This paper explores the regional engagement of Polish universities and shows that the assumptions about the linkages between universities, their regions, and economic competitiveness that are taken for granted in the knowledge-economy policy discourse in advanced Western European economies may not fit Poland today. Universities in Poland contribute to economic development, but numerous other features that are known to contribute to economic growth are non-existent, and numerous inhibitors of economic growth, already addressed in knowledge-intensive economies, are still in force. Two decades of social and economic transformations are not long enough to bridge the gap between two parts of Europe. Expectations from universities to boost regional economies and contribute more directly to regional economic growth and new jobs may be unrealistic in the Polish case, due to a multitude of other relevant factors not linked either directly or indirectly to universities.