University of Hawaii athletic director Hugh Yoshida spent 10 minutes reminiscing about the good, old days before conceding the best ones might be behind them unless someone comes up with a viable game plan.
Naturally, Gov. Ben Cayetano and UH president Kenneth Mortimer believe that should originate in the athletic department, but Yoshida feels he needs a kick-start in the right direction.
His argument is, if you're going to cut $1.2 million from a modest budget, and then force the athletic department to pay the state about $700,000 to play in Aloha Stadium when the high schools and the Pro Bowl compete for free, then something's got to give.
Mortimer and Cayetano hope the private sector will be willing to donate those big bucks during these harsh economic times, and they feel Yoshida is the one who should be soliciting it.
So the third-year athletic director called a press conference yesterday, had Rainbows head coach Fred vonAppen tell an insightful joke about the current state of affairs and then sounded his cry for help from the wilderness.
One problem is, Yoshida's relationship with vonAppen remains a little hazy, while his statements read from a prepared text did nothing to reveal just what Hawaii plans to do to keep from falling off the Division I map.
"We need to have some idea where we're going," Yoshida said. "We need to have some direction. We can't remain status quo the way we're running right now.
"We're not making up any ground, we're losing ground. And that's the biggest concern. At this stage, I don't know what to expect. We need to emphasize the fact that we need to reload and we need to get better in football.
"We're making a statement, stating our position, and we'll see where it takes us. There were some concerns before Fred got here. But without some kind of commitment, it's going to be difficult for us to perform against top teams coming here in the future."
Next year, Hawaii opens with Big Ten opponent Minnesota and closes with national powerhouse Notre Dame. VonAppen isn't interested in being the sacrificial lamb, and said as much after yesterday's practice.
"We're closer to teams at the bottom than the ones at the top," vonAppen said. "We need to come up with some ideas of our own because it doesn't look like we're going to get a lot of outside help.
"Hugh and I have had our differences, but we've always kept open the lines of communication. We talk. It's better that we're united than divisive because we're on the same team."
VonAppen prompted this recent turn of events by saying last week that the program needed to start addressing certain problems, ranging from team charter flights to year-round training tables to improving the existing facilities.
He also said that the average recruiting budget for 55 teams he surveyed was $175,000. Hawaii's was cut to $105,000 this season.
"And we have farther to go than anybody else," vonAppen said. "If anything, ours should be higher because of that fact."
Yoshida hopes the Legislature will loosen the purse strings in the next session and appropriate funds to help improve the facilities.
He also is hoping Cayetano's input on how to get the private sector more involved, and upcoming talks with Aloha Stadium officials, will help the struggling program pay its debts other than just through gate receipts.
Yoshida counted on improved season-ticket sales in football to help offset the $1.2 million Mortimer is removing from his budget the next three years, but they were off 7 percent from 1995.
"Right now, we have a $12 million budget that's about $4 million behind the national average, so we're trying to struggle to get to that level playing field," Yoshida said. "These are the teams we're competing against and we're $4 million behind."