June 11, 2025 • 9 mins
UC's Director of Athletics John Cunningham joined us to discuss the school's new indoor complex and the revenue sharing era of college sports, on ESPN1530.
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Podcasts of The Mo Egger Radio Show are a service of Longnecks Sports Grill.
Listen to the show live weekday afternoons 3:00 - 6:00 on ESPN1530.
Listen Live: ESPN1530.com/listen
Get more: https://linktr.ee/MoEgger
Follow on X: @MoEgger
Instagram too: @MoEgger
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
They are going to cut the ribbon tonight and at
u SE's new indoor practice facility, which if you've been
anywhere near UC's campus you've seen sprout up the Shakely
Indoor Practice Facility and Performance Center. And obviously it's been
an interesting week if you follow college athletics, I'm sure
it's been an interesting time to be working in college
athletics with the house settlement and the ushering in of
(00:22):
the revenue sharing era. And so I wanted to talk
about those things and more with our next guest, the
Director of Athletics at the University of Cincinnati, John Cunningham.
Getting ready for a big night. It's good to have you, sir,
How are you?
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Yeah, good mo.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
It is a busy day here in bearcat Land and
really exciting to open up this beautiful state of our
building and get to just celebrate a little bit.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
This kind of unfolded pretty quickly, relatively speaking as it
relates to buildings being built.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
It did in a sense, yes, I mean we.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
From start to finish, we moved very efficient and quickly.
But there's another sense that you know, this has been
talked about for ten years probably you know, I mean
we were were functioning for a long time with a
with a bubble that served a purpose but was not
up to clearly up to uh Big twelve standards and
Power five standards. But so you know, it was just
(01:19):
something that we always talked about.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
We needed a permanent indoor for all.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
Of our sports, not just football, but but but clearly
you've got to have that in this day and age,
and so we didn't.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
We didn't just build a nice one.
Speaker 3 (01:30):
We built an absolutely stunning one, and we're excited to
open it up today.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
It has been described as two buildings in one elaborate
done on that.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
For me, yeah, we uh we I was.
Speaker 3 (01:43):
As I wrote my speech today, I kept calling it
a facility.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
But it's not just that.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
If it's it's it's multiple facilities. It's an indoor and
then it's also a performance center that's going to house
our our football program, and then also a nutrition center
for all of our student athletes. So I'm referring to
it as a complex. So it's it's you know a
lot of square footage, a lot of things are going
to happen here. It's it's, like I said, state of
the art. It's going to help us prepare our football
(02:09):
team to uh, you know, compete and win obviously in
our league, but also send players to the NFL.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Guys are going to want to come here.
Speaker 3 (02:16):
And have these facilities and have you know, all of
this at their at their fingertips to prepare them for
the rest of their lives. So anyway, very excited to
open up both buildings and the Shakely Indoor and the
Shaky Performance Center.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
And it's worth mentioning, you know, folks are going to
see and understandably so football facility, but this is going
to impact every sport at the university absolutely.
Speaker 3 (02:43):
I mean, just as we use the Bubble for every sport,
we're going to have every sport working out in here.
We built we built this to be able to handle
obviously any weather issue that we have with soccer, lacrosse
or you know, baseball was a big, a big deal
for us. We wanted to put some netting in here
for Coach Bush and so they'll they'll be able to
use it all year round as well, and so it'll
(03:04):
get get a lot of use morning tonight.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
And then the nutrition center is.
Speaker 3 (03:08):
Really what kind of ties the whole department together. When
you get together and break bread together, you can really
build a one team motto, which we have and I
think that's going to help us just as the department really,
you know.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
Become tighter.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
John Cunningham, as well as the director of Athletics at
the University of Cincinnati, I have spent the week reading
a lot of opinion pieces about the House Settlement and
the new era that is being ushered in in college athletics.
I know this is something that you and I have
talked about. It's something you've been working on. You've been
a member of the House Settlement Implementation Committee, and I
know you You've probably been asked multiple times over the
(03:44):
course of the week to talk about what this is
going to mean for the University of Cincinnati. So I'll
be the latest to throw some questions your way. You've
you've talked about the school being ready, You've talked about
the athletic department being ready for what's next in college athletics.
Walk me through the the run up to this era
and and specifically what's been involved.
