B1G Expansion and more Conference Realignment

[WoodyHayes1951]

Oklahoma would be in the Big Ten now if it wasn't for Okie Lite. FACT.

[Lyons in the Sea of Red.]

I just dont understand why the B1G feels the need to jump the gun now. If superconferences are inevitable, why act now on sh#t schools when you can wait til the rest of the country has the same thinking and better schools are more willing to jump? Or are we afraid that the B1G doesn't have enough to offer to get them?

 

All this is going to lead to is making the SEC even stronger than it already is.

[Judoka]

Last time I checked, alumni don't *just* stay in the state in which they obtained their degree. They typically settle elsewhere, and there happens to be a lot of B1G alumni in D.C. and Baltimore.

 

Plus, there have been multiple stories about how New York City has a significant audience for college football in general--if you can get them watching Nebraska, Ohio State, or Michigan via Rutgers (or before, Syracuse, when they were rumored), then adding the woefully under-performing local school in Rutgers pays off.

 

Also, Fox Sports supposedly buying the YES! network in New York may play into this as well. (link goes to Frank the Tank page where someone brought this up)

 

Don't forget that Fox Sports is also the minority owner of the BTN.

 

 

I think this plays out and when done, the ACC is basically dead. Clemson/FSU go SEC, we get some combo of Ga Tech/ND/UNC.

If this is all about money and TV markets neither of those teams make it to the SEC...the Big XII, maybe.

[QMany]

I don't understand this at all.

 

That being said, what does this do to the Michigan v. OSU rivalry? When you get more teams, really hard to have that protected cross-division rival. This may mean we lose Michigan in our division. Hellllllllo division championships for years to come!!!

[VectorVictor]

Last time I checked, alumni don't *just* stay in the state in which they obtained their degree. They typically settle elsewhere, and there happens to be a lot of B1G alumni in D.C. and Baltimore.

 

Plus, there have been multiple stories about how New York City has a significant audience for college football in general--if you can get them watching Nebraska, Ohio State, or Michigan via Rutgers (or before, Syracuse, when they were rumored), then adding the woefully under-performing local school in Rutgers pays off.

 

Also, Fox Sports supposedly buying the YES! network in New York may play into this as well. (link goes to Frank the Tank page where someone brought this up)

 

Don't forget that Fox Sports is also the minority owner of the BTN.

 

 

I think this plays out and when done, the ACC is basically dead. Clemson/FSU go SEC, we get some combo of Ga Tech/ND/UNC.

 

Florida will never allow Florida State or Miami into the SEC, just as South Carolina will never allow Clemson into the SEC.

 

And ESPN's end game appears right, in that this is a move to go to 16 teams--folks honestly shouldn't judge the Rutgers/Maryland move until we get our final two pieces of the puzzle in place.

[Lyons in the Sea of Red.]

I don't understand this at all.

 

That being said, what does this do to the Michigan v. OSU rivalry? When you get more teams, really hard to have that protected cross-division rival. This may mean we lose Michigan in our division. Maybe pick up Wisconsin. Hellllllllo division championships for years to come!!!

Division championships mean sh#t when you play in a weak conference.

[Lyons in the Sea of Red.]

Is there any chance that the B1G presidents could vote against it? I know it requires an 80% vote...

[RedDenver]

This is a terrible, terrible, TERRIBLE move. Even forgetting the teams being added, the Huskers will only now rarely play tOSU and Wisky. Here's the breakdown:

8 games conference schedule and keeping crossovers (6 division games and 1 crossover every year and only 1 non-crossover team):

home and home in consecutive years (like it is now) means tOSU plays Huskers 2 years in a row (2011-2012 for example) and then not again for 11 years (next game 2023 in the example - Wisky not until 2025). This is the scenario is Rutgers and Maryland are added to the east and Illini move to west and everything else is unchanged.

 

Removing the crossover game haves the time to every 6 years, but destroys existing rivalries like tOSU-Mich being played only every 6 years. Could keep the crossover but only play one game (instead of back-to-back home and home) which would also reduce the time to every 6 years, but then tOSU would play at Lincoln and then not see the Huskers until 6 years later in the Shoe.

 

Looks like 8 conference games is untenable. So I'll look at a 9 game schedule:

home and home in consecutive years (like it is now) means tOSU plays Huskers 2 years in a row (2011-2012 for example) and then not again for 5 years (next game 2017 in the example). Not nearly as bad but still sucks since some players could play a full 4 years at NU and never face tOSU, Wisky, etc.

 

A redivisioning for a straight east-west split makes this even worse as Mich, tOSU, and PSU would all be in the east and only Wisky would be in the west with NU out of the power teams. And the majority of the population centers are all in the east minimizing any improvement to recruiting for NU (although it's a big advantage to the east teams).

 

The only real advantages here are a few more dollars (only about a 5-10% increase to the athletic budgets of each team for the most optimistic outlooks) and possibly getting rid of the terrible division names (I call them the Chutes and Ladders divisions). That's about it from my perspective. Rutgers and Maryland are about as exciting an add as most of the MAC, Big East, or Conference USA. Maybe the powers that be will redeem themselves with some sort of fancy scheduling or adding actually interesting teams for getting to 16 team conference.

