Big East expansion exercise approaching 2025… | Page 3 | The Boneyard

Big East expansion exercise approaching 2025…

There really isn’t a non P5 school that moves the needle on conference value, or is worth sacrificing the full double round robin schedule format if we exceed 11.

Kansas is the prime target. It would take Fox making a commitment to overpay Kansas for Indy football to get the value for joining the basketball league. This would be mostly a win for Fox pulling Kansas from the Big 12, for which ESPN has primary rights (Fox and others have select games in a secondary position).

This is financially possible in the devalued Big 12, and transition costs can be minimized by waiting until 2025 for the expiration of current agreements.

I’d only expand for Kansas. But if we could land Kansas, I’d also take Kansas State and Iowa State as a package deal.

This isn’t consensus, but as a Philly and Nova fan, I’d welcome Temple in this expansion scenario (only if Kansas is joining) to balance the East. Temple in Philly doesn’t threaten Nova, it would only add interest in the Philly market by enhancing the rivalry with conference play.
 
Why couldn't Gonzaga be a basketball only? This is a basketball league that should do everything in its power to put the best basketball product on TV. Gonzaga isn't SDSU, they will survive post Few, even if they aren't ranked top 5 every single year. Dayton and VCU are interesting from strictly a program strength perspective.
 
As a fan (ignoring all the money, logistics, etc.), I would not want to see any of the teams mentioned in this thread join the Big East except ND, Gonzaga, and Kansas. To the people who brought up Fordham, St. Louis, BU, and the like: Would you actually be excited to see UConn play these teams up to 3 times per season? Granted, those are three of the most extreme examples, but even Memphis, Dayton and VCU get a big no thanks from me.
 
Can everyone just stop with the Kansas talk? The Big 12 specifically picked good BB schools (that also had good football + markets) to please Kansas and to maintain the #1 conference in basketball. Why would Kansas leave the #1 basketball conference + huge payday to join the Big East? It makes zero sense.
 
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Dream Jobbed 2.0 said:
Kansas
Gonzaga
Baylor
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Baylor and even tcu are reasonable targets, but again, travel sucks.

But like with Kansas, where does football go?
 
JonnyRI said:
VCU, Dayton etc…. Will take more from the league in revenue than they will ultimately bring in and make the conference on average weaker rather than stronger.

No, no and no.

we already have DePaul.
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VCU has been a top-50 team in seven of the last ten years. Dayton has been a top-75 team in eight of the ten years.

Comparing these two schools to DePaul (one top-100 finish this decade) makes no sense at all.

We'll be fortunate to have either of these teams join the Big East. Great locations, attention to basketball, rabid fans.
 
Hey Adrien! said:
VCU has been a top-50 team in seven of the last ten years. Dayton has been a top-75 team in eight of the ten years.

Comparing these two schools to DePaul (one top-100 finish this decade) makes no sense at all.

We'll be fortunate to have either of these teams join the Big East. Great locations, attention to basketball, rabid fans.
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The entire A10 TV package is what, $10M total? There is a reason for that.
 
metsfan2323 said:
Throw out all of your partisan rooting interests and think of this like a mathematician working for Fox Sports with a job to perform.

Which school adds the largest potential fanbase that would realistically say yes to the offer?

Which school brings the Big East to a new state with a flagship university that again would accept the offer?

And if the answer turns your stomach you are just adding fuel to the fire with that angst. Great sporting events that draw TV audiences are largely built around that stomach turning angst otherwise known as a "RIVALRY".
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You're talking UMass.
 
EricLA said:
What about schools that have historically been good, or have the potential to be good? Maybe in a better league they start to rise again? St. Joe's? BU? Maybe those are bad examples. I'm sure the board could come up with better north-east'ish schools that might be a good fit.

