Manuel feels UConn in middle ground financially with power conferences (K. Duffy)

[ZooCougar]

Somewhat agree. I no longer blame him for Louisville taking the ACC spot over us, but I don't like that he tries to sell us (the fans) like we are in some great conference that we should be proud of. I did not see UCF/George O'leary say peep about how great the conference was when they were accepting their Orange Bowl trophy. They didn't say a damn peep about The American with Mike Aresco standing right there on stage. That to me was very telling. No one associated with UConn should even utter the conference name when discussing UConn's future. Be conference neutral when talking about our future, please.

The AAC exists to fill our schedule and provide crappy bowl tie ins. Not much else.

 

[noeynox]

The AAC exists to fill our schedule and provide crappy bowl tie ins. Not much else.

That's how I feel as well, though that game at Memphis the other night was a fun game to watch.

 

[zls44]

My big problem with Manuel was that he forced Ollie to lose out in the Brandon Austin recruitment.

Now I have nothing bad to say about the guy.

I meant Walter Harrison.

 

[ZooCougar]

That's how I feel as well, though that game at Memphis the other night was a fun game to watch.

Might be the only new member that has a home venue worth playing at.

 

[huskymedic]

The AAC exists to fill our schedule and provide crappy bowl tie ins. Not much else.

They also exist to pay us our percentage of exit fee money/NCAA Tourney credits

 

[ZooCougar]

UConn
UCF
Cincy
NIU
USF
Boise
SDSU
BYU
CSU


Would love to see the revenue figures of those schools. That conference wouldn't be too shabby in theory.

 

[noeynox]

UConn
UCF
Cincy
NIU
USF
Boise
SDSU
BYU
CSU


Would love to see the revenue figures of those schools. That conference wouldn't be too shabby in theory.

I'd swap out NIU with either Temple or Navy or even Ohio, if you could get a traditional MAC school. In the west maybe add Wyoming. They paid decent coin to get the North Dakota State coach.

 

[ZooCougar]

They also exist to pay us our percentage of exit fee money/NCAA Tourney credits

That will run out.

 

[Hoophound]

UConn UCF Cincy NIU USF Boise SDSU BYU CSU Would love to see the revenue figures of those schools. That conference wouldn't be too shabby in theory.

I'd be curious who would be in a real best of the rest conference. Borderline schools would be Temple, Fresno, UNLV, Nevada, New Mexico, Colorado St, Tulsa, N. Illinois, East Carolina, SMU and Houston.

Shoe-ins would be UConn, Cincy, BYU, Boise, UCF, USF, Navy and SDSU.

I'd go with:

UConn
Cincy
Temple
UCF
USF
Navy

Boise
Houston
UNLV (as I understand it, UNLV has more potential than Nevada, I'm indifferent)
Fresno
Colorado St
SDSU

 

[tzznandrew]

When we had SDSU and Boise, I thought it made sense to add other flagship schools out west.

East

UConn
Temple
Cincy
USF
UCF
Navy
Memphis

Boise
Houston
SMU
New Mexico
Nevada
UNLV
SDSU

That conference is not terrible in basketball east or west (UConn-Cincy-Temple-Memphis vs. New Mexico-UNLV-SDSU), and can play some football.

Would have been a good call, given our scenario...but oh well, we have what we have.

 

[HuskyHawk]

When we had SDSU and Boise, I thought it made sense to add other flagship schools out west.

East

UConn
Temple
Cincy
USF
UCF
Navy
Memphis

Boise
Houston
SMU
New Mexico
Nevada
UNLV
SDSU

That conference is not terrible in basketball east or west (UConn-Cincy-Temple-Memphis vs. New Mexico-UNLV-SDSU), and can play some football.

Would have been a good call, given our scenario...but oh well, we have what we have.

What is the fascination with Navy? East Carolina would be better from a football perspective, and Navy basketball is awful. And no, it doesn't bring in any TV money except for one game a year.

Depending on what the P5 does, and what the NCAA allows, it is possible that there is a furtehr restructuring. If half the AAC and half the MWC want to accept the full cost of attendance for scholarships, and the other half does not, it isn't out of the question. 14 is too many though. It would more likely be 12.

 

[Hoophound]

What is the fascination with Navy? East Carolina would be better from a football perspective, and Navy basketball is awful. And no, it doesn't bring in any TV money except for one game a year. Depending on what the P5 does, and what the NCAA allows, it is possible that there is a furtehr restructuring. If half the AAC and half the MWC want to accept the full cost of attendance for scholarships, and the other half does not, it isn't out of the question. 14 is too many though. It would more likely be 12.

