Interview with Delany

[btstimpy]

Did he just say men's indoor tennis? There are no words, just no words.

I did. You can laugh if you like, but Tennis is a big deal at UVA. We're trying to improve Golf.

 

[Seaa Blue]

I did. You can laugh if you like, but Tennis is a big deal at UVA. We're trying to improve Golf.

Why?

 

[uconndogs]

Hey, stimpy, at the 1:13 mark

 

[btstimpy]

Why?

We like it. And it's pretty cool to have Boyd Tinsley from the Dave Matthews Band donate millions of dollars for the Indoor Facility. Good Crowds show up to watch the matches too.

http://www.virginiasports.com/facilities/boyd-tinsley-courts.html

 

[Hoophound]

Virginia excels in all the rich, white kid sports. It's a country club for college kids full of preppy dudes and simple featured yet hot girls with nice clothes. It's sort of like a CT prep school in 1989.

 

[billybud]

Louisville is at $95 million and about to jump $20 million in TV revenue and its basketball pulls in 3x as much as its football.

Yeah...Louisville...an outlier.

Of the top 25 highest grossing programs at schools...only Louisville (at #21) is basketball...all the other 24 are football.

Are you suggesting that Louisville is an example of how it really works?

http://businessofcollegesports.com/2013/11/14/most-profitable-football-and-basketball-programs/

 

[BC1978]

Football and bball are in tailspin. Hard to believe you can see it any other way. 20-30 in football last 4 years. Basketball has fallen off a cliff.

Wow! Nice selective use of data for FB. 4 whole years! With year 1 and year 4 of your "sample" both winning seasons! After TWELVE consecutive winning seasons, BC has 2 straight losing seasons, the coaching staff is replaced...and the new coach promptly gets BC back to a winning season. Such a tailspin!!

I guess by your logic, Uconn FB is in a hopeless tailspin. They have had 3 consecutive losing years which they have yet to come out of. Last year, they were one of the worst programs in FBS and their 4 year record is little better than BC's at 21-28. Unlike BC, they have yet to reverse the trend with a winning season. So, by your own standard, "hard to believe" you would see it any other way!

 

[Fishy]

I figured the Virginia nitwit would be the first to get himself banned, but I see we have a horserace.

And UConn fans who live in Buffalo and have an affection for Penn State and endless pedantic arguments should also consider perhaps occasionally letting things go instead of beating them into the ground over and over and over and over again.

 

[billybud]

But, since Louisville is pulling in the bucks at the Top 25 level, I can see why they might have been attractive.

 

[billybud]

I am self banned for a while....I'll give y'all (plural of y'all) a break...see you in July...

Bye for now...bb

 

[buddy]

If hockey is so unimportant as you claim it is..then why the move to Hockey East? and talk of a new rink etc etc...seems you would be satisfied with just remaining in the Atlantic and remaining competitive against schools with a similar Hockey profile. You dismiss the sport because B.C. has won five national titles. As far as Im concerned.... if its good enough for the BIG to create a hockey conference of its own, then the sport must have an audience of some significant proportion and certainly can produce revenue if given proper resources. Delany knows it, Susan and Ward know it, but i guess you know better.[/quote
For many UConn fans, BC is the lowest of the low and it is unlikely that you will be able to get any empathy here. You all can't be trusted. Period. The days national titles for BC in hockey are over, especially once UConn joins that conference. That is whole story with BC. Once UConn joins a conference, BC is done. That is what they have been afraid of for the past 20 years.

 

[BC1978]

I figured the Virginia nitwit would be the first to get himself banned, but I see we have a horserace.

And UConn fans who live in Buffalo and have an affection for Penn State and endless pedantic arguments should also consider perhaps occasionally letting things go instead of beating them into the ground over and over and over and over again.

Message received, Fishy. Mea Culpa.

 

[huskyrob1]

Did he just say men's indoor tennis? There are no words, just no words.

Hey, Jim Delaney is just chomping at the bit to get it on the BTN, hosted by Ted Robinson and Mary Carillo.

 

[huskyrob1]

The man added Rutgers. Let that sink in. He is obviously not concerned about athletic pedigree in football or anything else.

