Aim B1G UConn

[Durks07]

Just a little bit more hope from our good friend BuffaloLion:

Virginia burned their bridge when they signed the ACC GOR. They were at the top of the list as team 15, and had a verbal ok. We were just debating as to whether to take Florida State as team 16 (non-AAU) or someone else.

You being an Ohio State fan probably already know this as Ohio State was Florida State's biggest ally. When Barron signed the GOR out of the clear blue sky, it was like kicking Ohio State in the gonads. Ohio State had called in a LOT of chips to get FSU approved, and from what I understand, had 11 votes. Delany wanted it to be unanimous which was what was holding things up.

We will expand to 16 before 2017 if one of two things happens. Either UConn gets AAU status, or the University of New York's rebranding is a success. If either of those two things happen, the 3 team pool we will choose from is 2 of UConn, University of New York, or Missouri.

If those NEITHER of those two things happen, we will wait until the Big 12's GOR expires in 2025, and take Kansas as 15. They have been in constant contact with us, and want in the CIC BAD. The western teams, especially Nebraska, are lobbying hard for them. With this new "targeting rule" in football, there is speculation that basketball could surpass football in popularity by 2025.

The other team that has been in contact with us is Oklahoma. They want to renew their rivalry with Nebraska, and also really want in the CIC. They, like Kansas, also have many western allies, and are a National Brand. Of course their problem is that they are not an AAU University. If they have AAU membership before 2025, look for them to be team 16. If not, and UConn is still not an AAU school, look for darkhorse University of New York as team 16. They will have been 12 years into their rebranding by then, and would be bringing with them a gigantic television market.

http://mbd.scout.com/mb.aspx?s=157&f=1395&t=11724969

Take it for what it is worth...

 

[WestCoastHusky]

You're welcome. A variation on a prior post of mine to share my perspective. I believe I share a common interest with you: UConn to the B1G. The initial expansion of the B1G to include Penn State and then Nebraska made sense to me given their status as football brands. After the announcement that Maryland and Rutgers were invited, my initial reaction was similar to that of a number of my fellow B1G alums: why? However, as I came to understand the rationale, my perspective changed. This B1G expansion is now about developing academic collaboration with universities and penetrating markets on the East coast to be a bi-regional conference. Since I did not know much about Maryland or Rutgers and thought expansion was not over, I made a decision to learn more about other East coast universities that might be future B1G members. I wanted to post to let you know that there are some of us in the B1G who have made an effort to learn more about UConn and after doing so see your value and let you know that we appreciate you seeing value in becoming a B1G member.

Thank you for supporting UCONN to the B1G. Many of us believe B1G now fits UCONN much more than the ACC. UCONN is a flagship university that can carry its own state as well as part of Boston and NYC TV markets. We can help B1G penetrate the New England TV markets. In addition, our academic mission is right there with rest of the B1G. We do lack AAU status currently, but our president is working hard to address this issue. State of CT just committed additional $1.5B into UCONN this year in addition to the $900M+ they already allocated for UCONN health center. We just need that B1G invite and the state will expand our football stadium to 60K+.

Let's keep the UCONN to the B1G train alive. As an alum, there is no way I would want our great school to settle for the AAC. We don't belong here and sooner we are elsewhere the better.

 

[Marty Jackson]

And you know that because?

common sense...

 

[Adios]

That's too hostile. Just show the coaches and star players with the words. "UConn. New England's university."

Based upon socioeconomic trends and where we are now, I really think that's our future.

 

[CTBasketball]

Based upon socioeconomic trends and where we are now, I really think that's our future.

I think we're already there.

 

[Adios]

I think we're already there.

To some extent, yes. But right now, BC is in a "power conference" and we are not.

 

[CTBasketball]

To some extent, yes. But right now, BC is in a "power conference" and we are not.

I feel like we already trump BC. They are like the DePaul of the old Big East.

 

[Adios]

Just a little bit more hope from our good friend BuffaloLion:



http://mbd. /mb.aspx?s=157&f=1395&t=11724969

Take it for what it is worth...

Buffalo/western NY taken ahead of the state of CT? I don't know if that would happen. I am aware that Buffalo is an AAU school.

Which school's message board was that posted on?

