Key tweets, and it's all gone to Hell.

[jostar1]

Dodd misrepresents the real question. The real question is whether the Big 12 wants to take a school as basketball only. The Big 12 is not committing to anything on football. Some schools may not want a basketball-only member, I don’t know, but that is the question from the Big 12’s perspective.

You are misrepresenting it. The plan as has been stated in all of the stories is for football to join in 2031 after meeting financial benchmarks. That is what the Big 12 would be committed to.

Per Dodd's prior story:

"CBS Sports confirmed that the plan would be for UConn to join the league in all sports except football by 2026. Football would then join in 2031 after meeting a set of financial benchmarks".

 

[jostar1]

This is not true from everything I've heard. UConn wouldn't take less money, more travel AND a significant investment in football just to join. Yormark has worked on this for a year. UConn increased the Big East media deal, which is why Endeavor gave its pitch. No way ESPN offers them 6 million.

Agree. Matt Norlander estimated it to be $10-$11million.

 

[AllHusky]

Don’t settle Huskies, gotta stay on the slog. Big Ten is possible, gotta show we can compete.

Seems to me that we flew too close to the sun for football in the Big East and then completely fell off the face of the earth. All the skepticism we currently face is the same skepticism we faced when going 1A in football and schools are probably wondering if we can do it again. They'd be taking a flyer on us.

This process just sucks. No other school has remotely been jerked around like this. Not even close. And the lack of leadership from the Board, the multiple Presidents and multiple ineffective ADs, until AD David Benedict is the real core issue, not these other conferences

Nice analogy, pretty damn close to what happened. Felt a little bit like how dare you be competitive already

 

[Padutch5]

Those 15k kids would turn into 20k when their friends from home and other schools show up to tailgate and go to a game!!

How many people are employed at UConn-Storrs within a 25 min drive? My friend works for Dining Services, her husband Employee season ticket discounts. A bunch.

Die hard do what I need to do to go to a game fans. How many season tix we have last year. At least them.

Has anyone been to Penn St Football? Do you know how far those "hometown fans" need to travel to get to the Happy Valley? I was an hour away i Lewisburg. The locals bar was the Towne Tavern(great black diamond steak $11 1984.) Had some Rutgers friends come out for the PSU-Rutty game in '83 or4, saw the Towne Tavern owners in the parking lot, RV, TV, Living Room furniture, they'd been there since Wed for a Saturday game. Half never went inside.

No, we aren't 107,000 Penn St fans in Beaver, but we certainly could be 50 in Storrrs. Build it and they will come, win and more will come.

We just need to get our foot BACK in the door.

Yes, we have been to a number of games at Penn State [by the way The Rent is far better stadium from a fan standpoint.].Before Pa. widened the roads into the stadium fans started arriving on Thursday and didn’t leave until Sunday because of the choked roads. I dont see ct or the towns between Storrs and Rt 91 allowing that traffic or do I see Ct paying to widen the roads.

 

[AZHuskiePop]

Why do you not think we will achieve AAU status? Schools like USF and Arizona State just did last year. We are pretty close.

Who is ahead of us? And keep in mind the SEC is taking draft picks too. They have eight spots to the Big Ten's six if both go to 24.

Teams with a non-zero chance of joining either a 24-team SEC or Big 10:
UConn
Utah
Kansas
Arizona
Arizona State
Colorado
TCU
Texas Tech
Stanford
Cal
Notre Dame
Florida State
Clemson
North Carolina
Virginia
Georgia Tech
Louisville
Virginia Tech
Duke
Miami
NC State
Syracuse
Pitt

That's the list.

The Big 10 list (many of which may end up in SEC).
UConn
Arizona
Colorado
Arizona State
Utah
Kansas
Notre Dame
Florida State
Clemson
North Carolina
Virginia
Georgia Tech
Virginia Tech
Duke
Miami
Syracuse
Pitt

IF eight of the above schools land in the SEC, that leaves 6 spots for 8 teams in the Big 10 (not including Notre Dame).

