Kiyoat Husker

Maryland fans suck. Period.

I like it. Stirrin the pot. Acrimony beats apathy when it comes to college sports.

Back to the Field Turf...

We'd better be careful or the smart Cowboy fans will spray our field turf with round-up like they did at CSU back in 04. wait...

(1) can't really speak to the college game too much, but at DC Nationals game it doesn't seem to be an issue (Philly fans certainly make one think that's the way it is, though)

(2) Maryland yes, Rutgers?

(3) True (other than PSU and Maryland perhaps, even though PSU owns the record b/t the two 35-1-1 according to Wiki, still a bit of rivalry action there)

(4) See (3)

(5) I think Rutgers truly is a sleeping giant, they just need the right shot in the arm, perhaps the B1G is what does it, who knows (not so sure about Maryland)

Yes, I guess I was thinking mostly of the Philly fans, who have that rep...

and Beaver Stadium http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1227396-college-football-rankings-10-worst-stadiums-for-away-fans-to-visit/page/7

and The obscene chants back in 07 at the Rutgers-Navy game.

that's fine, though. We're used to entire student sections that throw garbage on the field and get ejected from the game (see Colorado)

Does anyone have experience attending or playing Rutgers or Maryland Games? What is the character of their fans?

Some assumptions on my part:

1) East Coast and Middle Atlantic fans tend to be very critical at games, booing and cursing at both opponents and their own team. (there are some of these fans everywhere, of course)

2) There is much more passion for basketball than football (obviously they are better at it)

3) Games with B1G schools will lack much of the acrimony and hatred that go along with rivalries, thus making them pretty vanilla in the first few years (like Nebraska's last two seasons)

4) Penn State will be the only team with much history playing them.

5) Like other B1G schools, Rutgers and Maryland are large, old, and have good academic reps. This should equate to large and educated alumni bases. = potential sleeping giants fan-wise.

Am I making an ASS of U and ME in ASSUME-ing?

It must be coincidence that Clowney didn't mention Barrett Trotter, Tyler Wilson, Zach Mettenberger or Jeff Driskel. I'm sure that's an oversight on his part, and he meant to.

The article linked has been changed to say that Clowney actually meant to say Tyler Wilson and not Taylor Martinez. It did seem odd to talk smack about a team you played two years ago.

Yeah, uh, I knew that, ... I was just kidding.

Well this thread can probably just go away then...

Lose only to UCLA and tOSU (in the Champ Game). Beat USC in the Rose Bowl!!

12-2, Bitches!

Trash talking before the game is ballsy, since you have to back it up. Trash talking after the game is just being a punk. I still hate that p@ssy Chase Daniel for running his mouth after he beat us. Both times, if I am not mistaken. 07 and 08.

Ferentz doesn't suck. Iowa sucks, and the sucking vortex of the Suck-eyes must have sucked all the good coaching right out of him. That sucks.

A little off topic, but I'm surprised Mangino didn't land another HC job after KU. The guy is a good coach. So what if he yells at his players. And assistant coaches. And everybody else. He can whip a team into shape and win. Who knows, maybe he'll end up at Nebraska in some capacity--say OC or something. Don't laugh, he is at Youngstown State right now--that town where we hire all our coaches from.

... AND, he is originally from that area as well, if I am not mistaken. I'm sure Bo would get along well with him, but brings a little baggage. And I don't mean his pants, although being morbidly obese has not helped him in the job market. He is a good coach, though. I'm sure we could hook him up with Chuck Weis's guy and get a staple, or a tapeworm, or something.

Maybe he could hire Richard Simmons to follow him around and hurl insults at him all day. Now that's entertainment.

Well, at least WE're still talking about it...

for whatever that's worth.

keep the dream alive...

yeah, I guess the wheels of justice always move slowly... the bigger question is why won't any media outlet touch this?

http://www.mysanantonio.com/sports/article/Longhorns-Insider-Kearney-case-not-going-away-4368627.php

So, I did a little google search to see what was up with the Bev Kearney case. Apparently:

Kearney's lawyer filed a complaint against UT with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Texas Workforce Commission alleging racial and gender discrimination, as well as retaliation.

The EEOC has 180 days to investigate Kearney's claim before she can sue UT, which her lawyer,Derek Howard, said she intends to do. The 180-day window expires Sept. 8.

In the meantime, multiple staffers at UT — including in the athletic department — could be subject to questioning. Howard said he has knowledge of “in excess of 10” inappropriate relationships between UT staffers and subordinates.

 

Sucks to have to wait, but at least this stuff will come out just in time for football season!