 

[woomba]

He ( and a few other guys from Western NY) have been pushing that idea for months - it's complete fantasy and not based on any comments from the Big Ten (or even a sportswriter based speculation)

 

[Durks07]

Buffalo/western NY taken ahead of the state of CT? I don't know if that would happen. I am aware that Buffalo is an AAU school.

Which school's message board was that posted on?

I don't necessarily buy the Buffalo bit either, its posted on the Penn State board, I figured I would throw the whole quote there.

 

[frankthetank]

SUNY Buffalo?! AAU status is certainly important to the Big Ten, but it does NOT mean making moves that have zero financial or athletic basis. I've always believed that UConn is not really a top candidate for the Big Ten, but at least there's some decent financial and athletic arguments for that that type of expansion. Also, I know people generally hate Rutgers, Syracuse and BC here, but there's still some type of realistic financial argument for all of them, too (whether you want to acknowledge it or not). Buffalo, on the other hand, isn't even on the fringes of any viable discussion. If AAU status was all that mattered, the Big Ten would just add Rice and Tulane (great institutions in top football recruiting areas and, theoretically, large TV markets on paper). I remember having to pull teeth 4 years ago when I brought up the importance of the AAU in Big Ten expansion, but now it seems like it has gone in the opposite direction where a lot of people mistakenly believe that the Big Ten would reduce its revenues simply to add in AAU schools. Any Big Ten expansion still has to make financial sense and almost certainly with old school and old money football programs (and SUNY Buffalo doesn't fit the bill on any of those metrics). Expansion in and of itself has NEVER been the goal of the Big Ten (which is something too many realignment observers have been trying to push and/or want to believe).

 

[junglehusky]

Frank... speaking for myself here since I know many are more optimistic, I think of UConn more being in the "potentially, in 10-15 years we'll see" category for the B1G, and if UConn goes anywhere in the next 5 years the ACC is the more likely landing spot. I think if Buffalo gets its athletics department ramped up (i.e. consistently winning the MAC in FB , beating BCS, er, power five teams if it can schedule them) they might be included in the "potentialy, in 15-20 years..." category. If not for Jim Delany, then for the CR buffs or at least for worried UConn fans wondering how we'll get screwed over next.

 

[frankthetank]

Frank... speaking for myself here since I know many are more optimistic, I think of UConn more being in the "potentially, in 10-15 years we'll see" category for the B1G, and if UConn goes anywhere in the next 5 years the ACC is the more likely landing spot. I think if Buffalo gets its athletics department ramped up (i.e. consistently winning the MAC in FB , beating BCS, er, power five teams if it can schedule them) they might be included in the "potentialy, in 15-20 years..." category. If not for Jim Delany, then for the CR buffs or at least for worried UConn fans wondering how we'll get screwed over next.

I think that's a fair assessment of UConn to the B1G - if the football program can get up to a certain sustainable level both on the field and off the field, then there's certainly potential in 10 to 15 years. There's a plausible expansion to the NYC-ish market in that scenario. I'm just not seeing it at any level with respect to Buffalo - the Big Ten would have just taken Syracuse if they wanted to get into Upstate New York (and the conference, for various reasons, wasn't that enthralled by the prospect of getting into that area compared to all of the other potential moves out there). I've seen some posts by Buffalo Lion over the past couple of years and I think that he's a solid poster, but this particular case seems to be driven by a personal desire to see Penn State games come to his hometown than anything that the Big Ten schools would be interested in doing.

 

[Sea Goat]

I think that's a fair assessment of UConn to the B1G - if the football program can get up to a certain sustainable level both on the field and off the field, then there's certainly potential in 10 to 15 years. There's a plausible expansion to the NYC-ish market in that scenario. I'm just not seeing it at any level with respect to Buffalo - the Big Ten would have just taken Syracuse if they wanted to get into Upstate New York (and the conference, for various reasons, wasn't that enthralled by the prospect of getting into that area compared to all of the other potential moves out there). I've seen some posts by Buffalo Lion over the past couple of years and I think that he's a solid poster, but this particular case seems to be driven by a personal desire to see Penn State games come to his hometown than anything that the Big Ten schools would be interested in doing.

Would have taken Syracuse? Really - after it got booted from the AAU? Moving along - UConn doesn't have 10-15 years - it will over in short order if UConn doesn't find an escape hatch soon.

