UConn's proposed 2015 BE Division | Page 3 | The Boneyard

UConn's proposed 2015 BE Division

Status
Not open for further replies.
huskymedic said:
http://www.bigeast.org/News/tabid/4...NS,-CHAMPIONSHIP-GAME,-STARTING-IN-2013-.aspx

CHICAGO – BIG EAST Conference Commissioner Mike Aresco, emphasizing his conference’s national scope, announced that East and West divisions of six teams each in football will begin play in the 2013 season, culminating in a new BIG EAST Championship Game.

“This new alignment gives the Conference and its fans the best of both worlds – national exposure that is a result of the BIG EAST being in six of the top 10 U.S. media markets – with a schedule that focuses on spirited regional rivalries,” said Aresco.

The BIG EAST Football Championship Game will be played between the East and West champions at the home field of one of the participating teams, not at a neutral site, promising an exciting fan experience.

“This unique combination of nationwide scope and regional flavor reflects our commitment to innovation in response to the changing landscape in college football,” Aresco said, “while honoring a tradition of success on the field and in the classroom.”

Aresco continued: “Combined with the extension through 2026 of our historic relationship with Madison Square Garden for the BIG EAST Basketball Championship, the new BIG EAST Football Championship Game will provide two signature events of national significance in college sports.”

The new divisions will be:

East Division
UCF
Cincinnati
Connecticut
Louisville
Rutgers
USF

West Division
Boise State
Houston
Memphis
San Diego State
SMU
Temple


Aresco noted that this alignment will likely be revisited after the 2014 season, when the U.S. Naval Academy and possibly other schools begin play in the BIG EAST.

In this new structure, each team will play eight Conference games per season, of which five will be against divisional rivals. The home and away opponents for each school will be announced after the BIG EAST athletic directors’ annual meeting in New York on Dec. 3.
Expand ...

ok this is great news
1-temple signed up knowing west and we get our east teams we want to be with.
2-the conf ship at a teams place is great. take the highest ranked team. thats good. imagine lville going to bsu or uh to uconn or w/e. great!
3- other schools A+++++ need west schools for 8-8. f bball stuff. uconn/lville/cincy/temple/memphis can hold a 16 team conf a float by themselves. usf/ucf/ruty/uh/smu are all building right now bball wise. we have seen news with all of them. sdsu is a good bball school. if we go 16 all sports they are quality, even bsu is building bball wise. navy wont play bball and we should get in also like navy. byu is a gem and unr will be good also. those are the 3 we need.
 
this is the kind of leadership this conference needs. Thank you Mike Aresco. Thanks for posting that link husky medic.

Here's a little history lesson from the UConn Task Force on the Upgrade to 1-A football published to the UConn community in October 1997 the week after the BOT approved the upgrade. If we are to continue to be aligned with schools that do not play 1-A football, in teh Big East, the leadership structure of the conference, has to have it's priorities right, and I'm convinced we finally have a leadership that does. THe final question in this piece from 1997, has finally been answered, by a leadership structure that has arrived at the conference alignment based on the principle in the first paragraph, that 1-A football conferences are the dominant voice in the NCAA. we may not like what it looks like, but all the programs that have left the Big East, and have joined - since 1997 - including us - have either joined, or left, based on leadership with different priorities.



"As the newly restructured governmental framework of the NCAA begins to operate, it is becoming more and more apparent that conferences will be the most significant entity in the regulation of intercollegiate athletics. It also becomes more evident each day that the dominant voices in this new structure will be those of the I-A conferences.

"The new structure is clearly established to give the I-A member institutions the ability to control and dictate the solutions of the major issues which affect intercollegiate athletics such as academic integrity, student-athlete eligibility, competitive standards, financial aid and the economic structure of television and post-season competition.

"In my opinion only institutions which are members of I-A conferences will be in a position to have a major voice in the future of intercollegiate athletics."

The Big East Conference recent Commissioner's Update explained that "the last five years have been at times tumultuous for the governance of The Big East Conference. Expansion was a painful issue for the Conference in 1994. And varying levels of Conference membership and NCAA play have created a complicated web of competing interests between members of The Big East and The Big East Football Conference. These disparate concerns have at times led to disputes over the continued structure of The Big East. Thankfully, with strong leadership and a universal vision, these disagreements have been settled. Today Big East basketball and football are full partners in our ever expanding success. Although our membership in now on common ground, we must continue to anticipate obstacles to our success as an all-sports Conference."

A restructuring of The Big East occurred as recently as 1994 with the addition of Rutgers and West Virginia (already members of The Big East Football Conference) and Notre Dame. While this action was taken to avoid the departure of the football institutions from The Big East, the potential for volatility persists. When viewed in light of the Kramer analysis, the Division I-A institutions may see little to be gained financially from continued association with the non-Division I-A institutions. Those schools not involved in I-A football are: Georgetown, Providence, St. John's, Seton Hall, Villanova and the University of Connecticut, the only nonsectarian school in the group. Where will UConn find the opportunity to affiliate with a conference composed of institutions of similar size and mission if not included in The Big East Conference as it is structured today?

http://advance.uconn.edu/1997/971027/fballqa.htm
 
MediaHandler.ashx
 
HuskyfanDan said:
3- other schools A+++++ need west schools for 8-8. f bball stuff. uconn/lville/cincy/temple/memphis can hold a 16 team conf a float by themselves. usf/ucf/ruty/uh/smu are all building right now bball wise. we have seen news with all of them. sdsu is a good bball school. if we go 16 all sports they are quality, even bsu is building bball wise. navy wont play bball and we should get in also like navy. byu is a gem and unr will be good also. those are the 3 we need.
Expand ...

