Dom Amore: If Big 12 calls, UConn will have to choose between Big East love and Power Five money.

[husky429]

Leagues worse? What does this mean?

Research funding and academic rankings in the B12 are not where UConn aims to be. I believe we would be the best ranked school in the conference. Research $ is the part of conference affiliation that we as fans don't often think about, but is really important when these decisions come to a vote.

 

[noeynox]

Research funding and academic rankings in the B12 are not where UConn aims to be. I believe we would be the best ranked school in the conference. Research $ is the part of conference affiliation that we as fans don't often think about, but is really important when these decisions come to a vote.

Where does UConn rank in the Big East? They'd be 3rd in the Big 12. Cincinnati is #1.

 

[navery12]

So it’s all about competing financially? Our football team will be BC or Cuse or worse. Baseball will be no better

Our football team would kill to be BC or Cuse.

And you clearly haven't followed UConn baseball at all if you think it wouldn't be worse. The baseball team just spent the entire season ranked, mostly in the top 10, and isn't going to get to host a regional as a 1 seed because they slipped up in a single game against Butler

 

[noeynox]

Our football team would kill to be BC or Cuse.

And you clearly haven't followed UConn baseball at all if you think it wouldn't be worse. The baseball team just spent the entire season ranked, mostly in the top 10, and isn't going to get to host a regional as a 1 seed because they slipped up in a single game against Butler

When UConn was on equal footing financially with these schools it showed it would have zero problems competing with them. Tie one arm behind their back where the best they could do was bring back Edsall on a shoe string budget and yeah, we wish we were as good as them. It didn't take much, 1 year of Mora to beat BC on the field. Give this program a fair chance to compete damn it.

 

[August_West]

If it doesn't come it doesn't come. The rest of your post is speculation about what the deal is gonna be and preferences against playing those schools. "God knows who gets picked off next"? Tell me who is wanted and by whom? Now I'll speculate. The beauty of it is that there is going to be a best of the rest leauge and this commissioner will likely pick up pieces from both the PAC and ACC. Once the B1G and SEC are done.

Again just say you'd prefer they just shutter the FB program down completely.

I simply believe we can wait this out while it all shakes out and end in a better position than a desperation, lacking self respect move to a conference that makes zero sense for us. There will be opportunity in the future to end up with the rest of the left overs.

I’m fine playing football, we can be cannon fodder as an independent just as well as we can in Big12. ( or were in AAC) . Honestly what is our football ceiling in ANY league? You mentioned Calhoun before, probably as a program builder, that can NEVER happen with Football. Calhoun built this program on the backs of a great college basketball region, legendary teams and fertile recruiting grounds. None of those area features apply to football. What is our ceiling ? You have big conference money northeast teams like Syracuse, BC, and Rutgers, how are they doing with their millions , their conference , and a way richer football tradition?

Play football. It’s fine. We could maybe make a bowl game every few years , that’s good. But man, it’s was way rough for northeast schools to compete BEFORE NIL. Now teams have pro league payrolls. We have so much against us on this front that have nothing to do with conference affiliation. So until something actually makes sense for us in these crazy times, I think we should wait it out.

 

[Dove]

T

Dude 75% of uconn fans don’t care about football - it’s about winning titles, they should stick with whatever is best for basketball. And maybe that’s the big 12 but most people don’t care about football.

They will once the wins....followed by big big wins...come. I remember a rainy game against a USF team that was about to be #1 in the country. We won. What a crowd! Stormed the field.

 

[August_West]

Holy straw man. Please point to a single post advocating UConn take a cut-rate deal.

If we get offered a cut rate deal for big12 there will be a plethora of people here foaming at the mouth to take it.

 

[CTFAN4LIFE]

I simply believe we can wait this out while it all shakes out and end in a better position than a desperation, lacking self respect move to a conference that makes zero sense for us. There will be opportunity in the future to end up with the rest of the left overs.

I’m fine playing football, we can be cannon fodder as an independent just as well as we can in Big12. ( or were in AAC) . Honestly what is our football ceiling in ANY league? You mentioned Calhoun before, probably as a program builder, that can NEVER happen with Football. Calhoun built this program on the backs of a great college basketball region, legendary teams and fertile recruiting grounds. None of those area features apply to football. What is our ceiling ? You have big conference money northeast teams like Syracuse, BC, and Rutgers, how are they doing with their millions , their conference , and a way richer football tradition?