The fascination with Navy is viewership and as a result more money. Navy has far greater national appeal than ECU.

 

[tzznandrew]

What is the fascination with Navy? East Carolina would be better from a football perspective, and Navy basketball is awful. And no, it doesn't bring in any TV money except for one game a year.

Depending on what the P5 does, and what the NCAA allows, it is possible that there is a furtehr restructuring. If half the AAC and half the MWC want to accept the full cost of attendance for scholarships, and the other half does not, it isn't out of the question. 14 is too many though. It would more likely be 12.

Eh. I don't care about Navy or East Carolina. I was just looking at the group above and brought Navy over since, for UConn at least, it adds a drivable (ish) game. But sure, replace Navy with ECU for all I care about. Or add them both and go to 16.

In this scenario, I'm perfectly fine with 14 to 16. Get some flagship publics out west like Wyoming (you could even sell me on Colorado State), or a school like Air Force. Then, you compartmentalize the divisions to minimize travel. 7 or 8 is fine per division because it leaves you with 12-14 Home and Home games, and then you have UConn/Memphis/Cincy play schools like UNLV/New Mexico/SDSU on a yearly basis to keep their RPI up and to make it more appealing for TV.

Cincy
UConn
ECU
Navy
Memphis
Temple
UCF
USF

Boise
Colorado State
Houston
New Mexico
Nevada
SDSU
SMU
UNLV

Each team in division plays each other twice, and 2 H/2 A games against teams from other division for 18 league games. You can't tell me that, minus Louisville next year, guaranteeing two games against Memphis, Temple, and Cincy, in addition to a game a year against perennial good teams UNLV, SDSU, and New Mexico (plus a team like Boise/Colorado State/SMU who are periodically good) wouldn't be preferable to what we have.

 

[Dooley]

I'm going to guess that more than half of the AAC is not on the same page as UCONN (full cost of attendance, paying stipends, etc). In fact, the only non-P5 schools that I would think, although I have no idea, are on the same page (or at least part of the page) are BYU, UCF, Cincinnati and possibly USF. I don't think Boise is willing to go all-in for all sports although I do think they would just for football. Ditto for SDSU, Fresno St, and maybe Houston. I have no read whatsoever on Colorado State but if they decided they wanted to play, they have the enrollment and alumni base to warrant it. BYU is interesting because I do not honestly know if there is a potential religious impact/barrier but judging simply from national brand recognition and revenue alone, they are a no-brainer in terms of ability to create the revenue to support such a move.

At the end of the day, I think UCONN will be fine. UCONN has the resources, the brand, the revenue stream, and backing of the State legislature. UCONN operated just fine in the old Big East and has even added to its athletic budget with the addition of hockey despite being stuck in the AAC. If a split were to occur, I would guess UCONN would be added. It wants to play by the same rules as the other "big" schools that can generate the kind of revenue that UCONN can.

 

[ZooCougar]

Ugh

I'd be curious who would be in a real best of the rest conference. Borderline schools would be Temple, Fresno, UNLV, Nevada, New Mexico, Colorado St, Tulsa, N. Illinois, East Carolina, SMU and Houston.

Shoe-ins would be UConn, Cincy, BYU, Boise, UCF, USF, Navy and SDSU.

I'd go with:

UConn
Cincy
Temple
UCF
USF
Navy

Boise
Houston
UNLV (as I understand it, UNLV has more potential than Nevada, I'm indifferent)
Fresno
Colorado St
SDSU

Nevada doesn't have the revenue. They have had a strong team in the past, but we need programs with strong performance and revenue. In this case revenue and the ability to play by P5 standards trumps performance.

We definitely need another stronger western school with cash to balance the construct out. Maybe that's Memphis or Houston. Memphis has decent revenue.

I like ECU over Temple. Temple has money issues. ECU is like another Cincy, they will be another thorn in our sides and will become one of our few appealing football opponents in conference along with Cincy, UCF, Houston and a couple of others.

The problem I have with the AAC is that it just another lame attempt to regenerate Big East football. In doing that we lowered standards and we have Tulsa and Tulane.

I think we need a new idea, a national conference with an East and West with the very best from the MWC and AAC. That will be a tough conference that will have TV appeal across many Time Zones. It would be hard to not improve on the current deal.