FYI the pedigree in Rutgers football goes all they way back to 1869 when the first inter collegiate football game was played on the Rutgers campus between RU and Princeton. Rutgers is a special case, the sport was born there. I'm no Rutgers fan, but those are the facts. Joe Paterno also insisted on Rutgers for his Northeast football league back in the day…..

an interesting read…...http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...paternos-east-coast-conference-plan-succeeded

 

[IthacaMatt]

You couldn't be more right. By adding Rutgers and Maryland, the Big 10 is "all in" on the east coast. It was phase one of a process and the reasons those two schools were chosen first was simply because they better fit the more traditional profile of the conference. We have talked at great lengths about where UConn stands, but the truth is that UConn with the others schools already affiliated is the missing link to the east coast for both conferences. .

I agree with this. I think the issue is that there's really only 1 spot left in the ACC and they're hoping it will go to Notre Dame. The Big 10 still holds out hope for ND, too. That's why UConn is in limbo, IMO.

The only problem with Delany's reasoning (absorbing 2 schools first and then UConn in a next step) is that you have a bigger impact on perception by having that extra school, especially with the basketball profile of UConn. I think the Big 10 needs UConn more, to make an east coast product more desirable. I don't think the ACC needs UConn as much to get east coast viewers.

The Big 10 isn't going to get many eyeballs for hoops on the basis of Penn State, Rutgers and Maryland. And despite football being the major factor in terms of money paid out, the networks still need that programming to fill in from Thanksgiving to April.

To me, the Big 10 would complete its next round most successfully with UConn shoring up the east eyeballs and the hoops credentials, and stealing Oklahoma from the Big 12 to give them the football rivalry with Nebraska. That used to be a major one in college football and would be a great one for the league.

 

[IthacaMatt]

+1
This is a good post. Delany appears to have a cogent plan in place and the resolve to see it through despite the struggles he knows the conference will face.

OTOH ACC expansion has felt reactionary and without regard to a bigger vision. They left a school like BC isolated for nearly a decade, when any number of Big East Teams could have eased their transition. They later take a school like Louisville which was light years behind UConn academically, and only marginally better than them in football over the previous decade.

I remain a believer that The B1G's Plan is focused entirely on easternward expansion. Kansas and Missouri have both coveted conference membership in the past and both could have been had on more than one occassion w/o the entanglement of grant of rights agreements. Neither have recieved an offer to date.

IMO Delany's original plan was to shake the ACC up enough with a UMD offer in order to grab UVA and UNC. The ACC closed ranks with their GOR and subsequent lawsuit against The Terps. The outcome of this lawsuit will be telling for how hard he will continue to pursue the one ACC Property that makes the most sense for The B1G, UVA. UCONN could be free and clear in 27 months. It will be interesting to see unfold.

This is forgetting that the original teams in 2003 were supposed to be Miami, BC and Syracuse, not Va. Tech. That would have eased BC's transition and have given them a rivalry type of football game.

 

[IthacaMatt]

That would be a shame. It does tickle me a bit that the ACC will forever be little brother to the other power conferences from now on, though.

Florida State winning the national title in football, and Clemson being a top 5 team for much of the season was a very good step toward getting enough traditional football powers back to where they were. If teams just play to their historical norms over the last 25-30 years, the ACC will likely win more bowls than the Big 10, have better attendance at those bowls than the Big 10, Big 12 and the Pac 12+.

 

[IthacaMatt]

Can someone please tell me what UVA has that Delaney wants so bad for the B1G? And what does UVA have from a marketing the northeast/New England point of view? I mean if I know my history, the state of Virginia is and always has been a southern state with a lot of southern ties, ask General Lee if you don't believe me. And last but not least, what does UVA bring to the table that UCONN does not in terms of capturing the northeast/NYC market in a sports marketing arena????? Don't get me wrong, UVA is a decent school, on the northern border of the south, but I don't see Delaney getting all hot and bothered about adding them to the B1G. I mean Delaney opened an office in NYC, not in Richmond or Norfolk.

Well, you're not playing the game right if you don't see why the Big 10 would want UVa. They have Maryland. Virginia is a populous state in a major media center. They would bring a lot of eyeballs on cable. You aggregate schools together and it's like a network effect - the more you have, the more energy it creates, the more benefit and usefulness you get out of the combination. Virginia, Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio. It's like filling in states in an election map.

