Who Will Be the 12th Big East Team? | Page 3 | The Boneyard

Who Will Be the 12th Big East Team?

freescooter said:
The Big East would be better off dropping a couple of schools rather than adding. DePaul has done nothing but take money since it joined. Butler really doesn’t fit. Seton Hall was a power... for about 3 years in the 1980s. Same with Georgetown though they were relevant for longer. But have essentially decided to be the Catholic Ivy. They don’t care if they win or lose as long as their faculty gets tapped for White House jobs But they couldn’t be dumped due to the fact that they bring the academic prestige every league requires. With a league of second tier commuter academic institutions saving Gtown and UConn they are needed as the league’ s Vanderbilt.
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so much hate for the 3rd best basketball conference in the country since it's founding. love that it drives you so crazy.
 
Dooooooomed said:
P5 contraction is coming. It will be one of our former BE conference mates with a poor football program.
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We are already in the BE, we can't join again...

Oh you meant another ex BE member with a lousy FB team...RU sure?
 
bendm said:
so much hate for the 3rd best basketball conference in the country since it's founding. love that it drives you so crazy.
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Guy is a masochist, he's been bludgeoned on this issue for years now.
 
I like 11 teams. But if wanted, I would say Cincinnati. But don't see it happening because of Xavier, and their football team is on the rise and would not go independent.
So 11 is good.
 
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If (and it's a big if) the Big East were to expand there's no way they go to divisions in basketball.
 
I think 11 schools is more perfect than any situation we’ve been in in my lifetime. Why are we trying to fix something that isn’t broken whatsoever?

The only way the Big East considers expanding again is if the opportunity comes along for a really high level program that raises the profile of the whole conference long-term (see, “UConn”).
 
aburks41 said:
Why are some of you even entertaining the idea of letting a mid major team into a power conference? That’s just stupid and does nothing to help the big east. Sorry to break it to y’all but no one cares about Davidson, Dayton, Drake(??), or UMass..also 11 is the magic number for a round robin. Expanding to 12 is never happening and shouldn’t happen unless Cuse, Notre Dame, or Pitt want to come back (and that is never ever happening either)
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I mean lets not pretend that isn't exactly what happened to create the existing version of the league.

Creighton was in the Missouri Valley before joining the league in 2013
Xavier was in the Atlantic 10 before joining the league in 2013
Butler was in the freaking Horizon League before moving to the A10 for a single year and then ultimately the Big East in 2013

Even the previous version of the Big East had added teams from mid major leagues:

Marquette joined the Big East from CUSA in 2005. Before that they were members of the Horizon league and the Great Midwest league for basically the entirety of their athletics program's history
DePaul joined the Big East from CUSA in 2005 and was a founding member of CUSA in 1995
Other teams to join in 2005 from CUSA: Louisville, Cincinnati, USF

Oh, and not to mention that most people would consider UConn's add from the American as a team moving from a mid major to a power conference.

Just over half of the existing league membership was a "mid major" as recently as 16 years ago. Athletic conference membership continuously changes and always has changed. I'm not trying to discredit the current version of the league, I'm just saying let's not act like there isn't precedent for doing exactly what I've bolded in the above. If you were going to add a team (and again it's not happening), where they currently play shouldn't even be remotely close to a deciding factor. You have to remember these are academic institutions that would be looking for peer schools and like minded institutions (i.e. Jesuits in the case of the Big East) to join together for academic research and other purposes in addition to athletic competition.
 
The only school you add to the Big East outside the P5 is Gonzaga. It doesn't matter how far they are from the rest of the schools. Everyone else does not move the needle.

If a P5 school ever wanted to join us, you take either the Cuse and or Notre Dame. I can't see this happening, but you welcome them with open arms. Everyone else is just filler.
 
Putting aside the fact that 11 teams works perfectly for a 20 game round robin schedule, here is the issue with adding a 12th team.