Speaker 3 (04:05):
Sure, I mean, the run up became very quickly dominated
by third party collectives, which are groups of donors that
were gathering money and paying players through nil contracts and
and it just became frankly unruly. There were no real
regulations around it, partly because it was a third party
(04:26):
and and you didn't know the game that you were playing.
You didn't know what everybody was spending. The agents were
ever able to spend a lot of things and really
drive up some pricing and and it just, frankly it
wasn't sustainable. Everybody, I think across the board, no matter
what level you're at, agrees with that.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
So we had to you know, pull pull us back
in house.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
That's exactly you know, no no pun intended, but we're
able to move because of the house settlement. We're able
to move operations in house and you know, distribute revenue
share from television on tracks, and you know, we just
feel like as an industry. I was just with you know,
eighty eight Athletic Directors, Division one Athletic Directors DAN in Orlando,
(05:10):
and we just feel like we have to re establish
some rules and regulations and this is the start.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Of doing that.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
And so now it's going to be incumbent upon us
to you know, like I said, re establish compliance and
get some rules around it. But number one, it's going
to create transparency, which is so important because when you
have transparency, at least you know what's taking place. And
we're going to create this commission with a commissioner and
he's going to be able to come in and have
(05:38):
some enforcement that we haven't been able to have recently.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
I know, around the country, whether you're an alum or
a fan of any school in intercollegiate athletics, you want
to know what this is going to mean for the
institution you care about the most. So for you see
alums and Bearcat fans like myself, give me an idea
of how you see is ready for this next era?
Speaker 2 (06:02):
Yeah, I mean we've been.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
We've been prepping for it and working with across campus
to you know, get ready for this new era and understand.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
What our finances are going to look like.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
You know, we have the benefit next year of getting
getting a full share of Big twelve money, which really
helps cover the expenses of what what House is going
to create. And in the Big twelve you've got to
be at a full share, which is twenty point five
million of distributed money to student athletes through nil contracts
or very close to that, and so we're going to
(06:33):
be right there. We know that we were going to
be competitive with our conference peers and really nationally with
everybody around the country, and so we just feel like,
you know, we've we've fought hard to put some things
into place so that we can we can go toe
to toe and again, hopefully it's transparent, Hopefully we know
the game that's being played, and then from there we
(06:54):
can we can adjust and compete.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
What is the Athletics Impact Fund.
Speaker 3 (07:01):
So that is our our version of covering some of
the expense of this new twenty point five million dollar
expense line that's hit every every Division one major college program.
So you know, everybody across the country is finding ways
to raise money into this, and so that this is
our version of that we're.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
Asking for, you know, the masses.
Speaker 3 (07:25):
I mean, I think that that's how we're going to
attack this. At Cincinnati, we have three hundred and fifty
thousand living alumni that care about this place, that want
us to be successful, and so we feel like there's
a play to get to the masses kind of like
an annual fund, you know, donations into this fund to
help us cover any gap that we have between money
that we have coming in from the Big twelve media
(07:46):
rights deal. And the gap between that and what it's
going to cost to be a full share school, which
is absolutely our intention and I believe very strongly will
be there.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
In the middle of everything happening this week, the University
of Cincinnati has partnered with Ticketmaster. What is that going
to mean for Bearcat fans?
Speaker 3 (08:05):
You know, there's there's kind of two players in college ticketing.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
And and one is Ticketmaster.
Speaker 3 (08:10):
The other one was the one that we were with
for a long.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
Time, Paty Olin.
Speaker 3 (08:14):
Uh. You know, we made a we made a decision
after you know, really a thorough evaluation of sort of
what was going to be best for us, and to
be honest, as we try to do some really unique
things around our fan experience and in the technology side
of where ticketing is going, we just felt tech Ticketmaster
was a better a better fit for us.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
But you know, it's it's.
Speaker 3 (08:37):
Going to allow us to do some things with with
a new app and a new website and some different
things where we can we can push some elements to
our our fans through the Ticketmaster platform and through our
own apps using Ticketmaster. But you know, it's about about
fifty percent of schools use Ticketmaster. Fifty percent use another
company very similar should be able to uh to UH
(09:01):
still obviously have your mobile ticketing, share your mobile ticketing.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
And and all those good things.