 

[Dooley]

Honest question (I'm not being snarky): wasn't the concept of a national concept spread across all time zones essentially shot down? SDSU and Boise both backed out the arrangement and BYU was not interested from the beginning. I would agree that the national concept got me the most excited while UCONN sat in AAC purgatory. My ideal purgatory conference would have been:

UCONN
Temple
Cincinnati
Memphis
UCF
USF
Navy

Houston
SMU
SDSU
Boise
BYU
Colorado St
Fresno St

That would give a 2-division 14 school conference with as best of a mix of football, basketball, TV markets and national appeal as possible. Because it's a purgatory conference, there's no need to get to 16 as some of these schools would bolt for a better conference as soon as the phone rang. If/When a school leaves for another conference, the larger conference concept can be re-shuffled to cut back on travel.

Football would play all division members annually (alternating home/away) and 2 cross-conference mates (1 home and 1 away) per year, allowing for 3 out of conference games. Basketball would play all division members twice (home and away) and each cross-conference mate once (alternating home/away) pr year. Non revenue sports would play all division members twice (home and away) and vary the cross-conference games depending on sport/schedule/budget.

Just typing this out makes me hope that Susan has Jim Delany on her cell phone plan's Friends and Family network.

 

[itgoeslike]

Honest question (I'm not being snarky): wasn't the concept of a national concept spread across all time zones essentially shot down? SDSU and Boise both backed out the arrangement and BYU was not interested from the beginning.

If you remember, in advance of renegotiating the BE contract, ESPN sweetened the BYU deal and proposed a BSU centric deal for the MWC. SDSU really didn't have too many options. We'll see what happens in the future. I will say this, adding the above 3 teams would help both the football and basketball RPI. Maybe New Mexico fits into this model.

 

[ZooCougar]

Honest question (I'm not being snarky): wasn't the concept of a national concept spread across all time zones essentially shot down? SDSU and Boise both backed out the arrangement and BYU was not interested from the beginning. I would agree that the national concept got me the most excited while UCONN sat in AAC purgatory. My ideal purgatory conference would have been:

UCONN
Temple
Cincinnati
Memphis
UCF
USF
Navy

Houston
SMU
SDSU
Boise
BYU
Colorado St
Fresno St

That would give a 2-division 14 school conference with as best of a mix of football, basketball, TV markets and national appeal as possible. Because it's a purgatory conference, there's no need to get to 16 as some of these schools would bolt for a better conference as soon as the phone rang. If/When a school leaves for another conference, the larger conference concept can be re-shuffled to cut back on travel.

Football would play all division members annually (alternating home/away) and 2 cross-conference mates (1 home and 1 away) per year, allowing for 3 out of conference games. Basketball would play all division members twice (home and away) and each cross-conference mate once (alternating home/away) pr year. Non revenue sports would play all division members twice (home and away) and vary the cross-conference games depending on sport/schedule/budget.

Just typing this out makes me hope that Susan has Jim Delany on her cell phone plan's Friends and Family network.

It was shot down. But due to recent developments it may need to be revisited.

If you want a conference full of like minded schools with enough resources to spend to keep pace with the power 5 then you will have to pull from around the entire country in order to get enough schools to have a viable conference. You need 8-10 teams at least.

 

[SixRings]

Honest question (I'm not being snarky): wasn't the concept of a national concept spread across all time zones essentially shot down? SDSU and Boise both backed out the arrangement and BYU was not interested from the beginning. I would agree that the national concept got me the most excited while UCONN sat in AAC purgatory. My ideal purgatory conference would have been:

If I recall something similar was discussed and as zoo said it was shot down. I always liked the idea. It seemed to be the best of all the others and added up to a very strong league. Sort of addition by subtraction. But that league would be nobody's biatch.
Travel is a problem for BB in your model though. Although you alternate yearly you still have 3 or 4 trips across country each year on top of the in-conference travel that would be, by all standards, a lot itself.

 

[huskypantz]

That will run out.

Hopefully after we run out of the AAC.

 

[Dooley]

Thanks guys. Either way, I hope this latest talk of P5 splits or stipends expedites UCONN's escape from this conference.

