Xavier's AD sent a public letter to all Xavier fans last June explaining that they were unprepared for all of the teams that spent aggressively prior to the House settlement. Because of that, Xavier was well below the average Big East budget for 25/26. He acknowledged that this was not where Xavier wanted to be, that they want to be among the top teams in the BE, to compete for a BE title and that plans were in place to get back there for 26/27.
It turns out he was serious and he came through. Jumping from $5.5M to over $14M in one year has led to Pitino having the resources to bring in one of the top Transfer classes in the Country. They rate #1 in On3's rankings and #9 in EvanMiya's. They also retained 3 players including 6'10" Jovan Milicevic who averaged 12.4 points and shot 43.8% from 3. And if Borovicanin wins his case vs the NCAA, he'll be another double-digit starting Forward to return.
I complemented Xavier's AD at the time for being straight with their fan base and for having a legitimate goal for the 26/27 budget. Compare that to our approach of falsely overstating our place in the BE while stating our goal is to compete for national championships with no real plan to raise the necessary funding to get there. It leads to us being woefully unprepared for the Portal every year, losing all of our top players and scrambling to add to our budget just to maintain our spot as a bottom-tier BE budget.
If Xavier can do it, what is our excuse? As a University, we have a larger endowment, get more in annual donations, produce more annual revenue and have larger enrollment. The difference is leadership, accountability, and a true commitment to support their flagship athletic program.