Speaker 3 (09:07):
But we felt like it was the best fit and
offered our our fans the best experience. So UH now
we're we're getting to work uh and making sure that
that we're we're ready to go and and got to
launch it correctly.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Good stuff is always should be an interesting summer and
upcoming fall season at the University of Cincinnati. John, I
appreciate the time as always, man, Thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Thank you Mom.
They are going to cut the ribbon tonight and at
u SE's new indoor practice facility, which if you've been
anywhere near UC's campus you've seen sprout up the Shakely
Indoor Practice Facility and Performance Center. And obviously it's been
an interesting week if you follow college athletics, I'm sure
it's been an interesting time to be working in college
athletics with the house settlement and the ushering in of
(00:22):
the revenue sharing era. And so I wanted to talk
about those things and more with our next guest, the
Director of Athletics at the University of Cincinnati, John Cunningham.
Getting ready for a big night. It's good to have you, sir,
How are you?
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Yeah, good mo.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
It is a busy day here in bearcat Land and
really exciting to open up this beautiful state of our
building and get to just celebrate a little bit.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
This kind of unfolded pretty quickly, relatively speaking as it
relates to buildings being built.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
It did in a sense, yes, I mean we.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
From start to finish, we moved very efficient and quickly.
But there's another sense that you know, this has been
talked about for ten years probably you know, I mean
we were were functioning for a long time with a
with a bubble that served a purpose but was not
up to clearly up to uh Big twelve standards and
Power five standards. But so you know, it was just
(01:19):
something that we always talked about.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
We needed a permanent indoor for all.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
Of our sports, not just football, but but but clearly
you've got to have that in this day and age,
and so we didn't.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
We didn't just build a nice one.
Speaker 3 (01:30):
We built an absolutely stunning one, and we're excited to
open it up today.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
It has been described as two buildings in one elaborate
done on that.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
For me, yeah, we uh we I was.
Speaker 3 (01:43):
As I wrote my speech today, I kept calling it
a facility.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
But it's not just that.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
If it's it's it's multiple facilities. It's an indoor and
then it's also a performance center that's going to house
our our football program, and then also a nutrition center
for all of our student athletes. So I'm referring to
it as a complex. So it's it's you know a
lot of square footage, a lot of things are going
to happen here. It's it's, like I said, state of
the art. It's going to help us prepare our football
(02:09):
team to uh, you know, compete and win obviously in
our league, but also send players to the NFL.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Guys are going to want to come here.
Speaker 3 (02:16):
And have these facilities and have you know, all of
this at their at their fingertips to prepare them for
the rest of their lives. So anyway, very excited to
open up both buildings and the Shakely Indoor and the
Shaky Performance Center.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
And it's worth mentioning, you know, folks are going to
see and understandably so football facility, but this is going
to impact every sport at the university absolutely.
Speaker 3 (02:43):
I mean, just as we use the Bubble for every sport,
we're going to have every sport working out in here.
We built we built this to be able to handle
obviously any weather issue that we have with soccer, lacrosse
or you know, baseball was a big, a big deal
for us. We wanted to put some netting in here
for Coach Bush and so they'll they'll be able to
use it all year round as well, and so it'll
(03:04):
get get a lot of use morning tonight.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
And then the nutrition center is.
Speaker 3 (03:08):
Really what kind of ties the whole department together. When
you get together and break bread together, you can really
build a one team motto, which we have and I
think that's going to help us just as the department really,
you know.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
Become tighter.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
John Cunningham, as well as the director of Athletics at
the University of Cincinnati, I have spent the week reading
a lot of opinion pieces about the House Settlement and
the new era that is being ushered in in college athletics.
I know this is something that you and I have
talked about. It's something you've been working on. You've been
a member of the House Settlement Implementation Committee, and I
know you You've probably been asked multiple times over the
(03:44):
course of the week to talk about what this is
going to mean for the University of Cincinnati. So I'll
be the latest to throw some questions your way. You've
you've talked about the school being ready, You've talked about
the athletic department being ready for what's next in college athletics.
Walk me through the the run up to this era
and and specifically what's been involved.
Speaker 3 (04:05):
Sure, I mean, the run up became very quickly dominated
by third party collectives, which are groups of donors that
were gathering money and paying players through nil contracts and
and it just became frankly unruly. There were no real
regulations around it, partly because it was a third party
(04:26):
and and you didn't know the game that you were playing.