 

[upstater]

The only possibility I see is UConn talking to BYU and a few other likeminded schools about making commitments to play one another as Independents. BYU parked its basketball in WCC and maybe UConn could do the same with the A-10 but I doubt it. It would be mindbogglingly difficult to arrange these schedules, but the money from going it alone might make it worth it to hire someone who is solely in charge of scheduling.

I'm sure there are several schools in UConn's boat, schools that heel they have enough market pull to command 5x-10x what they are currently making from their conference. If these schools could commit to scheduling one another without sharing their rights, it could be beneficial for all of them.

 

[CAHUSKY]

Ugh


Nevada doesn't have the revenue. They have had a strong team in the past, but we need programs with strong performance and revenue. In this case revenue and the ability to play by P5 standards trumps performance.

Yeah, but they do have an Athletic Director who is a UCONN alum and im a season ticket holder so I think we should include them.

 

[ZooCougar]

The only possibility I see is UConn talking to BYU and a few other likeminded schools about making commitments to play one another as Independents. BYU parked its basketball in WCC and maybe UConn could do the same with the A-10 but I doubt it. It would be mindbogglingly difficult to arrange these schedules, but the money from going it alone might make it worth it to hire someone who is solely in charge of scheduling.

I'm sure there are several schools in UConn's boat, schools that heel they have enough market pull to command 5x-10x what they are currently making from their conference. If these schools could commit to scheduling one another without sharing their rights, it could be beneficial for all of them.

That's basically what the Eastern Independents used to do.

 

[bobbyinaz]

That's basically what the Eastern Independents used to do.

Not easy to do now.

B1G has gone to a 9 game conference schedule. Big 12 with 10 teams in the conference plays 9 conference games. SEC, with the start of the SEC Network, will wind up going from 8 to 9 games because they will want the inventory.

The problem with this approach is finding games once the conference games start for the P5 and even more difficult to find games played at the Rent.

You would need to get at least 6-8 schools to agree to a scheduling alliance to make this work. Maybe UConn, Cinn, BYU, Boise, UCF, USF, ECU & San Diego St. This would guarantee you 7 games. Still need to find 5 games plus need to create some bowl tie-ins

 

[upstater]

Not easy to do now.

B1G has gone to a 9 game conference schedule. Big 12 with 10 teams in the conference plays 9 conference games. SEC, with the start of the SEC Network, will wind up going from 8 to 9 games because they will want the inventory.

The problem with this approach is finding games once the conference games start for the P5 and even more difficult to find games played at the Rent.

You would need to get at least 6-8 schools to agree to a scheduling alliance to make this work. Maybe UConn, Cinn, BYU, Boise, UCF, USF, ECU & San Diego St. This would guarantee you 7 games. Still need to find 5 games plus need to create some bowl tie-ins

That why he mentioned the Eatsern independents. They were committed to one another and played each other each and every year. Yes, of course you need 9 teams to do it. You need 8 games.

 

[Husky25]

Not easy to do now.

B1G has gone to a 9 game conference schedule. Big 12 with 10 teams in the conference plays 9 conference games. SEC, with the start of the SEC Network, will wind up going from 8 to 9 games because they will want the inventory.

The problem with this approach is finding games once the conference games start for the P5 and even more difficult to find games played at the Rent.

You would need to get at least 6-8 schools to agree to a scheduling alliance to make this work. Maybe UConn, Cinn, BYU, Boise, UCF, USF, ECU & San Diego St. This would guarantee you 7 games. Still need to find 5 games plus need to create some bowl tie-ins

A conference by any other name is still a conference.

 

[upstater]

A conference by any other name is still a conference.

Well, you don't have championships. You don't have championship games. You don't have automatic births to the NCAA tourney. You don't have any conference officials or conference HQs. You don't have conference TV rights, conference logos, etc.

 

[Hoophound]

Lol. If we could get $10,000,000 from SNY etc. we could pay other schools to play us and make way more money than we get in the AAC. Seriously, if we manage our own media rights we can pay for games if we have to.

 

[Dooley]

Lol. If we could get $10,000,000 from SNY etc. we could pay other schools to play us and make way more money than we get in the AAC. Seriously, if we manage our own media rights we can pay for games if we have to.

I joked about a HUSKY TV Network a few weeks ago but then got to thinking seriously about it. If UCONN ever did break away from the AAC and owned all of their TV rights, it could sell all content to SNY for a better payday than what we currently get from the AAC. SNY would likely jump at the chance for something like this since showing re-runs of Mike Piazza and Dwight Gooden can only carry you so far.