Conference carousel to start spinning again?

[xu82]

They really need to separate football from everything else. Iff they manage to screw up the NCAA Tournament by excluding those outside the "super conferences" (whether the Big East makes that cut or not), it would be monumental in its stupidity.

I have to believe (or at least hope) that the NCAA Tournament is too much of a cash cow to mess up. It would be almost like ESPN getting rid of Mike & Mike….the only decent thing they had left. OK, no level of stupidity is truly impossible.

[MHettel]

They really need to separate football from everything else. Iff they manage to screw up the NCAA Tournament by excluding those outside the "super conferences" (whether the Big East makes that cut or not), it would be monumental in its stupidity.

Oh, I think the NCAA Tournament is already at risk given the changes to the Transfer Rule and the NIL.

The beauty of the tournament is that the lower seeded teams always had a CHANCE to become Cinderella. And we would see it, regularly. Some team that shouldnt have made it past the first round somehow keeps moving along and sending top seeded teams home.

And if you look at the makeup of those Cinderella teams, you would often see alot of the same themes emerge. Older teams that have played together for several years in a row with at least one or two guys that have fringe NBA talent or high level overseas potential.

I'm not going to take a 1000 words to make my point. But go look at the "transfer rankings" and see how many of the "freshman of the year" or "DPOY" or "POY" from the smaller conferences have transferred to a Big 5 school. Its a shocking %. Those are the EXACT players that enabled Cinderella.

I think there is a high change that we start seeing less and less upsets in the NCAA Tourney. Thats what people are there to watch. What happens when you take away the upset. Do you lose the viewers? Is the story less compelling. Do we just end up with 3 warm up rounds until we get to the same 8 teams playing for it all every year?

[waggy]

Just read that Phil knight is going to pay notre dames acc exit fee

[STL_XUfan]

Just read that Phil knight is going to pay notre dames acc exit fee

In exchange for the big 10 taking Oregon? Otherwise, why would he care?

[xu82]

In exchange for the big 10 taking Oregon? Otherwise, why would he care?

Exactly what I was wondering. I’d have to guess that would be his only motivation.

[waggy]

Who knows? People just throw shit against the wall mostly.

[xudash]

They really need to separate football from everything else. Iff they manage to screw up the NCAA Tournament by excluding those outside the "super conferences" (whether the Big East makes that cut or not), it would be monumental in its stupidity.

I am looking for a truly defendable reason for why they will not screw it up, and I keep coming up with the television executives. If we accept that both ESPN and Fox are behind the curtain, causing all of these massive shifts in conference realignment, then it is also true that, in this case, CBS, et al will dictate the value of the television package for the NCAAT. Inclusiveness is the pixie dust of that tournament. Everyone and their mother knows and understands that.

Regarding the point about potential fewer upsets due to the transfer portal, etc., and the lack of interest that may cause overtime, I can only suggest who knows. At the very least, as long as the “tent“ is big enough to cover the kind of programs it covers now; as long as it continues to be inclusive, then there will always be the chance for upsets and the tournament will still have its overall similar feel.

Everything that we are seeing now is all about football. We have to continue to hope and believe that they are solving for football and that basketball is along for the ride. So long as basketball is along for the ride and all of this, Xavier is extremely well positioned moving forward so long as the entire environment finds it’s footing with the NIL.

[MHettel]

I am looking for a truly defendable reason for why they will not screw it up, and I keep coming up with the television executives. If we accept that both ESPN and Fox are behind the curtain, causing all of these massive shifts in conference realignment, then it is also true that, in this case, CBS, et al will dictate the value of the television package for the NCAAT. Inclusiveness is the pixie dust of that tournament. Everyone and their mother knows and understands that.

Regarding the point about potential fewer upsets due to the transfer portal, etc., and the lack of interest that may cause overtime, I can only suggest who knows. At the very least, as long as the “tent“ is big enough to cover the kind of programs it covers now; as long as it continues to be inclusive, then there will always be the chance for upsets and the tournament will still have its overall similar feel.

Everything that we are seeing now is all about football. We have to continue to hope and believe that they are solving for football and that basketball is along for the ride. So long as basketball is along for the ride and all of this, Xavier is extremely well positioned moving forward so long as the entire environment finds it’s footing with the NIL.

What I really like about this is that we will literally get our answer to these questions over the next couple years. I think the cinderellas will be VERY few and far between. Much less frequent than in the past. And we will get to see.

[xudash]

What I really like about this is that we will literally get our answer to these questions over the next couple years. I think the cinderellas will be VERY few and far between. Much less frequent than in the past. And we will get to see.

Agree.

I believe it is somewhere between reasonably and highly likely that our position will improve. Texas and Oklahoma moving to the SEC destabilized the “wall“ that protects some of the lesser football programs like BC, Wake Forest, Syracuse, etc. The Big Ten‘s “acquisition” of USC and UCLA has virtually knocked it down.

The following is a direct quote from a fan on the Syracuse message board:

I'm fine if we aren't part of the imminent super conference(s) for football. I think the end game is football breaking away from the NCAA and the overall structure of basketball remaining the same. Just some weird conference alignment because of what will happen with football.

We will never compete at the highest level in football. Play in whatever the second tier ends up being there and go back to the Big East for everything else. The basketball program would be fine long term and the football program can compete with smaller state and private schools if that is how things end up.

We have discussed on many occasions here what the “candidate pool“ might look like for expansion candidates for the Big East. Last year it was a combination of considering Gonzaga, not dipping into the mid-Major pool, and having none of these P5 schools available for consideration. Well, that certainly could be changing now. Some of these schools, particularly the old BE members, may very well come back into doable view for all of this.

It will still take some time to sort out, but our conference has the luxury of time for now. We certainly do not have to do anything drastic.

One last thing: we could all look back very easily in even less than five years and see what a mistake it was for Gonzaga not to join the Big East when it appeared to have an opportunity to do so.

[XUBison]

Agree.

I believe it is somewhere between reasonably and highly likely that our position will improve. Texas and Oklahoma moving to the SEC destabilized the “wall“ that protects some of the lesser football programs like BC, Wake Forest, Syracuse, etc. The Big Ten‘s “acquisition” of USC and UCLA has virtually knocked it down.

The following is a direct quote from a fan on the Syracuse message board:

I'm fine if we aren't part of the imminent super conference(s) for football. I think the end game is football breaking away from the NCAA and the overall structure of basketball remaining the same. Just some weird conference alignment because of what will happen with football.

We will never compete at the highest level in football. Play in whatever the second tier ends up being there and go back to the Big East for everything else. The basketball program would be fine long term and the football program can compete with smaller state and private schools if that is how things end up.

We have discussed on many occasions here what the “candidate pool“ might look like for expansion candidates for the Big East. Last year it was a combination of considering Gonzaga, not dipping into the mid-Major pool, and having none of these P5 schools available for consideration. Well, that certainly could be changing now. Some of these schools, particularly the old BE members, may very well come back into doable view for all of this.

It will still take some time to sort out, but our conference has the luxury of time for now. We certainly do not have to do anything drastic.

One last thing: we could all look back very easily in even less than five years and see what a mistake it was for Gonzaga not to join the Big East when it appeared to have an opportunity to do so.

Oh, those UD losers on HLOH will not like this (spot on) assessment.