We are going to have to beat out schools like Pitt, Syracuse, Duke, Arizona State, and Georgia Tech to get to the promised land. The only way that happens if is we join the Big 12 or ACC in the very near future.

You are completely underestimating ASU ‘s potential.
Large market , AAU, largest student Body in the country
The residence of many B1G fans especially Oct to April .
The coming high tech area Silicon Valley without California .
Their downside is the president is more academic focused than sports.
Easy flight access from almost anywhere with two airports thats a consideration for Olympic sports.

 

[Huskyforlife]

10-11 until 2031 is fair. It’s more than we get in our current conference.

 

[CL82]

I dont see ct or the towns between Storrs and Rt 91 allowing that traffic

So do you anticipate them mobilizing their municipal militia to stop traffic on RT 44?

 

[Ucxc24]

Updated article this morning on where things are at.

Goes into the pros and cons about taking UConn, the risk of taking football down the road, but has an interesting tidbit in the end.

“Convincing a dozen members to brush aside those arguments and go along seems like uphill work. But Yormark has built his share of goodwill, which could be enough to sway some of those on the fence.”

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5732442/2024/08/30/big-12-uconn-naming-rights/

 

[nelsonmuntz]

Updated article this morning on where things are at.

Goes into the pros and cons about taking UConn, the risk of taking football down the road, but has an interesting tidbit in the end.

“Convincing a dozen members to brush aside those arguments and go along seems like uphill work. But Yormark has built his share of goodwill, which could be enough to sway some of those on the fence.”

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5732442/2024/08/30/big-12-uconn-naming-rights/

Weird at the end about the prediction that the Big 12 will only get 1 bid to this year's CFP. How many bids do experts think the Big 12 and SEC will get?

 

[JohnFSilver]

Updated article this morning on where things are at.

Goes into the pros and cons about taking UConn, the risk of taking football down the road, but has an interesting tidbit in the end.

“Convincing a dozen members to brush aside those arguments and go along seems like uphill work. But Yormark has built his share of goodwill, which could be enough to sway some of those on the fence.”

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5732442/2024/08/30/big-12-uconn-naming-rights/

Rant: I absolutely hate when The Athletic says, as first reported….

You are the NYTimes. No one gives a crap. Show some class and report the news. Don’t give yourself a pat on the back.

Second off, Locked On podcast was first.

 

[Urcea]

900 pages. Hopefully nearing the end of this saga.

And nary a key tweet to be seen!

 

[jostar1]

And nary a key tweet to be seen!

You mean THE key tweet!

 

[bendm]

Weird at the end about the prediction that the Big 12 will only get 1 bid to this year's CFP. How many bids do experts think the Big 12 and SEC will get?

weird? There are currently no would be at large teams ranked inside the top 12 that aren’t in either the BIG or SEC besides ND. they are getting all 7 at large bids most years

 

[ScottBonz]

Sure, if someone wants to commit to reading 22,500+ posts of conference realignment awesomeness.

For those of us who have read everyone of those posts, you have to wonder what we could've done with that time if it was spent otherwise. Cure for cancer? World peace? Who can say?

Feed it into llamma and we can have our own kick in the nuts gpt

 

[StllH8L8ner]

Sure, if someone wants to commit to reading 22,500+ posts of conference realignment awesomeness.

For those of us who have read everyone of those posts, you have to wonder what we could've done with that time if it was spent otherwise. Cure for cancer? World peace? Who can say?

This has to be a record for the number of threads on the same subject (Big XII news). I can’t keep up…

 

[CL82]

This has to be a record for the number of threads on the same subject (Big XII news). I can’t keep up…

"Casual"

 

[ZooCougar]

 

[nelsonmuntz]

weird? There are currently no would be at large teams ranked inside the top 12 that aren’t in either the BIG or SEC besides ND. they are getting all 7 at large bids most years

So you are saying it is already a P2. Then what are we doing? Do we think it is going to be better by 2031?

