Steven M. Sipple: Osborne's priorities on facilities don't match Sadler's

Now that Tom Osborne has identified the most pressing needs in Nebraska athletics, let’s see how many big-money boosters pony up.

Prevailing wisdom was Osborne’s move into the athletic director’s chair would elicit an immediate boost in fundraising. But it’s too early to measure his impact. For one thing, Osborne had a few small tasks that required his immediate attention once he came on board in mid-October, little things such as firing a head football coach and hiring a replacement, and helping with recruiting, and familiarizing himself with staff.

With those tasks finished, Osborne can turn his attention to helping raise money. But before you ask people for big bucks, it makes sense to have an idea how their cash is going to be spread around.

Well, now we know.

Numbers 1 and 1A on Osborne’s list of priorities are an improved academic center and new Hall of Fame, with a combined cost of $10 million or so. Add another $10 million for Devaney Sports Center maintenance, plus $6.5 million for capital improvements. And don’t forget $15 million is still owed for the complex that bears the AD’s name.

Excuse us if we left out any bills.

And pardon Doc Sadler if he just choked a little on his Cheerios.

You see, Doc’s pressing desires don’t necessarily jibe with his athletic director’s priority list.

Sadler would love for Nebraska officials to commit to building a practice facility for basketball — a place with gyms, locker rooms, offices, video rooms, meeting rooms, medical facilities, et al. A place where the Huskers could practice any time they want. The facility presumably would accompany the proposed arena in the downtown Haymarket district.

Commitment is the key word here. Shiny practice facilities are the hot thing in college basketball recruiting. In checking out these facilities, prospects gauge a school’s commitment to hoops.

Is Osborne fully committed to high-level basketball? To Nebraska winning Big 12 titles and advancing in the NCAA Tournament?

Just wondering.

Nebraska basketball coaches will forever fight the perception that dear old NU is a football school. It doesn’t help matters that Nebraska within a few years might have to settle for being the only Big 12 school without basketball practice facilities. That is, in a word, embarrassing.

Sadler and Nebraska women’s coach Connie Yori deserve a chance to recruit on a level playing field in terms of facilities. After all, it’s not as if they can use Husker basketball tradition to lure players. By contrast, Osborne did have gridiron tradition — not to mention academics and incredible fan devotion — to sell to recruits when he was the football coach, mitigating the impact of good-not-great football facilities.

In fairness, you have to recognize that Osborne does have difficult facilities choices to make in the next few years. Perhaps Doc just needs to be patient on the practice facility issue. Maybe he just needs to wait a few years. But coaches are typically an impatient breed.

 Remember, the proposed Haymarket arena probably wouldn’t be functional until at least 2011, so it would make no sense to build an on-campus practice facility before then. It also should be noted that Osborne wants to have a “footprint” near the proposed arena where space would be available for a practice facility — in hopes enough money could be raised to build it.

Osborne jokes that perhaps Oklahoma oil man T. Boone Pickens will swing up this way with $15 million to give. Osborne always has had an interesting way of sending important messages to the masses.

His message at the moment: We have priorities, and we need money for them.

But a basketball practice facility might have to take a back seat, for now, unless somebody with an inordinately fat wallet steps forward.

Sadler understands the pressures of being an athletic director, having served the dual role of head coach and AD at Arkansas-Fort Smith from 1998-2003.

“Unfortunately, when you’re an athletic director, most of the time you’re just dealing with problems and people’s wish lists,” Sadler said. “You’ve got to make some decisions.”

You have to admire Osborne’s measured fiscal approach amid the increasingly outlandish facilities arms race. Check out Texas A&M’s $22 million expansion to Reed Arena. Then put yourself in Sadler’s shoes. Nebraska has to recruit against that?

The thing is, if you’re too slow in the arms race, you end up with some quaint and somewhat antiquated facilities along with a quaint little basketball program — not the type Sadler has in mind.

Reach Steven M. Sipple at 473-7440 or ssipple@journalstar.com.