No reason to break away from Georgetown, Villanova, SJU and Marquette. They are quality bball opponents, regional rivals (except MQ) and are very strong in the Olympic sports.
 
uconNYC said:
No reason to break away from Georgetown, Villanova, SJU and Marquette. They are quality bball opponents, regional rivals (except MQ) and are very strong in the Olympic sports.
Expand ...


I agree. In the late 1990s, through the 2000s, there was plenty of reason to break away from them. Not now. It is - and always has been - about the leadership from the top down in this conference.
 
.-.
And despite the fun of how miserable the realignment will be after 14

Aresco noted that this alignment will likely be revisited after the 2014 season, when the U.S. Naval Academy and possibly other schools begin play in the BIG EAST.
 
businesslawyer said:
This. They are choosing how they break the league up based on what gets us better TV deals. No one gives a rats ass if people on the Boneyard understand why this works better for the networks.
Expand ...

Why is it better for the Networks? What I see is a guarantee that ever single game will be irrelevant on both sides. UConn gets on good league opponent in UL and bunch we don't want to see. But it's essentially the same for every school. SDSU would turn out for Boise and so naturally they don't get those schools. It's moronic. Every school gets the other schools they would least like to play. It's designed to kill enthusiasm across the league.
 
ZooCougar said:
Screw Memphis. Why did we let that dreck in?
Expand ...

Fred Smith has been wanting and willing to bankroll Memphis St. to play big boy football for a long time and has just been waiting for an invite.....and that they also have a decent basketball program............. are probably the two biggest reasons.
 
Carl Spackler said:
Fred Smith has been wanting and willing to bankroll Memphis St. to play big boy football for a long time and has just been waiting for an invite.....and that they also have a decent basketball program............. are probably the two biggest reasons.
Expand ...

That Fred Smith line has been around forever.

You can safely dismiss that idea. Memphis is a high school with ashtrays. It's not remotely the most followed school in the state. It's the third or fourth most popular school in the city behind Tennessee, Ole Miss, and Arkansas.
 
.-.
So is the zipper alignment consigned to the trash-bin of bad ideas?
 
ZooCougar said:
That Fred Smith line has been around forever.

You can safely dismiss that idea. Memphis is a high school with ashtrays. It's not remotely the most followed school in the state. It's the third or fourth most popular school in the city behind Tennessee, Ole Miss, and Arkansas.
Expand ...

I know you're overseas right? Well, don't be surprised when you come back, if FedEx seems to have replaced other advertisers, on all the billboards, scoreboards, and handouts at Big East football and basketball games.
 
Carl Spackler said:
I know you're overseas right? Well, don't be surprised when you come back, if FedEx seems to have replaced other advertisers, on all the billboards, scoreboards, and handouts at Big East football and basketball games.
Expand ...

I return in January.

Outlook on your hypothesis is doubtful to not a chance in hell. Fred Smith and FedEx don't need the Big East to market their product. That's just plain ridiculous, that's like ESPN advertising on local access cable.
 
So, unless the teams are reshuffled, UConn's Big East Schedule for 2013 will be:

Home: Louisville, Rutgers, USF, 1 Western Division Team
Away: Cincinnati, UCF, 2 Western Division Teams

We will know on December 3rd who those Western Division schools are. ( If we're playing SDSU on the road, I'll plan on taking vacation time to spend with sister & Brother-in-law living in S.D. to take in the game.)
 
Thank god we're going geographical divisions instead of some other format. In fact I thought the league pretty much settled on geographic divisions a few weeks ago which was why I was puzzled by yesterday's news that has since been quashed.

I like UConNYC's alignment. Maybe we can go to 16 by taking both BYU + Air Force, moving Navy back east, then adding one more out west (UNR for dan, or someone else)? But then the pie becomes smaller.
 
.-.
ZooCougar said:
I return in January.

Outlook on your hypothesis is doubtful to not a chance in hell. Fred Smith and FedEx don't need the Big East to market their product. That's just plain ridiculous, that's like ESPN advertising on local access cable.
Expand ...

When did I say that FedEx needs the Big East? it's the other way around. You asked why Memphis was allowed in.
 
Carl Spackler said:
When did I say that FedEx needs the Big East? it's the other way around. You asked why Memphis was allowed in.
Expand ...

Carl,

The Big East could make good use of Fed Ex. UConn could also use an invite to the Big 10, and I could use 500 million bucks.
 
When the column starts:
By Brett McMurphy | ESPN.com

I immediately discount. That guy is on some kind of mission to throw Monkey Bones into every discussion. And, that my friends, sends various people in our (self-described) fickle fanbase into a tizzy.

