Here's a link with a bonus pic of 2 great players from Georgia: http://wbbinsider.blogspot.com/2010/11/diamond-deshields-tells-it-how-it-is.html?m=1
Great pick up for Notre Dame! Not surprised at all. I felt like Geno and company kinda moved on to McCall! I think many of us on the Boneyard always thought she was going to be a part of the Fighting Irish! Glad she is staying in the BE.
Thanks for the pic Milford. Hopefully Diamond will join her friends at N. Eagleville Tech!! Shh it's a secret!!!!!
The issue is not what ND has or hasn't scooped in from TV revenues, it is what they could have done to prevent the BE from contorting. If ND was not concerned about the TV revenues, it would have been a no brainer for them to come into the BE. I know, they have of these great traditional rivalries they need to preserve. Only thing is, in a nine team conference they could have kept many of those rivalries going with 4 OOC games and maybe having to skip a year here and there with the those schools. As to UConn. it was an original member of the Big East when the league had no football and few of the schools had football or D1 football. . The only real case about UConn maybe not being in the BE at that time was that it didn't fit the big TV market model the league was fashioned on. They got in, among other factors, because of Dee Rowe's close relationship with Dave Gavitt and UConn's somewhat well-regarded stature as a hoops program in New England. When the league added football, the choice was not whether or net to jettison the teams that didn't have D1 FB, because there wouldn't have been much of a hoops league left, but to add teams who had all the major sports. ND was added later without FB because the league was interested in the Chicago TV market and the league was still being driven by the hoops mentality. It is hard to imagine any other major conference taking ND without the only true value it brings to a sports league. Nobody is saying ND didn't give what they were originally signed up to do. But things change and if one really believes that the league benefited as a major sports conference from ND's deals with them in other sports despite this recent spate of realignments, and that ND was giving up anything related to their most valuable commodity, no way I can agree with that. Moreover, as I said originally, at the very least I believe their women's hoops program has benefited from being in UConn's league and their men's hoops program is certainly better off than if they were independent in this era. Their other programs are probably better off being in a major conference as well. The only thing in a sports sense they have of value in the sad big-time era we are in is their football. For what reason lord only knows since they haven't been a great annual power for a long time. But that is their blessing . And they could have stepped up to the plate for the BE, but they didn't for financial reasons. I agree that they probably will be forced into a league, and we'll see how warm their ties are to the BE when that day comes. Don't hold your breath. As for ND's academics, as fine as they are, their entry into the league had next to nothing to do with their academics and all to do with their sports aura, which is all about football and not about any of their other fine teams. Which is too bad, BTW, because those other teams should have been grabbing more attention than their football team. C'est la vie. If there are people who think the BE is prestigious because of ND's academics, they probably wonder why ND is bothering with a bunch of state universities not named Cal Berkeley, Michigan or UVA and mid-tier academically secular colleges. (Don't get mad at me, I'm UConn all they way and it is a wonderful school, but there are some places it hasn't yet gone academically.) I just happen to think that pulling for a program connected to ND just because they are in the BE ignores that "special" relationship the Irish have and they care not about the football-driven realignment. You know why? Because they know they can get to any safe haven whenever they need to. I don't much care for the way the BE looks now. I must be old-fashioned, but I'd rather not have a collegiate conference whose geography looks like a major league professional sport. The weird thing is that the only "natural" rivalries left are among mostly teams that weren't part of the conference, some not even a few years ago. And even those are not historic rivalries. The arguable rivalries in football now are UConn-RU, USF-UCF, SMU-Houston and Cincy-Lville. None of those interlock with any of the others. ND is the only program that could have prevented the bolting of the recent 3.
I've always thought of ND as a B1G school based on the great football rivalries with Michigan State, Michigan, Ohio State, etc. from the 60's plus their physical location. I don't follow the intricacies of all you have discussed above, but as a casual observer, it seems as though the independent status was always an ego thing and a money thing, the ability to play the best teams at the time and to go where the cash was. The TV deal with CBS/NBC which forces the nation to encounter every ND home game on their local stations only reinforces that attitude. It produces the opinion (at least in me), that ND thinks we're the best and everyone must want to see us. Therefore I avoid ND football on TV. I do enjoy ND women's basketball, but I don't think of them as Big East members. Just too foreign a thought. If ND isn't doing well financially, I doubt if that was the plan. It just happened that their football program didn't perform and that hurt the pocketbook. As I said, I'm no expert on all this, just one person's opinion.
Watching all these kids commit to schools is kinda fun. Some of you seemed concerned theyre not coming to UConn. Well UConn looks to be pretty set for the next few years. UConn is loaded with some of the best talent inWCBB. So these kids, even if they wanted to attend UConn are looking elsewhere, because right now there isnt much room for them. Looking at our recruiting list for the next couple of years we already have top kids who want to come to UConn. No they havent verballed but I dont see Geno panicing so IMO I think these kids are most likely going to sign when Geno has all his cards in order. Good for Taya and ND. The BE is becoming a very strong conference.
Yes and no. ND is strong as ever. Louisville looks good. Then the downside is WVU going to Big 12. Georgetown lost a great coach and they have not hired anybody. If Sugar leaves they are toast.St. Johns lost a great coach to michigan. Still need to see how these programs recover.