If it's just OU I wouldn't say never if that pulled in Texas. I doubt the 2 would be willing to jump ship without taking a chunk of their fiefdom with them though.

agree. I think it highly more likely for the Whorns to take OU, OSU and TTech to the West Coast, abandoning the rest of the conf to be divided by the B1G, SEC, Mt West, Conf USA and America 16.

Edit: plus the MAC for ISU

Agree that the NYC and DC markets will probably provide a large portion of revenue. Exceeding the "new mouths to feed" aspect of enlarging the conference. Smart move.

I think that people sometimes don't understand the way the BTN works. I'm no marketing or mass comm expert, but I did stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night. I also lived in the Des Moines area for awhile, and I can tell you that some of the Iowa State fans were upset when the BTN made a deal with the local cable company. Basically you can think of it as anyone who has cable through that provider were contributing to the BTN. Whether you were a Hawkeye fan or hated them, you were still paying. (as long as the provider agreed to have BTN as part of the basic plan).

Multiply that by however many people live in the NYC and NJ areas, and you have a lot of people donating to the conference, whether or not they are a fan of the Scarlet Knights.

Now this could change in the future, as things are gravitating toward more personallized programming like HULU and Netflix, but I think the BTN will be fine there as well, because that gives the most profit to the most passionate fan bases, which the B1G also has. (see nebraska)

Division overall winning percentage past two decades (East in Blue...for obvious reasons)

 

Ohio State 0.796 (elite group)

 

 

Nebraska 0.704 (contenders group)

Penn State 0.692

Michigan 0.691

Wisconsin 0.690

 

 

Iowa 0.568 (always bowl-elligible group)

Michigan State 0.553

 

Purdue 0.504 (middling group)

Northwestern 0.494

Maryland 0.478

 

Rutgers 0.435 (punching bag group)

Minnesota 0.433

 

Illinois 0.389 (doormat group)

Indiana 0.338

 

Nice analysis. I put in spaces that represent about .05, or 5% jumps to help separate groups... over a 20 year span the balance is not too bad. Ohio State is obviously the one that tips the balance, but that would be the case no matter where you put them. We just need to do our part and win a few more games, and then the balance will be restored with us as an "elite" in the conference. I would love to see NU-Wisc be the de-facto West title game, and NU-tOSU be the frequent B1G title game in most years! Would really foster some meaningful rivalries with those teams.

Have been reading this thread and wanted to respond to concerns with the potential West division being like the Big 12 North. I am long time Big Ten fan, Michigan first, Penn State second. Love having Big Red aboard, and have enjoyed (and will miss) the short lived annual NU-Michigan game. I do not think the Big Ten will be at 14 teams for long, if at all. The Big Ten will go to 16 teams and adopt the 4x4 team pod format. I love this idea. You can play every Big Ten team in two years with a 9 game schedule. As an example, lets assume the Big Ten gets the team they really want, ND, and picks up Virginia. Very unlikely I know. Here are some example Pods.

 

West: Nebraska, Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota

Central: Illinois, NW, Purdue, ND

Great Lakes: Mich, Ohio, Indiana, Mich St.

East: Penn St, Maryland, Rutgers, Virginia

 

NU would play the three west pod teams every year (great for the fans and travel). For the other 6 conf. games NU would play the The entire central pod and 1/2 of the east pod. Year 2 you play the other half of the east and the great lakes pod. You keep this 2 year rotation, but alternate home and away. You get a home game with every big ten team every 4 years and play every team every two years. NU gets to go out east every year too. CCG is the best two teams. Not sure of the tie breakers.

 

Year 1: Minn, Wis, Iowa, Illini, NW, Purdue, ND, PSU, Maryland

Year 2: Minn, Wis, Iowa, OSU, Mich, MSU, Indiana, Rutgers, Virginia

repeat...

 

What do you think? You can mix and match the pods to your liking.

 

I really like your plan! Mine is pretty similar (you can find it on the "B1G Expansion and more Conference Realignment" thread), except that it consists of 20 teams split into 4 pods. But regardless of whether the B1G decides to go with 16, 18, 20, or even 24 teams, I definitely think a rotating pod structure is the way to go.

It could work. The best part of your scenario is getting ND, which won't happen, but still a workable system. Seems confusing at first, but with good name recognition of the pods, that might not be an issue. Also avoids having to play a semi-final by combining pods that play round-robin.

The way I understand it is that the teams labelled "cursed" are teams for which it just doesn't make sense why they can't get over the hump and win that championship. The Cubs and Red Sox are some of the most popular and supported teams in the country. They have huge fan bases, financial support, etc. and yet for some reason they couldn't cash it in. For a long time.

I think that only Husker fans at this point would say we are cursed because some of us just don't understand why the 90's don't keep happening every decade.