Play football. It’s fine. We could maybe make a bowl game every few years , that’s good. But man, it’s was way rough for northeast schools to compete BEFORE NIL. Now teams have pro league payrolls. We have so much against us on this front that have nothing to do with conference affiliation. So until something actually makes sense for us in these crazy times, I think we should wait it out.

What would waiting it out lead to and why would that scenario(s) be better?

 

[noeynox]

I simply believe we can wait this out while it all shakes out and end in a better position than a desperation, lacking self respect move to a conference that makes zero sense for us. There will be opportunity in the future to end up with the rest of the left overs.

I’m fine playing football, we can be cannon fodder as an independent just as well as we can in Big12. ( or were in AAC) . Honestly what is our football ceiling in ANY league? You mentioned Calhoun before, probably as a program builder, that can NEVER happen with Football. Calhoun built this program on the backs of a great college basketball region, legendary teams and fertile recruiting grounds. None of those area features apply to football. What is our ceiling ? You have big conference money northeast teams like Syracuse, BC, and Rutgers, how are they doing with their millions , their conference , and a way richer football tradition?

Play football. It’s fine. We could maybe make a bowl game every few years , that’s good. But man, it’s was way rough for northeast schools to compete BEFORE NIL. Now teams have pro league payrolls. We have so much against us on this front that have nothing to do with conference affiliation. So until something actually makes sense for us in these crazy times, I think we should wait it out.

They have waited. Over a decade plus to get played time and time again by the ACC. The ACC commish and ESPN told Malloy we were "next" how long ago?

The ceiling for UConn FB maybe what it was in the Big East, it may be higher. While in the Big East with similar resources to their peers in what they could pay coaches, they beat Syracuse, Pitt, WVU, Baylor, Iowa State, Indiana, South Carolina, Notre Dame, Duke, Vanderbilt, Rutgers, Cincinnati, Pitt.

When you're so broke as a program that all you can do is bring back Edsall on a contract with no buyout and a bunch of interns as assistants the program looks like it did under him and somehow people conclude the FB program will nevet be anything more than that, when they already showed they were capable of far more than that.

I only mentioned Calhoun in regards to him acknowledging how important FB was to the long term stability of the school and BB programs. This is why you see Hurley and Geno super pumped that the program showed signs of life in year 1 under Mora. Those guys looke genuinely stoked.

They cannot sit on their hands and let thia slip away. It is literally the drowing man scenario playing out.

 

[Gburyhusky]

And Chris Murphy wants to stay in the BE, which could be a hint on the political direction.

That's not what he said.

 

[Get a Job]

FWIW the opposite may be true. I haven't quite made up my mind on this issue, but my wife (a prof) says the B12 on average is leagues worse than what we're pulling in now--especially with Texas gone. We would probably lose much more than the 30 million in research funding.

Why do sources of research funding care about a school's athletic conference?

 

[noeynox]

If we get offered a cut rate deal for big12 there will be a plethora of people here foaming at the mouth to take it.

Layout the Financials of what a cut rate deal would look like. Understand the Big12 goes back to market in 2031. Long before the ACC can do so again.

 

[husky429]

Why do sources of research funding care about a school's athletic conference?

Idk man, ask the B1G.

 

[husky429]

Where does UConn rank in the Big East? They'd be 3rd in the Big 12. Cincinnati is #1.

Not sure where you're getting these #s, but based on US News (the most common metric), that is not accurate. Cincinnati is #151. UConn would be #1 in the conference at #67. Baylor and BYU would be #2 and #3 at #77 and #87.

We're third in the Big East behind GTown and Nova. Some of the schools aren't ranked nationally though--they get regional rankings because they aren't R1.

The rankings suck. We'd be better off looking at other metrics but I have no idea how to.

Edit: Realized you might've been talking about totsl research funding. I assume that has some to do with # of faculty, so I have no idea how to know what is or isn't very good.

