Big East - College football playoff.....

[Carl Spackler]

Disagree with this. A team at UConn's level depends on finding less-regarded but still talented prospects and coaching them up. This is especially true in the Northeast where the high school preparation isn't as good as Texas or Florida. By the team our players are redshirt juniors and seniors, they can compete with the players Texas and Alabama get out of high school. With an 80-player roster, we'll be 1- or 2-deep with capable players, Texas or Alabama will be 3- or 4-deep, but barring injuries we can compete with them.

Cut the scholarships in half, and Texas and Alabama are now 2-deep at every spot, UConn starts to have holes where unprepared freshman have to start. We get crushed when playing them. It's true there are more talented players spread around, but many will end up at non-BCS schools and even 1-AA schools. In any given year, depending on when a lot of talent graduates, a lower-level team like a UMass or Buffalo could be better than a Big East team. It would be like basketball, where only a few elite schools have consistent success -- all the next tier schools get a group of great players but then they graduate and you have a down year.

Personally, I think there's value to (a) seeing high-level football played at the BCS level, so letting a group of ~60 teams have large enough rosters that they can coach up talented players for a few years before playing them; and (b) giving plenty of young athletes a chance for a free education. Cut the scholarships per team, and a lot of athletes lose out.

While I tend to disagree with the broad generalization in your first paragraph spanning true freshmen coming out of high school as compared to RS Jr's and Sr's from up north.....I agree with the general idea you've put out. You touch on a subject that I've written about a bit. Youth football in the Northeast USA. That's where the difference trully lies in the recruiting landscape. The public perception and the media influence on conference affiliation and all of that is all fluff.

It's the quality of player that you plan on bringing into your program from day 1 that is what it's all about. I've talked about that so much around here. Elevating the level of competition within our own roster, and by extension elevating our level of play on the field on game days in the fall, is what it's going to take to get this program to continue on the upward curve, and I believe what i"m seeing so far from 2010, 2011, and now 2012....we most definitely are ramping up the quality of player coming in to the program from day 1.

If youth football ever comes back in full force in the northeast, there will be more than enough players to field a roster that is four deep the way you describe with local northeast players. I'll save the long dissertation as to why youth football declined in the north east over the past 35-40 years, but again is on the rise. Short version is that kids are begining again to have the opportunity to earn so many more scholarships in football than in any other sport, and northeast college football is beginning to implement scholarships in large volumes again.

 

[Carl Spackler]

As for leveling the recruiting playing field? The day that any coach in the country for any program in the country can walk into a kids living room, and legitimately say that they can have the opportunity win a national championship - is when the recruiting palying field is trully level, and then - you'll see academics begin to matter a whole lot more too. College football, last week, took the first step toward something like that happening, a step that had been waiting 130 years to happen. It's a baby step, but it's step in the right in direction.

 

[metsfan2323]

metsfan,

the BCS system is biased to give certain conferences and certain schools the benfit of the doubtr....

How is the BCS system biased? The BCS rewards teams based on on the field success.

West Virginia was one win away from making the championship game a few years ago and they blew it. Since then the Big East has not had a team worthy of the championship game. Is that Bias or a bad job by the Big East?

Bias is forcing the Fiesta Bowl to select UCONN for its "elite bowl game" when we were clearly not elite. Certainly Temple didn't think we were elite.

 

[ConnHuskBask]

West Virginia would have made the National Championship in 2007 with 1 loss - but they lost to Pitt the last game of the season.

Cincy would have made the National Championship in 2009 going undefeated - but Texas made a last second FG vs. Nebraska in the Big12 Championship game.

The system championship most years will be SEC, Big10, Big12 and Pac12, but let's no ignore the facts that a Big East team can make a run at a title.

Another thing that's just factually wrong is including the ACC as one of the top 4 power conferences. I believe the ACC doesn't have any teams since the first raid that would have qualified for the "Final 4".

