Originally Posted by
improbus
One of the things I have begun hearing is that the NCAA is going to give some more autonomy to the bigger schools and bigger conferences. I'm really surprised this hasn't happened earlier. Schools like Ohio State and Texas have really limited themselves by agreeing to play by the same rules as someone like Akron. I could really see some sort of Super Division 1 of schools that can really afford to give more to their players.
In Football, this could easily comprise around 40 schools. Not only would this benefit the kids involved, but it just might eliminate a large chunk of those meaningless games teams pad their schedules with early in the season. My mother in law splits season tickets to Ohio State football, and their home slate of games is embarrassing considering the prices they charge.
Just for fun, here would be my list of schools that would make this cut. Ohio State, Penn St., Wisconsin, Michigan, Michigan State, Nebraska, West Virginia, Virginia Tech, Clemson, South Carolina, North Carolina, Florida State, Miami, Pittsburgh, Georgia, Georgia Tech, Tennessee, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, LSU, Arkansas, Texas, Texas A&M, Missouri, Auburn, Oklahoma, Oklahoma St. Arizona St., Arizona, UCLA, USC, Cal, Notre Dame, Washington, Oregon, Kansas, Iowa, and Stanford. I'm sure there are more on the fringes of that list (like TCU, TT, BYU, Cincinnati, Louisville, Syracuse, etc...), and some that I've just missed. But, if that were a "league" like the NFL, it would be tremendous.