Best hope - the B1G obviously has an affinity for the NYC market, not an upstate NY market. That, as much as anything, should bring UConn into the discussion.

 

[frankthetank]

Would have taken Syracuse? Really - after it got booted from the AAU? Moving along - UConn doesn't have 10-15 years - it will over in short order if UConn doesn't find an escape hatch soon.

Best hope - the B1G obviously has an affinity for the NYC market, not an upstate NY market. That, as much as anything, should bring UConn into the discussion.

The Big Ten knew that Nebraska was going to get booted from the AAU. In fact, if all of the Big Ten members had voted to keep Nebraska in the AAU (and they didn't), NU would still be in the organization. The vote was seriously that close.

Syracuse is definitely a valuable school even without AAU membership - they are essentially what UConn would look like (powerhouse basketball program in the Northeast) if it had old money football tradition (even if they haven't been as strong on-the-field over the past decade). The fact that Syracuse is private doesn't mean as much since they are on the large side (so a lot of people see them as acting as the de facto "flagship" for the state of New York as opposed to any of the SUNY schools). Now, Syracuse wasn't valued as highly by the Big Ten as Maryland and Rutgers (I personally agree with the assessment of the former but disagree with the latter), but when the B1G legitimately thought that it had a shot at getting Notre Dame as a full member, Syracuse was very much in the middle of the B1G 16-team scenarios before they were taken by the ACC.

The main minus of Syracuse (or any school in Western New York) is that the region has as bad of demographic trends as the Detroit metro area these days (as the growth in the NYC metro area has masked a lot of the deficiencies in the rest of New York state). As with the New England states, New York State (including the NYC area) is also a truly terrible football recruiting ground considering the size of its population base (particularly compared to New Jersey and Maryland, much less Pennsylvania). To be honest, it's shocking how few Division I football recruits come out of New York State with it being the third most populous state in the country (i.e. states like Indiana, Mississippi and Missouri with a fraction of the population are beating NY State *outright* in terms of producing FBS recruits, much less on a per captia basis) . That is as important to the "demographics" quotient for the Big Ten as TV households.

 

[Sea Goat]

The Big Ten knew that Nebraska was going to get booted from the AAU. In fact, if all of the Big Ten members had voted to keep Nebraska in the AAU (and they didn't), NU would still be in the organization. The vote was seriously that close.

Syracuse is definitely a valuable school even without AAU membership - they are essentially what UConn would look like (powerhouse basketball program in the Northeast) if it had old money football tradition (even if they haven't been as strong on-the-field over the past decade). The fact that Syracuse is private doesn't mean as much since they are on the large side (so a lot of people see them as acting as the de facto "flagship" for the state of New York as opposed to any of the SUNY schools). Now, Syracuse wasn't valued as highly by the Big Ten as Maryland and Rutgers (I personally agree with the assessment of the former but disagree with the latter), but when the B1G legitimately thought that it had a shot at getting Notre Dame as a full member, Syracuse was very much in the middle of the B1G 16-team scenarios before they were taken by the ACC.

The main minus of Syracuse (or any school in Western New York) is that the region has as bad of demographic trends as the Detroit metro area these days (as the growth in the NYC metro area has masked a lot of the deficiencies in the rest of New York state). As with the New England states, New York State (including the NYC area) is also a truly terrible football recruiting ground considering the size of its population base (particularly compared to New Jersey and Maryland, much less Pennsylvania). To be honest, it's shocking how few Division I football recruits come out of New York State with it being the third most populous state in the country (i.e. states like Indiana, Mississippi and Missouri with a fraction of the population are beating NY State *outright* in terms of producing FBS recruits, much less on a per captia basis) . That is as important to the "demographics" quotient for the Big Ten as TV households.

FTT,

Here's part of my post last week on the recruiting numbers (off Rivals.com). You're right - it is not fertile recruiting ground. The trick is to get kids from elsewhere to come to the Northeast as Nebraska has.

