So everyone who still thinks basketball matters...

[freescooter]

raise your hand...

 

[Excalibur]

It mattered when the ACC added Pitt and Syracuse.

 

[The Funster]

It matters to the ACC. I'd be interested to see how much college hoops would benefit, long and short term, if the NBA loses the season.

 

[BBNBE]

When ESPN starts talking money, it doesnt matter and will not matter.

Look at the SEC, great football not great hoops. They have one of the better ESPN deals.

If you say it 100 times, doesnt mean its true.

 

[Heston]

It mattered when the ACC added Pitt and Syracuse.

It did? That was all football and the football contract. All things being equal, that took basketball into account, but those schools were selected to get more TV money and the vast majority of TV money is football.

 

[Excalibur]

It did? That was all football and the football contract. All things being equal, that took basketball into account, but those schools were selected to get more TV money and the vast majority of TV money is football.

ESPN to ACC: "Add two schools and we'll increase your contract by $x".

ACC: "OK, we're adding two basketball schools".

I said it mattered. I didn't say it was the driving force. So you admitted in your own post that I was right.

 

[Vuce]

And the point of this post is what? That Uconn, a HUGE basketball school, should drop the sport or the fans should not watch or care? Not going to happen.

 

[upstater]

It did? That was all football and the football contract. All things being equal, that took basketball into account, but those schools were selected to get more TV money and the vast majority of TV money is football.

Basketball is a BIG PART of the ACC's calculus, as it should be.

If the ACC adds UConn and ND, it's game over for the rest of the country in terms of corralling the best talent. The best players will head to the ACC. Game over. It will be prime time all the time.

If basketball is only a 20% consideration right now, it will be that much more for the ACC. Interest will double.

Have you guys seen the ratings for BE basketball games? They are a lot higher than ratings for BE football games.

 

[junglehusky]

It matters more to some ACC schools than to others. The question is how Swofford and the ACC offices see their role in balancing bball vs. football (i.e., FSU) and what the political dynamics of ACC presidents / AD's are like.

 

[ZooCougar]

Basketball doesn't matter to the SEC. It does matter to the Big East and the ACC because they suck at football, and have the best basketball conferences in the land.

That being said. Having a good basketball conference will only get you so far.

 

[businesslawyer]

Football drives the bus, but of course basketball matters. If it didn't, we'd be buried already. While the worst could still happen, we're a long way from that today.

 

[UConnRock]

None of these "football" schools would complain if the ACC ended up being the conference with 8 or 9 teams in the NCAA tourney with all the money associated with that. Last year the BE got approximately $20 million from the NCAA with their payment system for tourney participation. Add to that the ESPN money associated with their conference tourney in Madison Square Garden every other year and it isn't chump change. Then add the regular season contracts with ESPN/CBS and it starts looking better.

Regular season games and a tourney with UConn, Pitt, Duke, UNC. 'Cuse would be huge. It isn't football money but it is money.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

I agree that football is all powerful and basketball and markets are irrelevant. Evidence of this is that Oklahoma had their pick of conferences to jump to. Oh wait, everyone turned them down despite being one of the top 5 programs of all time. Well, Florida State had an easy time switching to the SEC...actually, that didn't happen either and now FSU's AD gives interviews bitching about getting blackballed.

Let's look at the 5 of the last 7 confirmed conference movers: Texas A&M, Colorado, Utah, Syracuse and Pitt. All football powerhouses. Well, maybe not. Actually Utah was pretty good but is struggling mightily in the Pac 12, Pitt and Texas A&M are OK and Syracuse and Colorado have kind of sucked in recent years. The interest in Missouri is entirely because of KC and St. Louis, and TCU is being counted on to carry Dallas.

Other than Nebraska, I can not find a single example of a program switching leagues where football was the driving factor.

 

[zls44]

So, Nelson, you're saying it's driven almost entirely by markets and success on the field has little to do with it. So, clearly, you think UConn is screwed, unless a few million people suddenly move into the Hartford/New Haven market.

 

[freescooter]

It matters so much that three also rans are leaving for new secure homes while the best program in the country over the last 15 years is left hanging on for dear life...And last year, when it looked like the B-12 would implode, one of the sport's blue bloods looked like it would be left by the wayside...I don't advocate dropping basketball but it is important to relaize that it is only marginally more valuable than soccer in the current environment.

 

[ZooCougar]

Nelsonmuntz,

Surely you don't think that FSU and Oklahoma were "rejected" because they don't have top basketball programs.

If that's not the stupidest argument ever then I don't what is.

What's the common element among the latest conference movers? Some have very good basketball teams, but they are unthreatening football powers. They are uncontroversial and don't threaten the status quo all that much.

If anything the PAC-12 membership didn't want thr four package deal, because they didn't want LHN and they knew that most of the schools in their conference would have been instantly outclassed.

FSU blackballed by the SEC? No shocker there really. Who do you think blackballed them?

