isn't just a game its an experience. Students will flock to listen to music, sit in the sun, hang out with friends, and then watch a game.

7. Open and wine and Davis athletic store for merchandise at the stadium. We need more merchandise. We need better hoodies, noise makers, etc.

8. We need to create a players walk in area. I'd propose renting out the parking spots alongside the stadium where the player walk to the stadium. For example, I pay $1K for my tailgating spot. This "tailgate row" could be reserved by fans and they can do whatever they want in their space. Bar b ques, kegs, coaches, tv's, etc. When the players come off the bus they would walk through this area. The more elaborate and fun each place gets the more it is for everyone.

I guess i could go on but you get my drift. UC Davis is such a unique place with so much potential we just need to start tapping into it.

Agreed on all fronts with both of your last posts. While interns are great, what I am saying is to create positions with actual athletic department professionals. You're probably looking at $1-2m in salaries, benefits, etc. for 8-10 positions, but they would generate at least that after a year pretty easily, and more as it grows. What's the old saying, you have to spend money to make money.

SailorGabe, the wine side of it is really underutilized. There has to be some winery out there or mega corporation that owns a wine portfolio that would get involved. Easy marketing and promotion. Plus the craft beer side of things, plenty of breweries around. Cal Poly added an 805 area to their north end zone, we can go bigger and better.

Aggie merchandise in general sucks. All bookstores suck, and they probably have the rights in the stadium. Until that is improved, until Adidas provides better offerings, and until they produce gear that people actually want, it is going to remain sucky. The college bookstore racket is real.

A tomato fight after the game would be outstanding. A BBQ pit would be outstanding. A concert area would be a nice touch. I've actually seen a high school in SoCal with a similar set up; tailgating area with a stage and a DJ, couldn't believe it. Student bands were up there shredding, fun atmosphere but no booze. Simple adjustment for a public university.

The Aggie Walk deal is a solid tradition but they come in really early. Not sure how you dress that up and get more people participating.

Great post.

I never understood the whole “cow” thing. If anything, it should be a “all animals” thing.

We have a Winery on campus!!!!! That should tell you everything.

A small anecdote from last November. I went to the MU (haven’t been there in over 10 years). Looked around for nice swag, none. Then I asked a group of student workers where I could buy wine produced by the school, blank looks. I was super disappointed.

Student wine sales were just recently allowed (2021?)--Davis had to get a waiver, similar to what SLO had also gotten some years prior.

You have to buy it at the winery on certain dates; limited production!

https://news.bftv.ucdavis.edu/viticulture-and-enology/hilgard631-wine-sales

I don’t know why Davis doesn’t have a digital bill board on I80 to advertise. Could have one on both sides of the freeway.

I get ya, but it’s already 2026.

I think that was a city thing in Davis on not allowing digital billboards. Even if true. Perhaps setting one up in Dixon at Dixon/davis border?

mid 1990’s.

Rec Hall change doesn’t do a lot for non-students, or improve the gameday experience much.

As others have said here the marketing behind our athletics suck. I’d be willing to bet on any given Saturday more UCD alumni are in Berkeley than Davis someone mo eh at a game

Again, we don’t want to be, can’t be, and shouldn’t be Cal. But right now the college athletics map of Highway 50/80 goes from the Bay to Sac to Reno without even stopping for a potty break.

The biggest problem most of us who are upset about the NDSU situation is that instead of a statement that gives clarity on our path forward and benchmarks, we are simply “staying the course” of lacking progression. The idea that you have to win an FCS Championship before moving to FBS is silly. It’s literally just wanting a banner hung in the rafters.

To move to FBS, and even retain the funding necessary for FCS as it ALSO gets more expensive there needs to be excitement around the program, not just a little tease which feels like a money grab as our peers (like NDSU who moved from D2 to D1AA with us) actually won the Championships and created a sustainable product.

Fact is, asking us for more and showing us what more looks like (stadium tweets and a conference contract that one can logically read and assume says we are next up), only to let a school with much less financials, resources, and growth potential bypass us, is boring, especially when only explained by an official statement that provided ZERO in new information, and was clearly a reaction to the negative reaction of at least enough Aggie backers that Rocko realized he had to say something, but did not say enough to temper the dissatisfaction and confusion.

Did we apply?
Did we reject the opportunity to apply/join in football?
If we applied and were rejected, what was the rationality behind the contract language?

Right answers only Rocko, not a bland statement created with too many adjectives and a thesaurus with what we already knew.

Ok a hypothetical for everyone here (including Central Campus aka the AD and President) who says we have to win the FCS NC before moving up…

What’s your excuse in 2027 when we win it and we get bypassed for yet another less “ready” school?

as a basketball season ticket holder, these changes will have a big positive impact on the gameday experience. the current "Rec Hall' still has that big barn feeling , even after recent small improvements in the student seating and lighting to make it feel more intimate. the concession area is woefully inadequate. the open space of the upper level is a bad look. our gym is in the upper half of the big west, but that's only because there are so many bad gyms in the big west. If they can close things up, while still having upper deck seating for the rare high-attendence games, like the arena in Henderson, that would the perfect solution. That's probably a bridge too far.

who would have said two or three years ago that it would make financial sense to spend $10-$15M to pay football in the MAC?

yes, the new upcoming if funded and actually gets built changes will be awesome at RH/Pavilion. That’s definitely a game changer as are all of the Aggie Ascent projects. In my opinion if these get pulled off as planed (realizing construction never does…like the two deck fully surrounded Aggie Stadium brochure from the 2000’s or Rocko’s Tweet with a different two deck design) we will have some of the best non-P4 facilities in the country, and surpass some P4 programs.

I was referring to the already happened RH renovation which is nice, better, and something compare to the original, but akin to fresh paint. Though, I haven’t been too impressed by very many college basketball facilities in general.

We had a press release 4-6 months ago detailing $270 million in facilities improvements which are supposedly funded? Maybe Rocko should have saved it for the NDSU announcement.

I'm not interested in following the Hornets bizarre high stakes path.

Regarding $10-15m for an FCS fee 2-3 years ago, who’s to say it won’t be $25-30 2-3 years from now when we are ready, which will then be the excuse to say we still aren’t ready?

It may be smart to lock in a fee at today’s known rate than tomorrows inflated cost. Maybe….