For Iowa State, it actually does make sense why they are not elite.

For Minnesota, I would actually call them cursed. For decades they were the sh@t, but have had a drought that has lasted since the 1960's. Minneapolis is a large metropolis with football-crazed people. The University is one of the largest in the country with a huge number of alumni. The Gophers curse is, I believe, the Vikings. The NFL started eclipsing college football in the 60's and 70's at the national level (but not everywhere).

I am making an assumption...

... I wonder if the Big 10 extends the Maryland travel deal to GT and FSU if they came into the conf...

not familiar with this deal. What am I missing?

Is ANY conference the Big 9?

Crap. I need to not post in the middle of the night...

fixed it.

We are already doing pretty much all of the right things. Our fans and our passion for football is what will always keep Nebraska great. We just have to have patience. I believe that our coaches are great at coaching, and pretty good at recruiting. With the new NCAA rules, maybe we could bring in a non-coaching recruiting staff that works as hard as our coaches, but can really focus on getting the talented kids here.

starting to read this, i did not think i would agree with you....

...however, i ended up agreeing with you...

I agree with me too, thanks for noticing!

if it is strictly the top 8 or 10, then conf. champs. become a liability. but if it is mostly by conference champs., then quality teams in the same division would be denied in favor of less quality teams from inferior conferences.

You make a good point here. If there are no Auto-qualifiers, then why even play the CCG? It only hurts a team that is already playoff-bound, and has proven themselves head-to-head as the best in the conference.

Your second point I would disagree with, though. If a playoff is mostly conf champs with a few wildcards, then the only "quality teams" that should matter (that did not win their conference) are the ones good enough to get a wildcard. If you want to be considered for a national championship, win your conference. No excuses.

Its more balanced than some people think. Wiscy has 3 rings in a row, as well as being continually at the top of the conference for more than a decade, they just don't have the sexy history, football history there only really starts with Alverez being hired. Iowa is historically about even with Michigan State. They both hover around 7 or 8 wins with a jump to 10 every now and then, and miss a bowl game about as often. And people are completely ignoring Northwestern, who came pretty damned close to 12-0 in the regular season last year. As long as Fitzgerald is there they will be more dangerous to us then MSU with Dantonio. Illinois, Purdue and Indiana are all pretty interchangeable. Rutgers and Maryland are not exactly powerhouses either. I expect them to hover around 7 wins a year. Don't kid yourself, O'Brian coached his ass off last year, but the talent deficit is going to start hitting them, it won't even be as bad this year. Wait for 2014 to about 2025. They have a few more years of a bowl ban, and they might not make it back to one for close to a decade.

 

I see two power teams in each division a couple very good teams, in each, and three also-rans.

Agree. Posters here are understandably wary of power shifts within the conference, but the B1G is NOT the Big XII. The culture is completely different. Texas took every opportunity to consolidate power and resources at the expense of the rest of the conference. Ohio State and Michigan may be football juggernauts, but they share equal space at the table with Indiana and Minnesota. Also the recruiting advantage of West vs East is less dramatic than Texas vs Cold Snowy North. Ohio is a recruiting destination, but so is Chicago. The Big XII was doomed from the start as two culturally disparate conferences merged. Keep in mind, also that the Old Big 8 Teams were actually much stronger than the South in the beginning of the "marriage".

Also think of the travel advantages within this now larger conference. It only makes sense to play the closest teams more frequently. Wisconsin makes more sense playing Nebraska/Minnesota/Iowa every year. Those are their regional rivals. Also, now we won't ever have to see Michigan/Ohio State as a back-to-back rematch in the Title Game.

I like it. I like it a lot.

I also think that the bowl system as we now know it will and should go away. 6-6 teams have no business in the post season in my opinion, and 7-5 teams from the MAC should not feel entitled to postseason play, either. Having a second-tier tourney and even a third-tier one would be preferable to meaningless bowls.

70 teams in post-season is too many. three tiers of 16-team playoffs would give you 48. If the remaining 22 "bowl eligible" teams want to have 11 pillow-fights after that, go for it. Can't wait to see the ratings on that.

I think the average College football fan would hate a 64 team playoff. This is the type of thing that playoff opponents point to as their greatest fear: to make the regular season irrelevant. I also think that each regular season game meaning something is an important thing that makes this sport unique and compelling. A rivalry game that gets out of hand can ruin an entire season. How awesome is that?

I like an 8-team, 12-team or 16-team format that includes mostly conference champs. That makes the Conf Champ games actually mean something as well.

Anything more than 16 will erode the regular season in my book. Unfortunately, once we finally get the tourney to be the right size someone will want to mess with it to make more money (look at the expansion of the silly play-in games in the BB tourney).