College Football Realignment

[dabvu2498]

Originally Posted by bucksfan2

What markets do the SEC have now? I think they want to build the best conference in general to for a national ESPN deal. As of right now most of the SEC Schools are located in smallish college towns. I guess you could say their 4 largest markets are Atlanta, Knoxville, Orlando, and Lexington.

Cities that you might not expect to have an SEC Network affiliate that do:

Anchorage, AK
Denver
Honolulu
Detroit
Minneapolis
Kansas City
St. Louis
New York
Columbus
Philadephia
Dallas
San Antonio
Spokane

http://sec.xosdigitallabs.com/Portal...Clearances.pdf

[RiverRat13]

Originally Posted by IslandRed

Well, if you're going to force me to say it... UNC is a public school that views itself as a private school, they're kind of snobs about their academic reputation, they're sensitive to the company they keep, and they think moving to the SEC would be like moving to the projects.

Doesn't matter if you or I agree with it, that's how they think. Football simply doesn't drive the decision-making the way it does at most other schools.

Now if it was their basketball team at risk and they needed the SEC to save it...

Yep.

[WVRed]

Originally Posted by IslandRed

Well, if you're going to force me to say it... UNC is a public school that views itself as a private school, they're kind of snobs about their academic reputation, they're sensitive to the company they keep, and they think moving to the SEC would be like moving to the projects.

Doesn't matter if you or I agree with it, that's how they think. Football simply doesn't drive the decision-making the way it does at most other schools.

Now if it was their basketball team at risk and they needed the SEC to save it...

The bolded part could be said about Kentucky. The rest, not so much. UNC's football program, even with probation, is on par with Kentucky's. They've actually produced some pretty good prospects lately, not that anyone in baby blue seems to care.

As for the Big East, they are the premiere basketball conference, but football is the horse that drives the carriage in all of college sports. The conference has shown to be historically behind compared to other conferences and the last poaching by the ACC is living proof of that. They added TCU in all sports just so they could keep their automatic bid.

[Sea Ray]

Originally Posted by IslandRed

Well, if you're going to force me to say it... UNC is a public school that views itself as a private school, they're kind of snobs about their academic reputation, they're sensitive to the company they keep, and they think moving to the SEC would be like moving to the projects.

Doesn't matter if you or I agree with it, that's how they think. Football simply doesn't drive the decision-making the way it does at most other schools.

Now if it was their basketball team at risk and they needed the SEC to save it...

Fair enough but where does the Big East fit in with UNC's philosophy?

[WVRed]

Originally Posted by Sea Ray

Fair enough but where does the Big East fit in with UNC's philosophy?

I kinda thought the same thing. The Big East is mostly metro areas or Catholic schools. UNC is neither.

UNC is more of a Big Ten school. Problem is, the Big Ten would never look at UNC.

[RiverRat13]

Originally Posted by Sea Ray

Fair enough but where does the Big East fit in with UNC's philosophy?

I only included the Big East because I assumed we were talking about a scenario where there's no ACC.

And there have been rumors that the Big 10 has indeed looked at UNC. I don't see it happening, but why wouldn't the Big 10 love to get a foothold in a growing state in the South, especially a state of nine million people? UNC would bring the Big Ten Network into about four times the amount of homes than Nebraska is going to bring. But as long as there is an ACC, Carolina will be in it.

[KronoRed]

Originally Posted by WMR

I still think the 14th will be either Missouri, Va Tech, or FSU. (In order of likelihood.)

It won't be someone from the ACC, when the vote was taken to let A&M in many articles said that they also put Missouri and WVU on the maybe table, this goes back to the last expansion, but I've read many times the SEC and ACC have a friendly agreement not to try and raid the other.

[RiverRat13]

Originally Posted by KronoRed

It won't be someone from the ACC, when the vote was taken to let A&M in many articles said that they also put Missouri and WVU on the maybe table, this goes back to the last expansion, but I've read many times the SEC and ACC have a friendly agreement not to try and raid the other.

I think I read that supposedly Florida, South Carolina and Georgia have a pack to vote against a second team from one of their states (FSU, Clemson or GT) being admitted into the SEC. Those three schools like the advantage of being the only SEC member in their respective state.

[Slyder]

If FSU is truly peeved at Tobacco Road Mafia and a quote from a Raliegh Radio station is true (basketball is what the next expansion will be about)....

Split from the bball with an agreement that they play each other in the other sports since its easy trips for the non revenue teams for most of the teams and great for tv spots in the non-conference basketball.