"The biggest problem the northeast D-1 schools are going to have in the future is maintaining relevance in the national conversation about football. BB will be fine and the ACC will be the best hoops conference in the country (until the B1G takes UConn), but I don't think hoops matters a lot. If it did, UConn would have been the first one poached from the old BE. It's football, football, football! Until the schools in the northeast, as a group, become more competitive then northeast football will languish. (I don't care what conference you're in.) For that purpose all D-1 schools from the northeast should support the development of region-wide competence in football. Only then will recruiting become easier and the schools will be more attractive to kids from the football rich south and southwest. The recruiting numbers don't lie. In all of New England, approx. 15,000,000 people, there were 21 D-1 scholarship kids. 10 from CT and MA each and 1 from RI. That's it! Add NY, PA, and NJ (population of approx. 41,000,000) you add 146 for a total of 167 D-1 players from the northeast (56,000,000 population base). Compare that to the numbers from TX, Fla, GA -=- 346, 332 and 184 respectively - total of 862 D-1 players from a population of roughly the same - 56,000,000.

You say enough with numbers. However, you can see that you have to convince kids from the south to come to school in the north to have any shot of developing northeast football at an elite level. The only way to do that is to have a thriving, competitive regional presence and an exciting brand of football. This will help create a national buzz about the sport in the northeast and that will attract athletes. Daunting task? You bet it is! But how the hell did Nebraska do it? A state that loves football, but works off a population base of 1,500,000 with only 5 D-1 recruits state-wide this year. It gets players from other football rich regions.

It will take awhile, but I think it can be done. The only question is whether the effete northeast fan base can embrace college football like it has been elsewhere. It did before --- this is where college football got its start."

The numbers don't lie - Northeast football will only thrive with an influx of out of region talent.

 

[frankthetank]

FTT,

Here's part of my post last week on the recruiting numbers (off ). You're right - it is not fertile recruiting ground. The trick is to get kids from elsewhere to come to the Northeast as Nebraska has.

"The biggest problem the northeast D-1 schools are going to have in the future is maintaining relevance in the national conversation about football. BB will be fine and the ACC will be the best hoops conference in the country (until the B1G takes UConn), but I don't think hoops matters a lot. If it did, UConn would have been the first one poached from the old BE. It's football, football, football! Until the schools in the northeast, as a group, become more competitive then northeast football will languish. (I don't care what conference you're in.) For that purpose all D-1 schools from the northeast should support the development of region-wide competence in football. Only then will recruiting become easier and the schools will be more attractive to kids from the football rich south and southwest. The recruiting numbers don't lie. In all of New England, approx. 15,000,000 people, there were 21 D-1 scholarship kids. 10 from CT and MA each and 1 from RI. That's it! Add NY, PA, and NJ (population of approx. 41,000,000) you add 146 for a total of 167 D-1 players from the northeast (56,000,000 population base). Compare that to the numbers from TX, Fla, GA -=- 346, 332 and 184 respectively - total of 862 D-1 players from a population of roughly the same - 56,000,000.

You say enough with numbers. However, you can see that you have to convince kids from the south to come to school in the north to have any shot of developing northeast football at an elite level. The only way to do that is to have a thriving, competitive regional presence and an exciting brand of football. This will help create a national buzz about the sport in the northeast and that will attract athletes. Daunting task? You bet it is! But how the hell did Nebraska do it? A state that loves football, but works off a population base of 1,500,000 with only 5 D-1 recruits state-wide this year. It gets players from other football rich regions.

It will take awhile, but I think it can be done. The only question is whether the effete northeast fan base can embrace college football like it has been elsewhere. It did before --- this is where college football got its start."

The numbers don't lie - Northeast football will only thrive with an influx of out of region talent.

Yes, I've seen those numbers and they're stark. This applies to much of the Big Ten Midwestern footprint, as well - it's not quite as bad as the Northeast, but it's very clearly the worst recruiting territory of the 5 power conferences. Ohio is a good producer of football recruits, but it can't support an entire conference in the way that California, Texas or Florida have been able to do. This isn't a surprise to the Big Ten powers that be - whenever you hear the word "demographics" coming from the mouth of Jim Delany (and he says that particular word with respect to expansion more than any other), it means "football recruits" as much as "TV markets".