We are going to get a decent contract for our sports content. And, I really don't think 12 to 14 (considering what we are looking at) ... nor 14 to 16 dilutes OUR (UConn) share. We are going to be north of $10m ... and not too close to the ACC $17m. It allows us to fight another decade & raise our credibility (as long as we don't let PP kill the Program in the next 15 months). It simply makes too much sense for us to be in a 7/8 divisional configuration with Cincy/UL, East/Mid-Atlantic and the 2 Florida schools.

We are not going to see the Zipper. We are not going to California more than once a year.

As for the other item on the Wish list, they are not going to let us trashcan Providence College nor Seton Hall in my lifetime.
 
Carl Spackler said:
When did I say that FedEx needs the Big East? it's the other way around. You asked why Memphis was allowed in.
Expand ...

You don't date, let alone marry, a tawdry crack-whore, just because she has a rich brother. There were several much better choices out there than Memphis, starting with Nevada.
 
Memphis is basketball. And ... they are going to be really good hoop for most of the next half-dozen years under Pastner. Solid solid talent & maybe the kid can create a solid identity. But certainly a Thursday/Friday entrant at MSG.

Tennessee, as we have seen with the SEC entrants, is not a dominant Football state in the south. Having said that, there is NO structural reason why Memphis can't become competitive ... with the right Coach building a competitive Program. We have seen too much of this with the BE & Temple.

I have no good answer to the question why they were invited. Basketball.
 
.-.
Not a lot of talk about Red/Blue outside of the ESPN snippet:

"League officials already have discussed how to split the divisions when the Big East grows to 14 teams. Sources said the most popular 14-team model would then be Red and Blue divisions that are nongeographic.
The proposed Red Division in 2015 would consist of Louisville, UConn, Memphis, Navy, San Diego State, USF and SMU, while the Blue Division would consist of Boise State, Cincinnati, UCF, Houston, Rutgers, Temple and the 14th team."

"Each team would play six games within its division and two games against the other division, including one permanent cross-division game. The annual cross-division games would be Cincinnati-Louisville, UConn-Rutgers, Boise State-San Diego State, Houston-SMU, Navy-Temple, UCF-USF and Memphis versus the 14th team."

"Those division lineups could be tweaked to appease the Big East's future TV partners and increase the worth of the media rights deal"

Maybe that's what ESPN wanted and didn't get? From all I read today, it seems pretty clear that post 2014 divsional alignement is in the air and not written in stone.
 
Their invite was an inside job. They hired Tranghese to "consult" for them, and he sold them to the hoop schools.

We're now saddled with an absolute skank, probably forever. Memphis will be herpes for the Big East.
 
Pudge - " the right Coach building a competitive Program" thing is what's stuck in my craw now. The Big East will have a bit more money and maybe okay to decent exposure in the next contract. But the ACC and the big conferences are going to blow the doors off when it comes to spending. Over the short term I could see more successes akin to Cincinnati, but over the long term I just don't see how NNBE schools will be able to retain top coaching talent. For pete's sake Cinci couldn't hang on to their previous two successful coaches. Less money for coaching, less money for recruiting means less competitive Programs. Sorry, that's what I'm seeing out of this. #ClapHarder won't cut it.
 
my original response to the memphis question was two parts: #1 Fred Smith and his willingness to dump the money into the football program to compete at the level he wants - which is already happening to a major extent, and #2 Memphis basketball.

While it's not explicit in the contractual agreement, it's entirely expected of Memphis State, that they pursue FedEx for sponsorship of Big EAst athletic events, AND pursue that the renovated liberty bowl become a contractual arranged bowl destination for Big East programs.
 
uconNYC said:
No reason to break away from Georgetown, Villanova, SJU and Marquette. They are quality bball opponents, regional rivals (except MQ) and are very strong in the Olympic sports.
Expand ...

thats fine if u want to play them in bball. get there cell phone numbers and plan a play date in december.
 
ZooCougar said:
Their invite was an inside job. They hired Tranghese to "consult" for them, and he sold them to the hoop schools.

We're now saddled with an absolute skank, probably forever. Memphis will be herpes for the Big East.
Expand ...


True, they did hire good old Mike in I think 2008 or something to be a consultant on moving out of conference USA. Memphis had been trying to get into the Big East since 2003. Memphis leadership was pissed off when Louisville, USF, Cincy, Marquette and Depaul were invited - and to this day - the invite of Marquette and Depaul - irks me. Those are two schools that sit quietly in the corner and must be extremely thankful for whatever they get off the money table.

Mike Tranghese cost Memphis something like $25k in consulting fees to tell them that they needed better athletic facilities on campus, and gave them his standard line about Big East football. "They had to win more." Good lord Mike Tranghese would be in for trouble in the same room with me.

No Mike, they didn't have to win more football games, to get invited, they just had to wait for your league to crumble to the ground on your leadership.
 
.-.
Status
Not open for further replies.

Forum statistics

Threads
168,336
Messages
4,565,331
Members
10,465
Latest member
agiglax


Top Bottom