Football Side is at 9. Let Notre Dame decide what they want to do. If they join fine, if not fine stay with the catholic schools (I'm assuming they stay with the basketball side).

With the TV contract about to be negotiated after 2012 I think:
Call
10 FSU
11 Clemson
12 Va Tech (if not gobbled up by the SEC)/ NC State if Tech goes SEC
13 BC (who has been the real loser of the last realignment)
Leave 14 open if FSU wants to bring Miami, NC State, or someone else.

FSU wants to be respected as a football school and the split allows us to show them and the rest that we understand its about FOOTBALL not protecting our buddies.

North:
1 BC
2 Cincinnati/ Va Tech
3 Connecticut
4 Pittsburgh
5 Rutgers
6 Syracuse
7 WVU

South:
1 Clemson
2 Florida State
3 Louisville
4 Va Tech or NC State/Cincinnati
5 USF
6 TCU
7 (insert 14th team here)

Basketball now has 8 schools: 1 ND (good/great bball program), 2 Georgetown (likewise), 3 Villanova (best of the bunch IMO), 4 St John's (improving), 5 Marquette (one of the bigger winners of the last round of reallignment), 6 Seton Hall (bleh), 7 Providence (garbage), 8 Depaul (likewise but at least in Chicago).

That is a real solid core to build from. Add some combination of the following schools: Butler
Xavier (makes it easy in the cross conference games as they play Cincy anyways)
George Mason
and other Midmajors that could add real value to the Big East they go as big as they feel is neccessary and would still remain easily the top bball conference. Have a big east vs new conference made for tv games (see if NBC wants the rights to it too).

[WMR]

Originally Posted by RiverRat13

I think I read that supposedly Florida, South Carolina and Georgia have a pack to vote against a second team from one of their states (FSU, Clemson or GT) being admitted into the SEC. Those three schools like the advantage of being the only SEC member in their respective state.

You forgot one. UK is part of that same agreement.

[WVRed]

Here's the next shoe:

http://espn.go.com/college-sports/st...ast-conference

Would have thought those two would have garnered B10 attention.

[Slyder]

Originally Posted by WVRed

Here's the next shoe:

http://espn.go.com/college-sports/st...ast-conference

Would have thought those two would have garnered B10 attention.

I can't see Pitt going to the ACC Without WVU and some assurances about a couple things, maybe I'm just misguided in the belief that short of a big 10 invite Pitt would stick with us. There was a rumor that the ACC was looking toward basketball as its driving force in the next round of expansion, FSU and Va Tech weren't real happy about it.

If that's their driving force I would be on the phone tomorrow. Everyone knows Basketball is Robin in this... except the ACC apparently.

[WVRed]

Originally Posted by Slyder

I can't see Pitt going to the ACC Without WVU and some assurances about a couple things, maybe I'm just misguided in the belief that short of a big 10 invite Pitt would stick with us. There was a rumor that the ACC was looking toward basketball as its driving force in the next round of expansion, FSU and Va Tech weren't real happy about it.

If that's their driving force I would be on the phone tomorrow. Everyone knows Basketball is Robin in this... except the ACC apparently.

I've never seen Pitt and WVU being joined at the hip. They're two state borderline schools separated by an hour and a half. If it was an in-state rival I could see it. Either way, i'm sure the schools would continue the rivalry even if in different conferences.

If Pitt does leave, I think it puts more pressure for WVU to bolt for another conference. I don't think the schools leaving hurt so much from a football standpoint, but I imagine it would hurt enough to cost the Big East an automatic bid.

[WMR]

I think you're right about the ACC and Big East merging but, IMO, you would see the ACC remain almost entirely intact and taking only the "upper crust" of the Big East to fill in the holes created by expansion and members poached by one of the other "superconferences."

Sounds like they're trying to do exactly what I said a couple days ago. Eerie.

[Reds Freak]

Here's my East USA Conference breakdown, based mainly on geography:

EUSA North (10 teams):
UC
UConn
Pitt
WVU
Louisville
Rutgers
Syracuse
Boston College
UVA
Maryland

EUSA South (10 teams):
VA Tech
GA Tech
NC
Duke
Miami
South Florida
NC State
Wake
Clemson
Florida State

EUSA Non-Football (10 teams):
St. John’s
Marquette
Georgetown
Villanova
Providence
Seton Hall
DePaul
Notre Dame
Xavier
Butler