 

[bendm]

So you are saying it is already a P2. Then what are we doing? Do we think it is going to be better by 2031?

You act like you alone have these ground breaking epiphanies but everyone realizes it’s already a P2 for football. It won’t get any better but the big12 is still guaranteed a top 4 seed in the cfp as well as access to the other dozens of bowl games and it’s the best P4 bball conference. Most importantly we need the tv revenue of being in an P4 conference. are you saying That it’s all for not unless we get into the BIG or SEC? If so then we might as well just shut down the athletic dept right now.

 

[Jbirdp5]

Agree. Matt Norlander estimated it to be $10-$11million.

Would 10-11 million be enough money to make the move? For the next 7 years we’d have increased travel costs for all sports and then being increasing the spending for football by a large amount to hit the thresholds they want. If something were to go wrong on the way to full membership the numbers could be way worse for the AD than they are now.

 

[bendm]

Would 10-11 million be enough money to make the move? For the next 7 years we’d have increased travel costs for all sports and then being increasing the spending for football by a large amount to hit the thresholds they want. If something were to go wrong on the way to full membership the numbers could be way worse for the AD than they are now.

it could get worse but this is the only chance at long term viability. if we make the investments and end up screwed then we'll have to drop football once and for all plus all the title ix women's teams. focus every remaining resource on bball.

UConn men made over 10 million in revenue last year. if we could use that to pay players and the school covers all costs of running the program then im not worried.

 

[UConn Dan]

You mean THE key tweet!

We’ve been so close, yet so far away. Cue up Lucy football

 

[FfldCntyFan]

So you are saying it is already a P2. Then what are we doing? Do we think it is going to be better by 2031?

I'm fully aware that you already know the answer but for some reason you get some thrill out of playing the contrarian.

I will use the English Football League to describe where the landscape is extremely close to having evolved to:

EPL (top tier) - B1G; SEC
EFL Championship (second tier) - B-12; ACC
EFL League One (third tier) - Big East; perhaps no other conference
EFL League Two (fourth tier) - the better four or five of the remaining conferences
EFL National League (fifth tier) - the next three or four remaining conferences (conferences that doesn't currently worry about their one bid playing in a first four game but doesn't expect a seed better than 12 or 13).
EFL Regional Leagues (sixth tier) whoever is left (they may soon need to worry if their one bid will no longer be guaranteed).

We are looking in to the possibility of joining the B-12 because we do want to survive well beyond the next ten plus years.

 

[ZooCougar]

I'm fully aware that you already know the answer but for some reason you get some thrill out of playing the contrarian.

I will use the English Football League to describe where the landscape is extremely close to having evolved to:

EPL (top tier) - B1G; SEC
EFL Championship (second tier) - B-12; ACC
EFL League One (third tier) - Big East; perhaps no other conference
EFL League Two (fourth tier) - the better four or five of the remaining conferences
EFL National League (fifth tier) - the next three or four remaining conferences (conferences that doesn't currently worry about their one bid playing in a first four game but doesn't expect a seed better than 12 or 13).
EFL Regional Leagues (sixth tier) whoever is left (they may soon need to worry if their one bid will no longer be guaranteed).

We are looking in to the possibility of joining the B-12 because we do want to survive well beyond the next ten plus years.

The Top 4 are relatively even tier wise. They have auto qualifiers into the CFP.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

The Top 4 are relatively even tier wise. They have auto qualifiers into the CFP.

Coug,

Using that logic, one could claim that the best G level conference isn't far behind as the highest ranked group of five conference champion will also receive an auto bid.

The reality is that there is a large stratification between the B1G/SEC and the B-12/ACC and it will grow. It will be rare if in any season the B1G/SEC won't combine for six or seven participants in the CFP and it will be equally rare if in any season the B-12/ACC combine for more than three.