None obviously that are as good as Gonzaga, but they didn't get there overnight either.
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One that comes to mind is Duquesne U which is right in Pittsburgh. They just opened a brand new fieldhouse and facilities and have been a solid team in the A-10. There is access to a large tv audience with a major arena (they have a locker room in the 19,000 seat PPG Paints Arena which was built in 2010) They have played some home games there as has U of Pitt. There is no NBA presence. Perhaps they might have room for expansion of their fieldhouse which presently holds 3500. It would be ironic to steal the hometown Pitt fans with a NBE team in their own backyard. This would give the NBE a foothold in the western Pa/eastern Ohio territory for recruiting as well.

nextpittsburgh.com

UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse opens as state-of-the-art sporting venue at Duquesne University

Duquesne University now has a state-of-the-art, $45 million arena called the UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse, to honor Chuck Cooper, the first Black player drafted by the NBA.
nextpittsburgh.com nextpittsburgh.com
 
Dooooooomed said:
St Louis is the most over-rated expansion candidate of any the the names being tossed around. Packed arena? They average just over 50% capacity. Recent Top 25 program? 4 NCAA tourney appearances over the last 20 years. Not the best candidate by any means.
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Good school. Terribly dying city.
 
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Val Ackerman said team, not teams and made a point of saying anything is possible in these crazy times and geography is not insurmountable. Kansas, Notre Dame, and Gonzaga are the only ones that make sense from the Big East perspective/TV. Kansas, they would have to know the Big 12 is further breaking apart (it will eventually) Notre Dame would have to be a bidding war between Fox and NBC. It seems pretty clear Gonzaga is the school being talked about. They are there for the taking, just work out the logistics.

This is driven by what the TV people are telling them. None of the other teams add value, they would actually devalue the conference.

We don't know much about realignment but we know you have to be proactive, look ahead, and plan for contingencies.
 
I see the answer to this in three tiers.

Tier 1: Kansas, ND, Gonzaga would be a slam dunk, take them whatever it takes to make them work. However, as discussed: Zags are too far, Kansas has their football to think about (really they need to just drop it), and ND is tied tight with ACC. So unless a miracle happens, I wouldn't want to lose the round robin.

Tier 2: That being said, if they HAD to take new team(s), I could see Dayton and VCU both stepping up to the next level. Dayton already fills the stands really well and VCU has a bit of history as well. But does FOX really see the benefit? If they do, I'd be ok-ish with it.

Tier 3: SLU and UMass... ummm.... uh... do we need it to close the deal with FOX? Well I guess you gotta do what you gotta do, but I wouldn't be happy about it. Maybe someone thinks they'd bring something after the move? There's a lot of risk in this, and I don't think odds are good of either actually bringing value.

I don't see any other possibilities.
 
shizzle787 said:
You're talking UMass.
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Yes, they would make a great addition.

Ignore their recent history. UMASS is in the same condition that Houston was in prior to joining the AAC. Houston capitalized on the AAC upgrade, found themselves a great coach and they are now a basketball power. UMASS would be quite capable of doing the same thing with a much better Big East upgrade.

Of course UCONN fans (and likely Providence fans) cringe at the thought of UMASS being turned into a basketball power because we are greedy and don't want the competition, however rivalries draw TV audiences and that's what this is about.

Watching everyone pretend UMASS doesn't exist in this thread has been quite comical. Even Davidson got a mention before UMASS (LOL)
 
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MU in MKE said:
I see the answer to this in three tiers.

Tier 1: Kansas, ND, Gonzaga would be a slam dunk, take them whatever it takes to make them work. However, as discussed: Zags are too far, Kansas has their football to think about (really they need to just drop it), and ND is tied tight with ACC. So unless a miracle happens, I wouldn't want to lose the round robin.

Tier 2: That being said, if they HAD to take new team(s), I could see Dayton and VCU both stepping up to the next level. Dayton already fills the stands really well and VCU has a bit of history as well. But does FOX really see the benefit? If they do, I'd be ok-ish with it.

Tier 3: SLU and UMass... ummm.... uh... do we need it to close the deal with FOX? Well I guess you gotta do what you gotta do, but I wouldn't be happy about it. Maybe someone thinks they'd bring something after the move? There's a lot of risk in this, and I don't think odds are good of either actually bringing value.

I don't see any other possibilities.
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I'd put Loyola Chicago in the tier 2-3 although Depaul would probably nix it. Loyola is on of the biggest Catholic schools in the country and has success recently.
 