 

[huskymedic]

Research funding and academic rankings in the B12 are not where UConn aims to be. I believe we would be the best ranked school in the conference. Research $ is the part of conference affiliation that we as fans don't often think about, but is really important when these decisions come to a vote.

Where does UConn rank in the Big East? They'd be 3rd in the Big 12. Cincinnati is #1.

Not sure where you're getting these #s…

 

[WestHartHusk]

If we get offered a cut rate deal for big12 there will be a plethora of people here foaming at the mouth to take it.

You are arguing with yourself. Who is advocating taking a cut-rate deal that doesn’t benefit the school?

 

[Billy Jack]

I don’t want to leave the Big East but there’s been rumors for years that some of the P5, P4 or whatever it ends up being leave the NCAA altogether. If that ever did happen we’d be essentially playing D2 basketball. I’m not crazy about it but I think you have to join the B12.

Those rumors have been about football, not basketball.

 

[Billy Jack]

Where does UConn rank in the Big East? They'd be 3rd in the Big 12. Cincinnati is #1.

Cincy gets to count its Medical School as part of its research dollars, which is a huge source of research grants. Because it’s med school is on a different campus, UConn does not. It’s an apples and oranges comparison.

 

[Drew]

literally the only group of people on this Earth that would choose to remain tied to Butler and Marquette over being in the P5 are UConn basketball only fans.

May be helpful to remember that perspective here when 99.9999% of people would choose the opposite of what you want.

 

[Billy Jack]

Idk man, ask the B1G.

The Big Ten is different. Inclusion in the athletic conference also means inclusion in the Big Ten Academic Alliance (formerly the CIC), which translates into institutional cooperation on research grants. That’s why the Big Ten insisted for generations that new members be AAU, a formal recognition of the amount of research they conduct.

 

[WestHartHusk]

literally the only group of people on this Earth that would choose to remain tied to Butler and Marquette over being in the P5 are UConn basketball only fans.

May be helpful to remember that perspective here when 99.9999% of people would choose the opposite of what you want.

UConn men’s basketball fans, specifically. The women’s fans get it.

 

[Billy Jack]

literally the only group of people on this Earth that would choose to remain tied to Butler and Marquette over being in the P5 are UConn basketball only fans.

May be helpful to remember that perspective here when 99.9999% of people would choose the opposite of what you want.

2022-23 Home Attendance:

Men’s Basketball = 194,600
Football ======== 132,500

 

[kobebeanbryant]

You left out Baylor (who has very recently won a title in men's basketball) and WVU, who we have a decent history with (more than exactly half of our current conference mates).

OK St, Iowa St and Kansas St (who you also left out) all have had very good programs recently.

None of those teams move the needle for me at all. They may be objectively better, but I just don’t care about them at all.

If we go to the Big 12, there will be a single conference opponent that I care about in the slightest (Kansas).

We may be forced to take the offer for the money, but my enthusiasm will return to AAC levels (even if the conference as a whole is significantly better).

 

[Billy Jack]

None of those teams move the needle for me at all. They may be objectively better, but I just don’t care about them at all.

If we go to the Big 12, there will be a single conference opponent that I care about in the slightest (Kansas).

We may be forced to take the offer for the money, but my enthusiasm will return to AAC levels (even if the conference as a whole is significantly better).

Same here. I don’t work with anyone who went to any of these schools. I don’t know anyone who graduated from any of these schools. I don’t know anyone who sends/sent their kids to any of these schools. There simply is no rivalry here with anyone I know or associate with.

The lack of rivalry is a huge problem. It contributed heavily to the decline in attendance during the AAC days. Privately BC alumni told me after their move to the ACC that they wished that they were back in the Big East even though their football and basketball programs were doing well in the ACC at the time. They were playing big names in football and huge names in basketball but their attendance shrank because there was no one on their schedule that anyone in their fan base cared about.

This is the future we’d be facing in the Big XII.

 

[BigTenFan]

Who are the top names in B12 ? Kansas?


I’m salivating at the thought of OK state, Texas Tech, Iowa State, TCU etc… real marquee stuff here.

Those schools you mentioned have a lot of alumni scattered all over the country.
That's a lot of eyes on UConn that would be unbelievable national exposure that they will never get staying in the Big East