Basketball and volleyball teams at the University of Southern Indiana will now play their home games at Liberty Arena.
The renaming of Screaming Eagles Arena on the USI campus was announced on Oct. 31, along with Liberty Federal Credit Union’s $10-million, 20-year gift to support USI Athletics programs.
It’s the largest single donation in USI history. USI Athletics Vice President and Director Jon Mark Hall notes that the dollars are not restricted, although a large portion will support athletic scholarships.
“In the simplest terms, it gives us the ability to make progress,” Hall says of the Liberty FCU donation. “… It gives our coaches the ability to recruit the best and the brightest.”
The newly named Liberty Arena seats 4,800 and opened in 2019. During the pep rally-style announcement attended by USI athletes, other students, and fans, Interim USI President Steve Bridges, and Liberty FCU President and CEO Bill Schirmer pulled a blue rug off the credit union’s logo embossed on the arena’s wooden floor.
USI in the 2022-23 school year moved from NCAA Division II to Division I athletics, as a member of the Ohio Valley Conference. With that move came an increase in the university’s athletics budget, making it necessary to find more outside support.
“This generous gift from Liberty will greatly enhance our athletic programs and provide much-needed support as we continue our transition to Division I athletics,” Bridges says. “Liberty’s commitment will help pave the way for future success and ensure our student-athletes have the resources they need to thrive.”
Schirmer says Liberty FCU and USI had discussed a gift for about a year.
“We talked about various levels of giving and came to this level as having the greatest impact over the next 5-10 years to really elevate athletic programs at USI,” Schirmer says.
Liberty FCU also views the gift as helping USI’s broader mission, Schirmer adds, “because with these funds for athletics, they can use their alternative funding sources to support higher education endeavors.”
Hall warned against thinking the gift from Liberty FCU could be a precursor to USI adding a football program to its athletics repertoire.
“Not at this time,” Hall tells [Evansville Business]. “We haven’t discussed football. I get the question, but I don’t think this leads to that at all. I think it just helps us to continue to make progress at the Division I level. When we make this plan (to move to Division I), we can’t get to where want to go without gifts like these.”