Nebraska is a bit of anomaly since they're effectively the college football version of the Green Bay Packers - many out-of-state recruits see that atmosphere where they've sold out every single game for the past 50 years and the 24/7/365 star treatment that they receive from Husker fans and are intoxicated by that. Literally every football program in the country (including the Ohio States and Alabamas of the world) wishes that their fans could be as loyal as Nebraska fans, so that's really a tough model to follow. No one is going to beat Nebraska's fandom (which is the dominant trait that gets football recruits to consider going there). UConn's comparative advantage, in contrast, is its location between NYC and Boston. As much as people here are quick to point out the geographic proximity of those major markets for UConn, I really don't think that message has gotten across to the rest of the country very well. To be honest, I think Syracuse has a stronger brand linkage to the NYC market in particular to the average sports fan than UConn. (I'm not saying that's right or that I personally believe that this is true, but I've seen that quite a bit over the past several years from non-interested parties.) IMHO, the best selling point to recruits is that UConn has mindshare in two mega-markets and I don't think that message has gotten across that well. Of course, those recruits have to believe that such mindshare exists.

 

[Adios]

Just a little bit more hope from our good friend BuffaloLion:



http://mbd. /mb.aspx?s=157&f=1395&t=11724969

Take it for what it is worth...

Thank you for pointing out which school's message board that is. Interesting thread. Texas to the ACC? All this CR is wild. Reminds me of picking kickball teams. Except for the fact participants can join on their own terms (ahem, ND).

What's kind of funny is B1G fans seem to want us more than ACC fans. But who knows where we'll end up. The ACC might have been wise to keep their conference together due to demographic shifts. But Louisville over UConn? Supposedly, the Big 12 was after ND and FSU, not Clemson and FSU. And that p*ssed off Clemson. If that really was the case, Louisville was at least somewhat a dumb move.

 

[auggie22]

The Big Ten knew that Nebraska was going to get booted from the AAU. In fact, if all of the Big Ten members had voted to keep Nebraska in the AAU (and they didn't), NU would still be in the organization. The vote was seriously that close.

Syracuse is definitely a valuable school even without AAU membership - they are essentially what UConn would look like (powerhouse basketball program in the Northeast) if it had old money football tradition (even if they haven't been as strong on-the-field over the past decade). The fact that Syracuse is private doesn't mean as much since they are on the large side (so a lot of people see them as acting as the de facto "flagship" for the state of New York as opposed to any of the SUNY schools). Now, Syracuse wasn't valued as highly by the Big Ten as Maryland and Rutgers (I personally agree with the assessment of the former but disagree with the latter), but when the B1G legitimately thought that it had a shot at getting Notre Dame as a full member, Syracuse was very much in the middle of the B1G 16-team scenarios before they were taken by the ACC.

The main minus of Syracuse (or any school in Western New York) is that the region has as bad of demographic trends as the Detroit metro area these days (as the growth in the NYC metro area has masked a lot of the deficiencies in the rest of New York state). As with the New England states, New York State (including the NYC area) is also a truly terrible football recruiting ground considering the size of its population base (particularly compared to New Jersey and Maryland, much less Pennsylvania). To be honest, it's shocking how few Division I football recruits come out of New York State with it being the third most populous state in the country (i.e. states like Indiana, Mississippi and Missouri with a fraction of the population are beating NY State *outright* in terms of producing FBS recruits, much less on a per captia basis) . That is as important to the "demographics" quotient for the Big Ten as TV households.

Frank, your comparison ignores the fact that UCONN has a much larger enrollment when compared with Syracuse, as well as benefiting from the identity of an entire state (region even, if you buy the "New England's Public University" pitch). To say that Syracuse and UConn are similar but for 'Cuse's old money football ignores these obvious and substantive differences.

I also fail to see the nuance in your suggestion that a private school with a focus on humanities (Syracuse) and a relatively small graduate school fit the B1G profile as well as a relatively large public school with a focus on research and STEM.

 

[junglehusky]

Frank, your comparison ignores the fact that UCONN has a much larger enrollment when compared with Syracuse, as well as benefiting from the identity of an entire state (region even, if you buy the "New England's Public University" pitch). To say that Syracuse and UConn are similar but for 'Cuse's old money football ignores these obvious and substantive differences.

I also fail to see the nuance in your suggestion that a private school with a focus on humanities (Syracuse) and a relatively small graduate school fit the B1G profile as well as a relatively large public school with a focus on research and STEM.