I don’t think UMass is a great addition given the Big East’s saturation in the Northeast. They don’t really even bring an audience. UMass is kind of loathed in Eastern Mass where the eyeballs are.

Personally, I don’t see why we’d expand at all. It doesn’t appear that there is anyone worth adding to the Big East. The best options are too far away or too obscure to make a difference.
 
Hoophound said:
I don’t think UMass is a great addition given the Big East’s saturation in the Northeast. They don’t really even bring an audience. UMass is kind of loathed in Eastern Mass where the eyeballs are.
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The Big East is not saturated in MASS, we have no presence there at all which is a shame, and I remember the 90's very well, there was UMASS Mania in that state just like Husky Mania in CT. They have a large fanbase it's just kind of dormant right now, add UMASS to the Big East and they will wake up. UMASS to the Big East would also be a kick in the teeth to BC which is nice.
 
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Do nothing. Keep the round Robin.

Gonzaga: too far, too linked to Few. I don't think they succeed when he's gone. We would hate the 10:00 PM eastern game times. Hint...so would Fox. The pacific time zone is TV ratings hell.
Kansas: will never, ever join the Big East. Insane to even think of it. The only league they'd leave for is the B1G.
Notre Dame: is locked in to the ACC for many more years. Why on earth would they downgrade their league in every respect? It's like imagining Gisele will leave Tom for your sorry ass.

Dayton, St. Louis, Davidson: don't add anything. Markets don't really matter anymore, especially for hoops.

Crappy eastern schools (St. Joes, BU, Temple...): are you people high?

The only name that might make sense, if they went indy for football (and they won't) is West Virginia.
 
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HuskyHawk said:
Kansas: will never, ever join the Big East. Insane to even think of it. The only league they'd leave for is the B1G.
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Your first mistake, never say "never, ever" in conference realignment. Kansas may not have a choice, I don't see the Big 12 existing down the road.
 
metsfan2323 said:
The Big East is not saturated in MASS, we have no presence there at all which is a shame, and I remember the 90's very well, there was UMASS Mania in that state just like Husky Mania in CT. They have a large fanbase it's just kind of dormant right now, add UMASS to the Big East and they will wake up. UMASS to the Big East would also be a kick in the teeth to BC which is nice.
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Eh, maybe. That was a unique UMass team. It took a very crooked coach, no academic or behavioral standards and paying the best player in CT to go there in order to catch that lightning in a bottle. That stuff would never fly there now.

I was living in Boston at the time, they definitely weren't having anything that compared to Huskymania there. It was a pretty big deal though, I'll give you that. I'd be much more interested if UMass' main campus were in Greater Boston.
 
huskymedic said:
Another option... h/t @Storrs South

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This is the only plausible suggestion. It would be a good suggestion if the BE has leverage. It doesn't. If anything this announcement lets the schools we would want to play against know the BE is in a financial bind and thus can set terms favorable to themselves.

This is not good news for the BE or for UConn. Viewership matters and I would consider the option of uniting all the conferences minus the P5 and proactively leveraging a tv deal with a major network with this group. The sum of all that viewership will be greater than the individual components. A value will have to be given to how it's divided based on some combination of viewership, success, sports programs and so forth. I doubt it could be achieved but otherwise the clock is ticking for most of these conferences.
 
1. Kansas
2. Gonzaga
3. Notre Dame
4. West Virginia
Then there's everybody else you could think. I find it unlikely that any of those 4 would join, but if you can't one of them I don't see how any other A10 or equivalent school moves the needle in terms of TV and viewership
 
Huskyforlife said:
Why couldn't Gonzaga be a basketball only? This is a basketball league that should do everything in its power to put the best basketball product on TV. Gonzaga isn't SDSU, they will survive post Few, even if they aren't ranked top 5 every single year. Dayton and VCU are interesting from strictly a program strength perspective.
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I believe a team can be a member in a conference for a single sport if their main conference doesn't offer it. That's why it happens in football and done Olympic sports primarily, and why the Big Ten teams had to play in their hockey conference.
 
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