 

I'm very depressed and angered by this move. This is the first time I've thought that the move to the B1G wasn't a good idea. B12 still needs 2 teams to get back to 12, so maybe that'll happen sometime in the future. Or maybe when the SEC goes to 16. Or maybe when this oversized conference splits up we'll end up with the "good" remnant. <sigh> Bad day for college football fans.

[Hingle McCringleberry]

If your wondering why Rutgers follow this link

 

http://thequad.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/09/19/the-geography-of-college-football-fans-and-realignment-chaos/

 

Basically Rutgers has a 20.9% share of the New York City college fan base, that equals 3% of the NYC pop, also know as 607xxx fans watching a Rutgers game.

 

To contrast. In Omaha, NU has a 71.1% share, for 36.4% of the pop, or 410xxx fans watching.

 

As far as I know BTN is not carried on the cable networks in NYC. This should pretty much force us into the biggest market in the US and we have a massive amount of upward potential for B1G teams to pic up fans.

 

Also going into ACC and picking up a couple more is very smart. Ga Tech is 11th over all in fans, and helps tap the Atlanta market. UNC is 30th.

 

Currently B1G is well set up for fans across the country watching.

Natioanl rank:

 

1 tOSU

2 Michigan

3 Penn State

12 Wiscoonsin

15 Iowa

18 NU

20 Sparty

27 Ill

28 Minn

44 Indiana

46 Purdue

54 NW

(32 Rutgers)

(58 Maryland)

 

Competition wise it seems a like a let down, TV wise, its a good choice. Combine those two with a potential coup in ND (doubtful, but who knows) and a strong Ga Tech, and we are really looking at a massive expansion of the footprint.

[suigeneris]

Florida will never allow Florida State or Miami into the SEC, just as South Carolina will never allow Clemson into the SEC.

 

And ESPN's end game appears right, in that this is a move to go to 16 teams--folks honestly shouldn't judge the Rutgers/Maryland move until we get our final two pieces of the puzzle in place.

 

Yeah, Jim Delaney is no one's fool. I wouldn't mind adding some combination of North Carolina, Virginia, and Georgia Tech so long as the divisions are drawn up evenly.

[VectorVictor]

The ball is starting to roll towards the 4 16-team Super Conferences. Selfishly I wish the Big Ten could add a few of our old Big 8 brethren, especially Oklahoma. But the problem that the Big Ten or any other conference runs into when trying to add an Oklahoma or a Kansas is that if you take one of them you have to take their state partner school as well. For example: if the Big Ten wanted Oklahoma they would also have to take Oklahoma State. I think this has to do with how those state's laws are written or something like that...don't quote me on this though.

 

Kansas has already said publicly they can move without Kansas State--before we left for the B1G, Kansas was talking with the Big East about a move into their conference.

 

You're correct about Oklahoma...they're beholden to Oklahoma State because of the makeup of the state legislature, who must approve their move. If Oklahoma can grease enough palms, though, they can leave their ball and chain, dumpster fire of a brother behind.

 

As for the other two (or more schools) to join with Maryland or Rutgers, knowing how Delaney works, and that we haven't heard a peep about conference alignment from FSU--the same FSU that, just a few months ago, was hell bent on getting out of the ACC...the silence is deafening.

 

If your wondering why Rutgers follow this link

 

http://thequad.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/09/19/the-geography-of-college-football-fans-and-realignment-chaos/

 

Ah, good find. I forgot about this article. Thanks for posting it.

[Excel]

That NYT piece has been posted and discussed a number of times. There are real problems with it. I wouldn't base anything off of it.

[WoodyHayes1951]

Honestly, I would have preferred to get Mizzou, Texas, OU and Kansas and then call it a day.

 

But OU has a T Boone problem and Texas is as stubborn as they get.

 

Mizzou and Kansas are NOT good expansion pieces by themselves. Especially for Football.

[VectorVictor]

That NYT piece has been posted and discussed a number of times. There are real problems with it. I wouldn't base anything off of it.

 

Such as?...

 

Mizzou and Kansas are NOT good expansion pieces by themselves. Especially for Football.

 

Nope. Though Kansas would go nicely with a North Carolina, Clemson, or FSU. And it would be nice for us to have our migration game against Kansas back...

[knapplc]

@McMurphyESPN

Maryland prez tells regents MD, RU in Leaders Division w/OSU, PSU, Wisconsin, Purdue & Indiana. Illinois moves to Legends

 

So:

 

Leaders

Indiana

Maryland

Ohio State

Penn State

Purdue

Rutgers

Wisconsin

 

Legends

Illinois

Iowa

Michigan

Michigan State

Minnesota

Nebraska

Northwestern

 

We're almost going to have to move toward nine conference games or we're never going to play the other division teams. With home-and-home games, we'll go 14 years without playing some of our Leaders Division opponents playing only eight games a year.