You didn't know what everybody was spending. The agents were
ever able to spend a lot of things and really
drive up some pricing and and it just, frankly it
wasn't sustainable. Everybody, I think across the board, no matter
what level you're at, agrees with that.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
So we had to you know, pull pull us back
in house.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
That's exactly you know, no no pun intended, but we're
able to move because of the house settlement. We're able
to move operations in house and you know, distribute revenue
share from television on tracks, and you know, we just
feel like as an industry. I was just with you know,
eighty eight Athletic Directors, Division one Athletic Directors DAN in Orlando,
(05:10):
and we just feel like we have to re establish
some rules and regulations and this is the start.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Of doing that.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
And so now it's going to be incumbent upon us
to you know, like I said, re establish compliance and
get some rules around it. But number one, it's going
to create transparency, which is so important because when you
have transparency, at least you know what's taking place. And
we're going to create this commission with a commissioner and
he's going to be able to come in and have
(05:38):
some enforcement that we haven't been able to have recently.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
I know, around the country, whether you're an alum or
a fan of any school in intercollegiate athletics, you want
to know what this is going to mean for the
institution you care about the most. So for you see
alums and Bearcat fans like myself, give me an idea
of how you see is ready for this next era?
Speaker 2 (06:02):
Yeah, I mean we've been.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
We've been prepping for it and working with across campus
to you know, get ready for this new era and understand.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
What our finances are going to look like.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
You know, we have the benefit next year of getting
getting a full share of Big twelve money, which really
helps cover the expenses of what what House is going
to create. And in the Big twelve you've got to
be at a full share, which is twenty point five
million of distributed money to student athletes through nil contracts
or very close to that, and so we're going to
(06:33):
be right there. We know that we were going to
be competitive with our conference peers and really nationally with
everybody around the country, and so we just feel like,
you know, we've we've fought hard to put some things
into place so that we can we can go toe
to toe and again, hopefully it's transparent, Hopefully we know
the game that's being played, and then from there we
(06:54):
can we can adjust and compete.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
What is the Athletics Impact Fund.
Speaker 3 (07:01):
So that is our our version of covering some of
the expense of this new twenty point five million dollar
expense line that's hit every every Division one major college program.
So you know, everybody across the country is finding ways
to raise money into this, and so that this is
our version of that we're.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
Asking for, you know, the masses.
Speaker 3 (07:25):
I mean, I think that that's how we're going to
attack this. At Cincinnati, we have three hundred and fifty
thousand living alumni that care about this place, that want
us to be successful, and so we feel like there's
a play to get to the masses kind of like
an annual fund, you know, donations into this fund to
help us cover any gap that we have between money
that we have coming in from the Big twelve media
(07:46):
rights deal. And the gap between that and what it's
going to cost to be a full share school, which
is absolutely our intention and I believe very strongly will
be there.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
In the middle of everything happening this week, the University
of Cincinnati has partnered with Ticketmaster. What is that going
to mean for Bearcat fans?
Speaker 3 (08:05):
You know, there's there's kind of two players in college ticketing.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
And and one is Ticketmaster.
Speaker 3 (08:10):
The other one was the one that we were with
for a long.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
Time, Paty Olin.
Speaker 3 (08:14):
Uh. You know, we made a we made a decision
after you know, really a thorough evaluation of sort of
what was going to be best for us, and to
be honest, as we try to do some really unique
things around our fan experience and in the technology side
of where ticketing is going, we just felt tech Ticketmaster
was a better a better fit for us.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
But you know, it's it's.
Speaker 3 (08:37):
Going to allow us to do some things with with
a new app and a new website and some different
things where we can we can push some elements to
our our fans through the Ticketmaster platform and through our
own apps using Ticketmaster. But you know, it's about about
fifty percent of schools use Ticketmaster. Fifty percent use another
company very similar should be able to uh to UH
(09:01):
still obviously have your mobile ticketing, share your mobile ticketing.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
And and all those good things.
Speaker 3 (09:07):
But we felt like it was the best fit and
offered our our fans the best experience. So UH now
we're we're getting to work uh and making sure that
that we're we're ready to go and and got to
launch it correctly.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Good stuff is always should be an interesting summer and
upcoming fall season at the University of Cincinnati. John, I
appreciate the time as always, man, Thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Thank you Mom.
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