What team would we add to the conference that would have a long term positive financial impact for the league (big fan base) and increase the league's competition as a whole (ability to keep a top tier coach to build a program)?

Outside of UConn, Nova and Georgetown, I don't think there are any schools in our conference who can attract a power 5 quality coach / keep a power 5 potential coach from jumping ship when things get good.

We saw it happen recently with Xavier, Butler and Marquette. This means that they need to keep replacing quality coaches with undervalued quality coaches to keep their teams & league competitive. What team do we add that wouldn't have that concern? VCU, Dayton, UMass and the likes have all proven to be stepping stone programs.

Gonzaga would be the only program from a competition stand point that would elevate the league, but that is never happening since they are so far west. Also, Mark Few may have another decade of run in him, but after that the NBE might be left holding a west coast lemon on every team's travel schedule.

Wichita State might have been a good add a few years ago with Gregg Marshall set to be a lifer there, but it looks like the league dodged a bullet with that.
 
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navery12 said:
I can promise you nobody thinks this
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A team moves from the AAC to the Big East- did that team move from a mid major league to a power league?
 
McLovin said:
Putting aside the fact that 11 teams works perfectly for a 20 game round robin schedule, here is the issue with adding a 12th team.

What team would we add to the conference that would have a long term positive financial impact for the league (big fan base) and increase the league's competition as a whole (ability to keep a top tier coach to build a program)?

Outside of UConn, Nova and Georgetown, I don't think there are any schools in our conference who can attract a power 5 quality coach / keep a power 5 potential coach from jumping ship when things get good.

We saw it happen recently with Xavier, Butler and Marquette. This means that they need to keep replacing quality coaches with undervalued quality coaches to keep their teams & league competitive. What team do we add that wouldn't have that concern? VCU, Dayton, UMass and the likes have all proven to be stepping stone programs.

Gonzaga would be the only program from a competition stand point that would elevate the league, but that is never happening since they are so far west. Also, Mark Few may have another decade of run in him, but after that the NBE might be left holding a west coast lemon on every team's travel schedule.

Wichita State might have been a good add a few years ago with Gregg Marshall set to be a lifer there, but it looks like the league dodged a bullet with that.
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1. I agree with your bolded. UConn should 100% dominate this league going forward because not only are we the school with the most resources available to us but also we're one of the 3 biggest brands by far in the league. Xavier has already had to replace multiple coaches, Marquette, DePaul, Butler, etc are fine programs but we've seen guys jump ship for bigger opportunities from there. The rest of the schools have established fine programs but like... Creighton? Seton Hall? Providence? These are all incredibly small regional schools with virtually zero national appeal or brand. UConn will benefit in both the short and long term from the brand and pure size of the school compared to everyone else in the league.

2. Wichita I actually think is well positioned even post Marshall because of the Koch $$. If you're willing to outspend everyone in your league, you have a chance to be good year in and year out. Plus a die hard fanbase and great facilities. In a weird way it almost helps Marshall was forced out in the way he was rather than having him stay another 20 years and trying to replace him after that. Now with Isaac Brown there I think they'll be fine but Marshall was being paid in the top 10 of all coaches in CBB. They'll be fine long term if they're willing to keep that level of commitment up.
 
McLovin said:
Putting aside the fact that 11 teams works perfectly for a 20 game round robin schedule, here is the issue with adding a 12th team.

What team would we add to the conference that would have a long term positive financial impact for the league (big fan base) and increase the league's competition as a whole (ability to keep a top tier coach to build a program)?

Outside of UConn, Nova and Georgetown, I don't think there are any schools in our conference who can attract a power 5 quality coach / keep a power 5 potential coach from jumping ship when things get good.

We saw it happen recently with Xavier, Butler and Marquette. This means that they need to keep replacing quality coaches with undervalued quality coaches to keep their teams & league competitive. What team do we add that wouldn't have that concern? VCU, Dayton, UMass and the likes have all proven to be stepping stone programs.