ACC will kick our ass in the TV dollars, but they are not far superior in on the field football.

 

[B1GEast]

How is the BCS system biased? The BCS rewards teams based on on the field success.

West Virginia was one win away from making the championship game a few years ago and they blew it. Since then the Big East has not had a team worthy of the championship game. Is that Bias or a bad job by the Big East?

Bias is forcing the Fiesta Bowl to select UCONN for its "elite bowl game" when we were clearly not elite. Certainly Temple didn't think we were elite.

The only bias I can see is that SEC teams, the SEC by the way is very top heavy, get unfair stronger schedule ratings. Last year the only SEC teams that had solid wins were Bama, LSU and Arkansas. Every one else was vastly over rated, especially Georgia.

Just look at how many SEC teams were in the pre-season top 25, unfortunately that affected BCS ratings.

 

[Srqhusky]

While I tend to disagree with the broad generalization in your first paragraph spanning true freshmen coming out of high school as compared to RS Jr's and Sr's from up north.....I agree with the general idea you've put out. You touch on a subject that I've written about a bit. Youth football in the Northeast USA. That's where the difference trully lies in the recruiting landscape. The public perception and the media influence on conference affiliation and all of that is all fluff.

It's the quality of player that you plan on bringing into your program from day 1 that is what it's all about. I've talked about that so much around here. Elevating the level of competition within our own roster, and by extension elevating our level of play on the field on game days in the fall, is what it's going to take to get this program to continue on the upward curve, and I believe what i"m seeing so far from 2010, 2011, and now 2012....we most definitely are ramping up the quality of player coming in to the program from day 1.

If youth football ever comes back in full force in the northeast, there will be more than enough players to field a roster that is four deep the way you describe with local northeast players. I'll save the long dissertation as to why youth football declined in the north east over the past 35-40 years, but again is on the rise. Short version is that kids are begining again to have the opportunity to earn so many more scholarships in football than in any other sport, and northeast college football is beginning to implement scholarships in large volumes again.

Well if you cut five scholarships from each team that would be less five star or highly recruited players that the a school such as michigan or Texas could sign. These players would now redistribute to other schools. Schools like uconn would reap the benefit of better players. It actually would make competition better if you want to see better players on the field . Schools like Michigan n Texas will have fewer five star athletes sitting on the bench because they will be playing.
Talent is talent wether it comes from the northeast southeast or china. Didn't a kid from Nashua just go in the second round? I just want to see more of the top end talent out of high school distributed . Wether You believe in stars or not the teams With the higher rated kids do better. You can look up that statistic.
Hopefully the bowls are redone to include the champions of the conferences that didn't make the playoffs. Has there been any talk of that

 

[Marty Jackson]

unfortunately it'll take more than winning games to win a championship in either scenario. nobody likes the status quo, but i'm not going to start loving a plan that doesn't even exist just because it's not the status quo. until we find out how money is going to be distributed it's hard to have too much of an opinion on this new plan, but if it's being developed by the commissioners of the other BCS conferences without us, i'm going to assume we're going to get screwed until i hear otherwise

couldn't have said it better... The playoff is simply a red-herring. It's how the money is split that is the real decision. And that is where anyone outside the big 4 will get screwed. Even the ACC has been relegated to an outsider with fb blue-bloods like FSU and Clemson.

 

[joey3$trike$]

This is an 8 team playoff.

True 8 team playoff would be best case scenario. I believe ND will have to choose a conference because of the $$$$ that playoffs would bring in. But will it be worth more than what they already get from NBC and being an Independent I'm not sure. I can't see how being in the SEC or Big 10 playing against alabama,lsu, or michigan, ohio st. every year wouldn't be more lucrative and better overall schedule ranking, than playing pitt, navy,army, uconn of the worlds, to be considered a top 4 team. But I know they make a load of $$$$ now, so how much these t.v. deals are with new conferences & championship games will make ND I believe pick a conference. Wherever the $ is they will go.