A fair point. Most major schools in the area either retained their older arena as a secondary sports facility (eg. Wisconsin) or built a smaller arena (eg. Purdue) for that purpose. Iowa did neither.

No WBB or VB back in the days of the Fieldhouse as I recall. Plus, like it or not, college athletics is in the midst of a facilities arms race. If you're going to be competitive at the major college level, it's going to cost. Just the way it is.

And I heard that was because she stuck up for herself and her staff when spoiled players and helicopter parents tried to take over the program. Wonder who's right.

Yes, heavy rainfall plays a role, obviously. The problem downstream people have is that the dam & lake have been managed for recreation (a full lake for boating) rather than flood control. When the area would receive heavy rain, the gates were promptly opened to keep the lake level constant. Conversely, in dry periods the gates were kept closed, resulting in the Maquoketa River being ankle deep in many places below the dam.

Of course, it's good to keep in mind that non-dammed rivers also flood (as the Maquoketa had prior to the construction of the dam), and that dams managed for flood control can be overwhelmed by very heavy rain (eg. Coralville).

Interesting, but more than just a rebuild is needed in Delhi's case. DNR comments would indicate they understand this, meaning huge redesign and construction costs. And Delhi, while nice, isn't the Dells.

Have you seen any video? All that water? How could you think it would make any difference??

Hehe, big talk from Mr. Willey. Better start schmoozing the FEMA people now, it's your only shot.

Tough talk from Alvarez. The fact is, the Big Ten blew up their own rule.

While we're reminiscing, let's remember a couple more things:

Even with that big chunk of state money, UNI was not fully funding the baseball program. Coach Heller had 8 scholarships to work with, vs. 11.7 allowed by the NCAA and given out by Iowa and UNI's competitors in the MVC.

Most MVC teams either have a nice on-campus facility or have access to a local minor league stadium. While Waterloo had been slowly fixing ancient Riverfront Stadium, it was still by far the worst in the MVC (UNI's own diamond having been abandoned years ago ).

UNI is the northernmost MVC school, which is a problem for spring baseball. The southern tier of MVC schools normally can practice outside and have some home games a month or more earlier than UNI, who had to rely on expensive southern trips to get in early games.

And frankly, the crowd at most UNI home games could fit into a couple of school buses. In contrast, Wichita State averages around 7000. The former players upset with the new football turf need to remember that UNI football draws 14,000+ to the UniDome.

In short, despite some fine coaching and better players than fans had a right to expect, the MVC was always an uphill battle for UNI baseball, and it was only going to get worse. UNI made the same decision that Iowa State, Wisconsin and Drake had made previously. Someday, if circumstances change, I hope that a UNI baseball team will once again take the field. But for now, it just doesn't work.

@richfromiowa - Might want to put the thinking cap back on. The rule is designed to keep Big Ten schools from poaching each other's recruits, and so benefits/hinders each member school equally. I agree that as a practical matter, Brust signed up to play for Lickliter as much as Iowa, and he can wait until Lick finds a new job and then go there, or else choose from hundreds of other non-Big Ten NCAA D-I schools. But Wisconsin knows the rules, and had a fair chance to sign Brust before the letter of intent was signed. Their continued involvement in the situation is recruit-poaching, and the Big Ten is correct to disallow it.