Memphis Tigers to host LeMoyne-Owen in Exhibitiion Wednesday

The University of Memphis squad (0-0, 0-0 C-USA), ranked No. 19 in both preseason national polls, opens its 2010-11 exhibition season with a home contest versus LeMoyne-Owen College (0-0, 0-0 SIAC) on Wednesday, Nov. 3. Game time is 7 p.m. (CT) at FedExForum.

Memphis, picked to reclaim the Conference USA crown in most preseason publications and websites, returns three starters and six letterwinners from last year's squad that won 24 games (24-10 record) and advanced to the National Invitation Tournament (NIT) second round. The Tigers finished second in the Conference USA regular season standings (13-3 league mark) and reached the quarterfinals of the C-USA Tournament.

Wednesday's exhibition is LeMoyne-Owen's first of 2010-11. The Magicians travel to Fayetteville, Ark., this weekend for their second exhibition against the Razorbacks.

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LeMoyne-Owen closer on football

Committee favors starting in 2012; president, board still must approve.

A feasibility committee will recommend that LeMoyne-Owen College field a football team starting in 2012.

The recommendation, based on expectations that football will drive up enrollment, will be made to president Johnnie B. Watson -- who seems inclined to approve it and send it to the Board of Trustees for the final OK. Watson said Wednesday afternoon that he had not received the recommendation. But he said he would support a plan, if fiscally sound, that would return football to the school, which last fielded a team in 1951.

"I think any college president would love to have a football team because of all the people that it brings to the campus," Watson said. "The primary question I would raise is how are we going to fund it? How are we going to sustain the funding of it?

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LeMoyne-Owen mulls revival of football program

On its athletic website it reads, "LeMoyne-Owen College ... Undefeated since 1951," along with a picture of the Magicians' 1950 football team. That streak could be in jeopardy. LOC has formed a committee charged with studying the viability of reinstituting a football program that has been absent from the historically black college since 1951.

"What they're doing right now is looking at the feasibility," said Robert Lipscomb, chairman of the school's Board of Trustees. "No decisions have been made. We've got to get some data first. They're still doing their investigation."

The committee chairman and other members have not been announced. William Anderson, the school's athletic director, said LOC president Johnnie B. Watson could have an announcement regarding football in the near future. There are indications the startup costs for football could be in the $2 million to $3 million range. It is believed the team would initially play as a non-scholarship club sport, before eventually growing into a Division 2 scholarship team that would participate in the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference, of which it already is a member for its other sports.

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