Yes, perhaps Frank's comparison may have been valid in the '90's but UConn has grown enrollment and research and is in the beginning stages of a massive faculty hire spurred by Pres. Herbst. That will continue to be a focus along with a major focus on increasing the endowment. Now Frank will jump in and say other schools are also rolling out building programs and planning to compete for research money - true, but strictly in terms of comparing UConn and Syracuse I think the trend is pretty clear.

 

[Sea Goat]

Yes, I've seen those numbers and they're stark. This applies to much of the Big Ten Midwestern footprint, as well - it's not quite as bad as the Northeast, but it's very clearly the worst recruiting territory of the 5 power conferences. Ohio is a good producer of football recruits, but it can't support an entire conference in the way that California, Texas or Florida have been able to do. This isn't a surprise to the Big Ten powers that be - whenever you hear the word "demographics" coming from the mouth of Jim Delany (and he says that particular word with respect to expansion more than any other), it means "football recruits" as much as "TV markets".

Nebraska is a bit of anomaly since they're effectively the college football version of the Green Bay Packers - many out-of-state recruits see that atmosphere where they've sold out every single game for the past 50 years and the 24/7/365 star treatment that they receive from Husker fans and are intoxicated by that. Literally every football program in the country (including the Ohio States and Alabamas of the world) wishes that their fans could be as loyal as Nebraska fans, so that's really a tough model to follow. No one is going to beat Nebraska's fandom (which is the dominant trait that gets football recruits to consider going there). UConn's comparative advantage, in contrast, is its location between NYC and Boston. As much as people here are quick to point out the geographic proximity of those major markets for UConn, I really don't think that message has gotten across to the rest of the country very well. To be honest, I think Syracuse has a stronger brand linkage to the NYC market in particular to the average sports fan than UConn. (I'm not saying that's right or that I personally believe that this is true, but I've seen that quite a bit over the past several years from non-interested parties.) IMHO, the best selling point to recruits is that UConn has mindshare in two mega-markets and I don't think that message has gotten across that well. Of course, those recruits have to believe that such mindshare exists.

We can agree to disagree about Syracuse. Syracuse has done next to nothing in football lately - lost 5 straight to the upstart Huskies from 07-11. In hoops, they won 1 national title while a member of the BE while CT won 3. But I recognize perception becomes reality.

Re: Nebraska, I've been to Lincoln for games (including OU vs. Neb. ranked 1-2 in 1987) and I understand the phenomenon. The whole state turns red. Regarding the rest of the B1G footprint, consider this: PA, Ill, OH, Mich, Ind, Wisc, Minn, IA, Neb. together have approx. 69 mm in population and had about 430 D-1 signees this year compared to 862 from TX, FL, GA alone. The numbers catch up to you at some point unless kids move around. Now there are probably enough D-1 programs to find teams for these kids in the South and SW (FIU, UCF, USF etc.), but if a kid and his parents want a big change of scenery and a great education then we can promote the Northeast. Although not an ideal comparison, Calhoun and Auriemma built programs out of whole cloth in this manner. How else do you get a Ray Allen or Emeka Okafor to throw in with Calhoun? The question is: can you get enough big impact players for football on consistent basis? That remains to be seen.

 

[woomba]

...the numbers catch up to you at some point unless kids move around. Now there are probably enough D-1 programs to find teams for these kids in the South and SW (FIU, UCF, USF etc.), but if a kid and his parents want a big change of scenery and a great education then we can promote the Northeast. Although not an ideal comparison, Calhoun and Auriemma built programs out of whole cloth in this manner. How else do you get a Ray Allen or Emeka Okafor to throw in with Calhoun? The question is: can you get enough big impact players for football on consistent basis? That remains to be seen.

Generally speaking this strategy only works for programs with a national reputation (which UConn B-ball would be part of) or for teams still recruiting outside its conference footprint but still in its geographic proximity (WVU recruiting Penn and VA, for instance). UConn taking that strategy will negatively impact other Big Ten teams reliant on OOS/OOC talent...which is a good chunk of the conference.

I think Upstater argued that this isn't an issue the last time I brought this up because UConn doesn't recruit that heavily in states that the Big Ten targets but my opinion is that is currently more a function of necessity than by choice. I think UConn's recruiting strategy will dramatically change if they ever join a larger conference and de-emphasize NE recruits ...similar to BC post ACC.

