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

[JVN]

Toledo getting poached again?

 

[uconnfan68]

Feel free. I'm more comfortable with the statements of people who were actually material participants and went on the record contemporaneous to the events.

PM me if you want to discuss in more detail.

No thanks. I'm just glad I was around to see a lot of great things at UConn.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

You’re allowed to be wrong.

But you’re not allowed to change the facts as they were in order to pretend you’re not.

A decade-plus later, Stanford, California and SMU are in the ACC and despite being considered three times by the Big 12 and winning however many championships, the ACC is not one percent closer to considering us for membership. Kinda feels like a blacklist, don’t it?

You are wrong about 2012 and absolutely dead wrong about 2003.

2003 was a coordinated strike by BCU, Miami, the ACC and ESPN on the Big East as the league was beginning negotiations for a new contract. My source on this is from one of the athletic departments that was part of the attack. I was told about it months before Tranghese went public, but I didn’t believe the story.

BC was concerned about being left behind because it saw the escalating costs of running an athletic program and knew UConn presented an existential threat if there was conference consolidation. Donna Shalala was embarrassed by the Miami football program and wanted to de-emphasize it, which would be hard to do in the Big East’s merit based revenue share. And when I saw “embarrassed”, she fudging hated the football program. The ACC thought they could knock the Big East out with one shot, and they would have if not for the lawsuit.

My source on 2012 is not as solid, but given the public swings of that realignment, including a potential Big 12/Big East merger, I doubt Fishy’s “it was all part of a master plan” theory. BC’s position was simply to keep UConn out of a major conference at all costs, because then BC would be the only available New England program. If that is what Fishy means by blacklisting, then sure. I will point out that UConn fundraisers were telling major boosters the ACC was all but a done deal in 2012.

Finally, I do have a good source that UConn was planning to rejoin the Big East over a year before they actually announced, which means Hurley knew UConn would be in the Big East when he took the job. I bring this up because there continues to be a vein of idiocy among our fan base that the AAC is equivalent to the Big East. Hurley would NEVER have come here if he thought we were staying in the AAC.

 

[UConnJim]

You are wrong about 2012 and absolutely dead wrong about 2003.

2003 was a coordinated strike by BCU, Miami, the ACC and ESPN on the Big East as the league was beginning negotiations for a new contract. My source on this is from one of the athletic departments that was part of the attack. I was told about it months before Tranghese went public, but I didn’t believe the story.

BC was concerned about being left behind because it saw the escalating costs of running an athletic program and knew UConn presented an existential threat if there was conference consolidation. Donna Shalala was embarrassed by the Miami football program and wanted to de-emphasize it, which would be hard to do in the Big East’s merit based revenue share. And when I saw “embarrassed”, she fudging hated the football program. The ACC thought they could knock the Big East out with one shot, and they would have if not for the lawsuit.

My source on 2012 is not as solid, but given the public swings of that realignment, including a potential Big 12/Big East merger, I doubt Fishy’s “it was all part of a master plan” theory. BC’s position was simply to keep UConn out of a major conference at all costs, because then BC would be the only available New England program. If that is what Fishy means by blacklisting, then sure. I will point out that UConn fundraisers were telling major boosters the ACC was all but a done deal in 2012.

Finally, I do have a good source that UConn was planning to rejoin the Big East over a year before they actually announced, which means Hurley knew UConn would be in the Big East when he took the job. I bring this up because there continues to be a vein of idiocy among our fan base that the AAC is equivalent to the Big East. Hurley would NEVER have come here if he thought we were staying in the AAC.

Here's a timeline of events related to 2012.

September 30, 2012: Gene DeFilippo retires from BC as AD
October 9, 2012: Brad Bates hired as BC AD from Miami (Ohio)
November 2012: Maryland announces they will leave the ACC for the Big 10.
November 2012: Louisville announces they will leave the Big East for the ACC.

Based on my understanding from my BC friends is that BC was OK with UConn joining the ACC in 2012 when Maryland left (DeFilippo was gone), but the ACC wanted to improve their football image and Louisville touted their football program and UConn never presented a plan to show how UConn was going to continue to improve their football program which was still a young FBS program. Thus, the football schools won the day and Louisville was added. End of the day, I think Manuel and Herbst thought UConn was in and didn't sell a plan of what the football program could become and Louisville seized the opportunity.

 

[Fishy]

You are wrong about 2012 and absolutely dead wrong about 2003.

2003 was a coordinated strike by BCU, Miami, the ACC and ESPN on the Big East as the league was beginning negotiations for a new contract. My source on this is from one of the athletic departments that was part of the attack. I was told about it months before Tranghese went public, but I didn’t believe the story.

BC was concerned about being left behind because it saw the escalating costs of running an athletic program and knew UConn presented an existential threat if there was conference consolidation. Donna Shalala was embarrassed by the Miami football program and wanted to de-emphasize it, which would be hard to do in the Big East’s merit based revenue share. And when I saw “embarrassed”, she fudging hated the football program. The ACC thought they could knock the Big East out with one shot, and they would have if not for the lawsuit.