 

[IthacaMatt]

If hockey is so unimportant as you claim it is..then why the move to Hockey East? and talk of a new rink etc etc...seems you would be satisfied with just remaining in the Atlantic and remaining competitive against schools with a similar Hockey profile. You dismiss the sport because B.C. has won five national titles. As far as Im concerned.... if its good enough for the BIG to create a hockey conference of its own, then the sport must have an audience of some significant proportion and certainly can produce revenue if given proper resources. Delany knows it, Susan and Ward know it, but i guess you know better.

Hockey to the Big 10 is what lacrosse is to the ACC.

 

[Stray_Dog]

that would be

I am self banned for a while....I'll give y'all (plural of y'all) a break...see you in July...

Bye for now...bb

that would be all y'all...for the record - I grew up in Florida

 

[huskyrob1]

Well, you're not playing the game right if you don't see why the Big 10 would want UVa. They have Maryland. Virginia is a populous state in a major media center. They would bring a lot of eyeballs on cable. You aggregate schools together and it's like a network effect - the more you have, the more energy it creates, the more benefit and usefulness you get out of the combination. Virginia, Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio. It's like filling in states in an election map.

The only game I'm playing is football and UVA sucks at it, and they'll always be the b@st@rd step child in Frank Beamers backyard. They don't even have a basketball tradition like UCONN does. And do they really have a lot of eyeballs in rural Virginia ready to watch B1G football???? I don't think so. Oh that's right, Virginia does have men's indoor tennis and soccer. I forgot. LOL!!! I even doubt that those eyeballs in rural Virginia even have the money to afford cable to much less watch BTN programming. If the BTN consults marketing firms about advertising rates, what do you think they will tell them about Virginia vs Connecticut?

 

[TerryD]

I agree with this. I think the issue is that there's really only 1 spot left in the ACC and they're hoping it will go to Notre Dame. The Big 10 still holds out hope for ND, too. That's why UConn is in limbo, IMO.

The only problem with Delany's reasoning (absorbing 2 schools first and then UConn in a next step) is that you have a bigger impact on perception by having that extra school, especially with the basketball profile of UConn. I think the Big 10 needs UConn more, to make an east coast product more desirable. I don't think the ACC needs UConn as much to get east coast viewers.

The Big 10 isn't going to get many eyeballs for hoops on the basis of Penn State, Rutgers and Maryland. And despite football being the major factor in terms of money paid out, the networks still need that programming to fill in from Thanksgiving to April.

To me, the Big 10 would complete its next round most successfully with UConn shoring up the east eyeballs and the hoops credentials, and stealing Oklahoma from the Big 12 to give them the football rivalry with Nebraska. That used to be a major one in college football and would be a great one for the league.

ND would be the 15th ACC football team, not the 16th.

I think that Jim "Ahab"Delany has finally gotten the message and has given up chasing ND, his great white whale.

 

[Fishy]

The ACC isn't heading towards expansion unless.....Notre Dame decides to join or the SEC/Big Ten start plucking bits off down the road.

They don't have a network and the prospects of them getting the SEC Network deal they covet are somewhere between Never and Never Ever. ESPN's not going to lay out the cash for a network that's has a tentpole in North Carolina/Virginia and is boxed in by the SEC Network to the south and the Big Ten and general disinterest in the north.

Without a network, there's no cash in expansion for the ACC.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

I disagree about the network thing. Everyone on this board, myself included, has underestimated Swofford's ability to get espn to pay up when espn didn't need to. Espn has two major conferences, the ACC and SEC, and cant afford to have either trail the pack. The Fox conferences are rising. I fully expect the ACC to get a major increase to their deal within 5 years. Maybe that is their own network, maybe it is just more money from ESPN.

Uconn needs to figure out a way to make us part of that increase.

 

[Fishy]

I'd say you're drunk, but you're generally off the wall and no one can stay that drunk for that long.

ESPN has already let the ACC fall behind the SEC - that gap will never be made up and ESPN is not going to throw money in a hole so that the ACC can feel good about itself. They put a little cash into the pot to convince the group to sign away their rights for the next 14 years which keeps the band together, but also removes every ounce of leverage.

ESPN has SEC football and they've built a network off of it - they're not going to run up against their own property by trying to sell cable operators on a network that plays second fiddle everywhere but NC and Va.