I'd be a little surprised if that's the core issue - construction costs have gone up so dramatically that $240MM for a facility isn't eye-popping. Even for a building that won't host revenue generating sports. And it seems like it got far enough along that nobody was balking at the cost. The bigger issue is fundraising - that was her signature success at Eastern Michigan, generating a huge increase in athletic donations. $12MM raised for the new facility indicates she wasn't having the same success at Pitt; interviewing at Northwestern could have been due to a realization it wasn't possible to have success increasing fundraising at Pitt. Or at least she knew she sure as heck wasn't going to do it.
Anyone looking at that job needs to figure out why Lyke wasn't able to increase donations to a level she'd almost certainly projected that she would - if they can't increase donations, they cannot succeed as AD.
So I don't agree with your take - if the $240MM was the core issue, I'd say the Gable-Shaw comparison is valid. If the $12MM is the core problem, its probably not (but whoever comes in better figure out a way to increase donations knowing they are following someone who had a proven track record of doing so and didn't at Pitt...that's a tough assignment).
As a caveat, I've read exactly three articles related to Lyke, Pitt athletics, and her termination and I DID NOT stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night - so my analysis could be utterly worthless garbage.
www.post-gazette.com
www.sportsbusinessjournal.com