 

[Sea Goat]

Generally speaking this strategy only works for programs with a national reputation (which UConn B-ball would be part of) or for teams still recruiting outside its conference footprint but still in its geographic proximity (WVU recruiting Penn and VA, for instance). UConn taking that strategy will negatively impact other Big Ten teams reliant on OOS/OOC talent...which is a good chunk of the conference.

I think Upstater argued that this isn't an issue the last time I brought this up because UConn doesn't recruit that heavily in states that the Big Ten targets but my opinion is that is currently more a function of necessity than by choice. I think UConn's recruiting strategy will dramatically change if they ever join a larger conference and de-emphasize NE recruits ...similar to BC post ACC.

A lot of good that has done BC.

 

[uconnfan68]

Remember this:

​

​

As far as Cablevision goes, they just DROPPED the B1G network in Litchfield County. If they add UConn to the B1G, I'll support it.

 

[Marty Jackson]

The Big Ten knew that Nebraska was going to get booted from the AAU. In fact, if all of the Big Ten members had voted to keep Nebraska in the AAU (and they didn't), NU would still be in the organization. The vote was seriously that close.

Syracuse is definitely a valuable school even without AAU membership - they are essentially what UConn would look like (powerhouse basketball program in the Northeast) if it had old money football tradition (even if they haven't been as strong on-the-field over the past decade). The fact that Syracuse is private doesn't mean as much since they are on the large side (so a lot of people see them as acting as the de facto "flagship" for the state of New York as opposed to any of the SUNY schools). Now, Syracuse wasn't valued as highly by the Big Ten as Maryland and Rutgers (I personally agree with the assessment of the former but disagree with the latter), but when the B1G legitimately thought that it had a shot at getting Notre Dame as a full member, Syracuse was very much in the middle of the B1G 16-team scenarios before they were taken by the ACC.

The main minus of Syracuse (or any school in Western New York) is that the region has as bad of demographic trends as the Detroit metro area these days (as the growth in the NYC metro area has masked a lot of the deficiencies in the rest of New York state). As with the New England states, New York State (including the NYC area) is also a truly terrible football recruiting ground considering the size of its population base (particularly compared to New Jersey and Maryland, much less Pennsylvania). To be honest, it's shocking how few Division I football recruits come out of New York State with it being the third most populous state in the country (i.e. states like Indiana, Mississippi and Missouri with a fraction of the population are beating NY State *outright* in terms of producing FBS recruits, much less on a per captia basis) . That is as important to the "demographics" quotient for the Big Ten as TV households.

Imagine if some NYC area kids grew up on BIG football. The northeast is the last area for huge growth in football.

 

[Waquoit]

Extra points if you can work the puppets and the time machine into that scenario.

Maybe we can get a TV from Nickelodeon when we go independent.

 

[djct1999]

Imagine if some NYC area kids grew up on BIG football. The northeast is the last area for huge growth in football.

Imagine that. It is quite clear FranktheTank does not understand the northeast, NYC, and what UConn brings relative to both Rutgers and Syracuse. The good news, I hope, is he, like most will soon realize that when both schools don't even put a dent into NYC for their respective new conferences. Lets flip the switch and start branding UCONN as the holy grail for NYC and its tv market. And maybe, just maybe, one of these days FranktheTank can say something positive about us and not just politely sh&T on us every single post. I am tired of hearing of how every school but us is worth something in realignment.

 

[WestCoastHusky]

Imagine that. It is quite clear FranktheTank does not understand the northeast, NYC, and what UConn brings relative to both Rutgers and Syracuse. The good news, I hope, is he, like most will soon realize that when both schools don't even put a dent into NYC for their respective new conferences. Lets flip the switch and start branding UCONN as the holy grail for NYC and its tv market. And maybe, just maybe, one of these days FranktheTank can say something positive about us and not just politely sh&T on us every single post. I am tired of hearing of how every school but us is worth something in realignment.

Agree with you. There are a ton UConn can bring to a conference being the flagship university for state of CT. When guys like Frank who are trying to convince us private schools like Cuse and BCU are somehow worth more, I stop taking his posts seriously. Frank is a lawyer, so he is used to write long drawn out posts that seem legit. Some people might believe him due to that and others will see the real truth.