My source on 2012 is not as solid, but given the public swings of that realignment, including a potential Big 12/Big East merger, I doubt Fishy’s “it was all part of a master plan” theory. BC’s position was simply to keep UConn out of a major conference at all costs, because then BC would be the only available New England program. If that is what Fishy means by blacklisting, then sure. I will point out that UConn fundraisers were telling major boosters the ACC was all but a done deal in 2012.

Finally, I do have a good source that UConn was planning to rejoin the Big East over a year before they actually announced, which means Hurley knew UConn would be in the Big East when he took the job. I bring this up because there continues to be a vein of idiocy among our fan base that the AAC is equivalent to the Big East. Hurley would NEVER have come here if he thought we were staying in the AAC.

Nope.

I’m right.

Rest of what you wrote was nonsense.

 

[buddy]

Here's a timeline of events related to 2012.

September 30, 2012: Gene DeFilippo retires from BC as AD
October 9, 2012: Brad Bates hired as BC AD from Miami (Ohio)
November 2012: Maryland announces they will leave the ACC for the Big 10.
November 2012: Louisville announces they will leave the Big East for the ACC.

Based on my understanding from my BC friends is that BC was OK with UConn joining the ACC in 2012 when Maryland left (DeFilippo was gone), but the ACC wanted to improve their football image and Louisville touted their football program and UConn never presented a plan to show how UConn was going to continue to improve their football program which was still a young FBS program. Thus, the football schools won the day and Louisville was added. End of the day, I think Manuel and Herbst thought UConn was in and didn't sell a plan of what the football program could become and Louisville seized the opportunity.

No such thing as BC friends.

 

[CL82]

No such thing as BC friends.

Just enemies you haven't met yet.

 

[JVN]

 

[shizzle787]

If that’s the argument, leagues need to find a way to get their best team in. The Ivy going to a 4-team tournament was a mistake, but they did it for the money.

 

[shizzle787]

When the field expands to 76, I think we will see more upsets again because the 12 seeds will almost exclusively be from the top 5 leagues.

 

[Fishy]

It's not realignment or NLI or the transfer portal.

It's realignment, NLI and the portal.

We've shoved all of the money in the sport towards a handful of schools - there's a reason why Indiana is suddenly good at football or Nebraska has won an NCAA game or Vanderbilt isn't a punch line. They have a $40M-$80M advantage over everyone else.

 

[UConnTrumbull]

It's not realignment or NLI or the transfer portal.

It's realignment, NLI and the portal.

We've shoved all of the money in the sport towards a handful of schools - there's a reason why Indiana is suddenly good at football or Nebraska has won an NCAA game or Vanderbilt isn't a punch line. They have a $40M-$80M advantage over everyone else.

Sure but why isn’t Nebraska football good? Why isn’t Indiana basketball good?

 

[Hoophound]

Sure but why isn’t Nebraska football good? Why isn’t Indiana basketball good?

Not yet. Being good at basketball is only a matter of time as far as Indiana is concerned. They just need to find a good coach. Nebraska football is a bit different. We’ve been seeing that winning in football requires two things, a great head coach and a lot of money. Nebraska struggles to get the very best coaches and players simply because they won’t draw someone like Kiffin, so they have to make a hire like Cignetti to get there. There aren’t many Cignettis out there to find.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

Sure but why isn’t Nebraska football good? Why isn’t Indiana basketball good?

It isn't difficult to fail, even if you have significant financial advantages. It can be very difficult to succeed, even if you do have significant financial advantages.

Indiana hired a coach who ended up being an excellent bridge (Tom Allen), as he was able to build a roster (over a couple of graduation cycles) capable of physically and athletically competing with top B1G schools, even if they didn't appear to make a lot of progress in the standings. This was followed by a coach who was able to take it up a few notches (Cignetti) and win a title (and yes, NIL and the portal helped tremendously).

Nebraska hired not only a great coach with a track record (Hoiberg), he may have been the one person capable of succeeding at a high level in that environment.

Each school finding their current coach was basically lottery ticket odds. A coach with Cignetti's track record is exceptionally easy to find. One who at an advanced age could have a season where he is among the best in the game at the highest level is borderline impossible.

Hoiberg is a native of the general region (he was born and raised in Ames Iowa, which is another corn state), his grandfather once coached at Nebraska, and from what he knew of the school and its fans support, likely was one of very few who could see Nebraska as a placeholder where men's basketball could succeed and may have been the only one who also was a high level coach.

One thing I will state unequivocally about Indiana's men's basketball and Nebraska football, with the inherent fan support each of those programs have, they can return to past glory on a far easier path than many schools.

 

[Fishy]

Sure but why isn’t Nebraska football good? Why isn’t Indiana basketball good?

Incompetence.

 

[upstater]

Sure but why isn’t Nebraska football good? Why isn’t Indiana basketball good?

Nebraska lost their advantage since the roster limits. They could regain it. But the US has changed since 1990 so it’s not clear that there are as many farm boys willing to be player #140 on Nebraskas bench