Wow, Warde, shouldn't you be running Michigan's athletic department or something?
I agree that the ACC was vulnerable and couldn't afford to alienate FSU (and to a lesser extent Clemson) at the time. I'll add the point that it was "common knowledge" that FSU was tired of Tobacco Road calling all the shots. Still much of the rest of your post is creative writing. The fact that you seem to cite 'Ville's future natty as a basis for their choice is a sign that you are reaching just a bit in your analysis. Likewise, UConn football at the time was a hot up and coming program and had already been to a BCS bowl.
As you noted, the majority of the ACC preferred UConn. Those votes were turned, so you can't really say that it was a done deal for Louisville. Really just the opposite was true. I think UConn wrongly relied on that representation and felt it had a done deal thus it stated silent while Jurich pitched hard. Would it have made a difference? Who knows, but it was a tactical error not to be in the trenches. It left one voice our there, Tom Jurich's. Minimally, the optics were very bad.
Actually, that is creative writing (or more bluntly misquoting) on your part, as I clearly stated that it was their 2012 Final 4 appearance that was Louisville's most recent performance at the time of the decision - which still ranked above us, since we had just lost in the first round to Iowa State after an under-achieving year and then got hit with the APR ban a month later... and only 7 months prior to the vote. My point was that we did not even hold an advantage in men's basketball over Louisville at that time. We didn't. That is a fact. Not sure what is creative writing about that.
And as for football... yes, we had made our first BCS bowl game almost 2 years earlier... and what came out of that? An unfortunate confluence of events that did more to hurt our brand then help: Our coach who had built the program and led us to that BCS birth left us within hours of the end of the game, and their were stories circulating in a number of places including on ESPN about how poor our fan support was... supposedly many thousands of tickets from our school ticket allotment went unsold, and we got bashed in many well-publicized circles for it. And even though some of that has been explained over the years since then, AT THE TIME we were made to look like a school that lacked in real fan support for our football program.
It is interesting how you anti-Manuel guys never mention how those "very bad optics" produced by our own fans hurt the UConn football perception with the ACC at that crucial time more than anything Manuel did or didn't do. And for the record, we were in the process of finishing up our 2nd losing, non-bowl season in a row. So in fact, we were not considered "hot" or "up and coming" by November 2012. THAT is creative writing by you.
From still another article on why the ACC chose Louisville over us:
Football was the deciding factor because administrators feared the league's football powerhouse schools, Florida State and Clemson, might leave for another conference if they were unhappy with whatever school the ACC chose. Choosing Louisville simply meant better football within the conference.
The Cardinals won their first nine games this past season and will play in the Sugar Bowl on Jan. 2 before a large national TV audience. On the other hand, UConn is home for the holidays, having completed its second losing season in a row. It remains in the Big East, a conference in flux.
The obvious fact is: football had taken over the driver's seat well before November 2012. Florida State and Clemson wanted Louisville, and it had nothing to do with Jurich's pitching, or Manuel's lack of doing the same. Yes, as I said and you supported, the majority of the ACC would have preferred us... but they preferred keeping Florida State and Clemson a heck of a lot more than they cared about whether the choice would be us or Louisville.
Maybe this is easier for you to understand if you were to put yourself in Swofford's position, or someone else in an ACC school president's decision-making position at the time. How would have you casted your vote? For UConn, and then potentially watched your conference go down the drain by pushing Florida State and/or Clemson to one of your rival conferences? Sorry, but if you are honest, the answer is a no-brainer. You would have voted for Louisville. And it would have had nothing to do with Jurich.
By the way, as a UConn Alum and 30-year fan... I hate the way conference realignment has gone just as much as you or anyone else. But it does not lead me to make up false narratives about what happened just because I do not like Manuel, or anyone else.
And as for Jeff Hathaway - there is a reason why both Jim Calhoun and Geno Auriemma did not like him, whereas they both had much more respect for Warde Manuel. Hathaway was way over his skis as our Athletic Director - unfortunately totally the wrong man at the wrong time for our athletic department.