 

[ZooCougar]

It matters so much that three also rans are leaving for new secure homes while the best program in the country over the last 15 years is left hanging on for dear life...And last year, when it looked like the B-12 would implode, one of the sport's blue bloods looked like it would be left by the wayside...I don't advocate dropping basketball but it is important to relaize that it is only marginally more valuable than soccer in the current environment.

It's pretty much the only bargaining chip we have to play. We win NCAA credits every year in the tournament, but the ACC isn't suffering from a lack of those.

 

[brasssbonanzaa]

It matters in that if it weren't for the brand of our basketball programs, we'd essentially be in the same position as USF, praying for teams like UCF and SMU to save the future of our athletic program with no other options available.

 

[brasssbonanzaa]

It matters so much that three also rans are leaving for new secure homes while the best program in the country over the last 15 years is left hanging on for dear life...And last year, when it looked like the B-12 would implode, one of the sport's blue bloods looked like it would be left by the wayside...I don't advocate dropping basketball but it is important to relaize that it is only marginally more valuable than soccer in the current environment.

Did you just call Pitt, Cuse, and WVU also-ran basketball programs?

 

[Vuce]

Uhhhh everyone knows that football is ruining rivalries and any semblance of regional sanity. It has been that way for a few years. It is driving the bus. So what is your point? Basketball matters A LOT to Uconn and its fans. Period.

 

[Drumguy]

Did you just call Pitt, Cuse, and WVU also-ran basketball programs?

And the sum total of their last 15 years together postseason games and national championships is 1? Sure they're better than most of the ACC brethren but we are the #1-3 best men's program for the last 12 years and the #1 women's programs. So yes brass ones, they are also rans compared to UConn. Not getting in a cat fight here but he's comparing them to UConn.

And their record compared to ours in the Olympic sports? We have one of the most if not the most successful across the board set of teams in the country.

 

[Druken Friar]

In all the places where it's too cold to do anything outside but ski and skate in the winter, basketball is huge. I don't know the TV facts and figures but I think some here vastly underestimate it's worth. After football it's clearly the number 2 revenue producer. In some conferences, it is the number 1 revenue producer. I read somewhere that Louisville makes more money on basketball than most of the top football programs.

 

[HuskyHawk]

Basketball matters. It probably matters more than it is given credit for. The weak link for basketball is that the tournament revenue is shared widely. But the conference games and tournaments have a lot of value and provide a lot of content. It takes a back seat to football, but there's a reason the Pac 10 has a better deal than the SEC, and it isn't football.

ESPN, Fox or NBC are all looking at the total content. Content is driving the bus right now, with Netflix, Amazon etc. Controlling the content is critical. College basketball provides more content than football, with each game less valuable. UConn is to basketball what Alabama is to football. We matter, we turn on TVs. We also have probably the only women's team that turns on TVs (maybe Tenn.). This is why I have no doubt whatsoever that we'll end up in the ACC or B1G. Add UConn to the B1G and Purdue sells out their women's games. Plus recruiting would improve for all those schools.

 

[Mr. Wonderful]

Unfortunately for the sport, as long as the NCAA negotiates the contract for television rights for the NCAA Tournament, and then keeps the lion share for itself, college basketball will always be a distant 2nd to college football in university revenue.

 

[businesslawyer]

In all the places where it's too cold to do anything outside but ski and skate in the winter, basketball is huge. I don't know the TV facts and figures but I think some here vastly underestimate it's worth. After football it's clearly the number 2 revenue producer. In some conferences, it is the number 1 revenue producer. I read somewhere that Louisville makes more money on basketball than most of the top football programs.

That is a good post because it raises a number of issues we really haven't discussed yet.

1. While basketball games get lower ratings than football games, and are therefore worth less money, the things that drive the increase in football revenues (that the event is watched live without editing of commercials) will also start driving basketball revenues. College basketball rights increases will start to go up, especially as one large conference can provide five weeknights and two weekend days of programming.

2. Because there are more conferences in college hoops, there are more properties to bid on, and more regionalization, and that drives prices down. If anyone thinks that the bigger conferences aren't going to try to remedy that, I don't know what to say. That, as well as seven days of inventory, will drive conferneces to expand to 16 in a few years, even if they don't now.

3. But here is the #1 unmentioned reason why college hoops is being so ignored as compared to college football -- because the value of the football product is overwhelmingly in the regular season, with revenues controlled by the conferences, while the value of the basketball product is overwhelmingly in the postseason, with the revenues controlled by the NCAA.

Football would not be so overwhelmingly driving the bus if we either (i) eliminated the NCAA tourney, and had a BCS type system where you had to win your conference to go to the dance, or (ii) we had a playoff in football with broad participation and the NCAA running it. Said overwhelmingly, it is not that basketball doesn't matter -- it's that the NCAA, and not the conferences, control its value.

PS -- And here I thought I was being brilliant, while two other posters made the same point simultaneously. Well, I'll settle for being correct.