I believe that academics has everything to do with athletic conference affiliation--at least with the B1G--and is the key to understanding their strategy and future plans.
I believe the B1G has made it clear, barring some strange and unlikely extraneous event (like ND and UT wanting in) that they a focused on two locations: NYC and DC. Why the full court press on the mid-Atlantic corridor? Because it's where the money and power is.
If it was about recruiting, they could target Texas or Florida or GTech. All better TV markets, too. But I don't think that's the strategy.
Most if not all of the research money comes directly from the centers of power--and those centers of power have generously bestowed big dollars on the Big Ten. The B1G graduates move to the power centers and feed the cycle.
However, with the demographic shift in the country, they need to expand the footprint and insure they have the clout in NYC and DC to keep the limited supply of research dollars flowing to the B1G--the consortium of the best research universities in the country. They want to imprint B1G into the sports zeitgeist of NYC and DC. They want the TV's in those local markets to be talking nightly about the local B1G teams.
That's part of the reason the push for Maryland, the deal with John Hopkins and the push into lacrosse--a hot and growing sport in the target market.
All things equal, I think the B1G wants UVa bad, bad, bad, and would prefer VTech or NC or both, to UConn. If UConn could somehow get UVa to the table, the entire deal closes.
The other conferences seem to be looking at TV money and TV money alone. B1G is thinking longer term--they did that (TV $) once, with Nebraska, and I think were headed down that road before they pulled up and reconsidered. Even if they get the money, it just gets recycled into the sports arms race--it doesn't help the university as a whole. And, frankly, a lot of the leadership figure football, at least as it's played now, is a dead man walking. For every coach coming into U Prez office asking for support, there's a physiology researcher or medical school brain coming in to say, "You've got to kill football. You're hurting these kids."
Research dollars, though, they go on and on and on--as long as you can be at the front of the line when they're dished out. B1G just wants the dollar-dishing power centers to think B1G first and it will help a lot if they plant flags in those power centers.
That is UConn's aspiration and ultimate hope. Geographically, almost ideal. Sports--great bb, the rest are projects. But that's okay with the B1G. For B1G sports fans, the Rutgers/Maryland additions were met with something ranging from indifference to overt despair and hostility. Both project schools, especially Rutgers. But they're great universities in the right locations--the sports will come along or not--it's only partially about TV--it's all about building a great research cartel. If the sports happens to entertain a few of us along the way, that's good, but it would be better if we ran the appropriations committee.
All of which is to say this: if UConn wants to be B1G, you may have great sports teams or totally sucky teams, but you will be a great and highly-respected university getting a healthy chunk of the total research spending in this country. And it's all, or mostly all, about academics.
