Vowels assumes reins at SWAC
ROSCOE NANCE
BCSP Contributing Writer
The league was rumored to be in financial trouble and was widely viewed
as in tatters in the wake of the fiasco which eventually led to Rudy
Washington being fired as commissioner. 
But the SWAC's past woes don't faze Robert Vowels, who took over as the conference's new commissioner on Dec. 1 after holding the same position in the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference for the past two years.
"It's an outstanding conference, a diamond in the rough," Vowels says of the SWAC. "It has been through some challenges. It needs some guidance, some help getting on track. I'm ready to move forward and take advantage of the good things it has to offer."
Vowels' plan for moving the SWAC forward revolves around enhancing the conference's Championship Football Game, men's and women's basketball tournament and expanding revenue sharing.
"Anything can get better," Vowels says. "The past couple of years the basketball tournament has improved. The SWAC (football) Championship, we need to keep working on. It was solid the first couple of years. We have to make sure we market it properly."
Vowels says the football championship game has vast potential. The inaugural game in 1999 was the best attended. That game featured Jackson State and Southern, perennial leaders in Division I-AA attendance.
Vowels plans to institute a "Road To The Championship" marketing plan to promote the championship game throughout the season and initiate a series of championship events to be held the week of the game to generate more interest.
"Matchups are important," Vowels says. "But if we market it in the mainstream and in our niche audience, we've got a chance to do some things."
Vowels' biggest challenge is to expand revenue sharing. His idea is for the conference to bring in revenue from TV, radio, corporate sponsorships, the Internet, licensing and merchandising.
The merchandising aspect would include developing a line of clothing and paraphernalia bearing individual school marks and the conference logo which would be available nationwide. The revenues generated would be divided among the ten-member schools using a pattern similar the ones that the Southeastern Conference and the Big Ten Conference have adopted.
Vowels was associate commissioner of the Big Ten and has first-hand knowledge of how well revenue sharing can work.
"You create a pot and at the end of the year everybody gets a nice little piece of change coming back," he says. "The presidents can use it for whatever they want to. It makes sure everybody benefits from what the SWAC has to offer."
Vowels is taking office at a critical point. The SWAC is in desperate need of strong leadership following Washington's controversial tenure.
SWAC contended that Washington misused and converted conference funds and property to his own use, misrepresented and suppressed SWAC's financial conditions and mismanaged SWAC and caused it to incur a huge operating deficit. Circuit Judge Marvin Cherner upheld SWAC's contentions.
"The conference is back in good state," Vowels says. "There's always room to enhance and improve. If there weren't a need to improve and get better, they wouldn't have asked me to come on board."
Vowels says he hasn't established an agenda in terms of what areas need the most attention. He plans to assess the state of affairs over the next several weeks and then form a plan of action, but he says he not looking at a long-term plan of action.
"Until you see what's going on, it's hard to say what needs to change," he says. "A five-year plan is good for organization. But my timetable is right now. I don't believe in holding back. We have to get in there and make it happen."
Vowels was one of four finalists for the SWAC job. Alcorn State president Clinton Bristow, president of the SWAC Council of Presidents, says the Council expects Vowels to implement and continue to expand a strong academic program for student athletes, which leads them to graduating in a timely manner; to develop and implement a national marketing plan that will secure additional corporate sponsors, and to exercise sound management for the conference office.
"He can use his (Big Ten) experience to help us achieve two of our goals," Bristow says. "The Big Ten is one of the strongest academic conferences in the nation. It has national name recognition, corporate sponsors and TV. He has done a commendable job taking a small conference (SIAC) and developing for that conference greater market appeal, and he has been a very effective day-to-day manager for his conference."
© 2002 Azeez Communications, Inc.