In the end, UConn is still CT's flagship university where the state has already invested billions. UConn still carries the CT's TV markets along with portion of NYC's and Boston's. While timing and circumstances have been horrible to us when it comes to realignment, someone will set it right at some point for us. Let's hope it is the B1G and screw the rest.

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[Adios]

The B1G and administrators know better than frankthetank. That's all that matters. Let's hope we get AAU status. Our meaningless school produced the AAU's current president. And he played football at UConn. We have no talent around here.

 

[frankthetank]

Agree with you. There are a ton UConn can bring to a conference being the flagship university for state of CT. When guys like Frank who are trying to convince us private schools like Cuse and BCU are somehow worth more, I stop taking his posts seriously. Frank is a lawyer, so he is used to write long drawn out posts that seem legit. Some people might believe him due to that and others will see the real truth.

In the end, UConn is still CT's flagship university where the state has already invested billions. UConn still carries the CT's TV markets along with portion of NYC's and Boston's. While timing and circumstances have been horrible to us when it comes to realignment, someone will set it right at some point for us. Let's hope it is the B1G and screw the rest.

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I don't think that they're worth more than a school like Maryland. However, it's also a vast overreach to state that just because they're "smaller private schools" means that their value is low compared to Rutgers and UConn. What I see here is a lot of underrating and/or discounting of what Syracuse and BC are worth (part of it might be that they're rivals of UConn). Now, they might not be as worth as much as Syracuse and BC fans want to believe that they're worth, but I definitely think that they're worth more in the conference realignment landscape than what a lot of people here are giving them credit for. University presidents legitimately like schools such as Syracuse and BC - you can argue that they shouldn't or that their fan bases aren't good or that their TV ratings are terrible or that their markets don't care about college sports or that their football teams are terrible, which all might be true, but they are perceived to be in the blue blood club and they receive (and have received as evidenced by how they were targeted by the ACC initially a decade ago up to now with how conference realignment has played out) a lot more leeway in their assessments by university leaders.

The reality is that different schools are going to get different margins of error. Nebraska has horrific demographics, but they are effectively a *perfect* football program in every other respect (tradition, fan base, history, national TV draw). The Huskers can overcome a low population base when they have fans that sell out 80,000 seats for 50 years straight in both good times and bad times. Maryland and Rutgers are probably the flip side - they aren't exactly football world-beaters, but both schools have exceptional demographics. My standard line about BC in conference realignment is that standard football fans (who just see the weak football records and attendance numbers) vastly underrate how much university leaders overrate BC - who knows whether it's a love of Boston (as a disproportionate number of university administrators were educated in that area) or memories of the Doug Flutie era, but BC gets much more positive vibes from the powers that be than fans or what their on-the-field metrics would warrant.

Like I've said elsewhere, UConn isn't going to get any margin of error since it's a fairly young FBS program that's not in a great football recruiting area. Expecting that conferences are going to apply the same criteria to UConn as they did to BC or Syracuse (or even Rutgers or Louisville) isn't realistic because the history (even if it's a bad history like Rutgers has) isn't there. So, UConn can't be merely just be a little bit better than BC or Syracuse for a year or two - UConn truly needs to blow them away for a sustained period of time in football. Otherwise, the power conferences are just going to revert to an already fairly entrenched belief that the Northeast can't/won't support college football beyond schools' respective alumni bases - they'll work with the BCs and Rutgers of the world since they can send their marquee teams like Florida State and Michigan into Boston and NYC regularly for exposure purposes, but the appetite to go beyond that when there are faster-growing options with more college sports fans and better football recruiting elsewhere might end up being limited.

That makes the next few years to be an extremely critical time for UConn football. As much as the AAC gets dumped on by the mainstream media, I don't think the teams are going to be pushovers. There are schools in great football recruiting areas (SMU, Houston, UCF, USF, and even Cincinnati), so it's not as if though there isn't going to be some real competition for UConn. At minimum, UConn needs to be competing for the CFP bowl Gang of Five slot regularly for a sustained period of time (the next 5 or 6 years). The old BCS AQ label of the Big East won't be there anymore as a buoy, so UConn has to turn it around in football immediately (because poor seasons are going to get judged MUCH more harshly compared to now). The fact that there's no margin for error needs to be a mantra for the athletic department if it wants a viable way to move up to the power conferences.