Gonzaga would be the only program from a competition stand point that would elevate the league, but that is never happening since they are so far west. Also, Mark Few may have another decade of run in him, but after that the NBE might be left holding a west coast lemon on every team's travel schedule.

Wichita State might have been a good add a few years ago with Gregg Marshall set to be a lifer there, but it looks like the league dodged a bullet with that.
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Gonzaga would be a great add. The distance is not that a big deal in the modern era. It has enough history, success, name recognition, and fan base that it adds plenty of value.

Outside of UCONN and Nova, there is no program in the Big East with a bigger national following than the Zags. It doesn't matter that they are out West. Few will be there a while, and even post-him they will be able to recruit a quality coach even more so if they have the Big East to sell.

This is is the only non P5 school that solidifies the Big East for a long time.
 
Huskymagic said:
Gonzaga would be a great add. The distance is not that a big deal in the modern era. It has enough history, success, name recognition, and fan base that it adds plenty of value.

Outside of UCONN and Nova, there is no program in the Big East with a bigger national following than the Zags. It doesn't matter that they are out West. Few will be there a while, and even post-him they will be able to recruit a quality coach even more so if they have the Big East to sell.

This is is the only non P5 school that solidifies the Big East for a long time.
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It's 2700 miles from Storrs to Gonzaga's campus in Spokane. Using the travel math site to calculate flight times its a hair under 5 hours each way from BDL-GEG. I agree travel has become easier and conferences a more national but this would just be insane.
 
Huskymagic said:
Gonzaga would be a great add. The distance is not that a big deal in the modern era. It has enough history, success, name recognition, and fan base that it adds plenty of value.

Outside of UCONN and Nova, there is no program in the Big East with a bigger national following than the Zags. It doesn't matter that they are out West. Few will be there a while, and even post-him they will be able to recruit a quality coach even more so if they have the Big East to sell.

This is is the only non P5 school that solidifies the Big East for a long time.
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Lol well in a dream scenario where everyone travels by Concord Jets and hyper loops, we add 3 more teams to the league to get back to 14...

Gonzaga, BYU and Notre Dame.

Zaga is solid. BYU and Notre Dame both have huge national followings, plus the willingness to play independent football. Our best hope would be to get NBC on board to break ND from the ACC and break BYU from their ESPN agreement. Saturday's on NBC become an afternoon game for ND and night game for BYU. Maybe throw UConn a bone and get them an annual match-up with both. And put us on NBCsports (their tier 2 network). I would imagine Notre Dame's annual games against BYU and Michigan were way more profitable for the network than games against Wake Forrest or Duke football.

Then again, our league once again become beholden to football schools.

Total fantasy and not practical, but would be fun in theory.
 
If Gonzaga was ok with the travel I don’t think the Big East would say no. But then again if Few leaves what are they?
 
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Huskymagic said:
Gonzaga would be a great add. The distance is not that a big deal in the modern era. It has enough history, success, name recognition, and fan base that it adds plenty of value.

Outside of UCONN and Nova, there is no program in the Big East with a bigger national following than the Zags. It doesn't matter that they are out West. Few will be there a while, and even post-him they will be able to recruit a quality coach even more so if they have the Big East to sell.

This is is the only non P5 school that solidifies the Big East for a long time.
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Distance not an issue? You think Dan Hurley was good with traveling to Houston, Dallas, Wichita, Tulsa plus two trips to Florida? I have news for you, traveling that much sucks.
 
ucp990411 said:
Distance not an issue? You think Dan Hurley was good with traveling to Houston, Dallas, Wichita, Tulsa plus two trips to Florida? I have news for you, traveling that much sucks.
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While yes the travel sucks and takes a toll on the team I think the bigger complaint was they were flying across the country to play teams like Tulane, Tulsa, SMU.
 
Spokane isn't very friendly geographically for a basketball program.

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McLovin said:
Lol well in a dream scenario where everyone travels by Concord Jets and hyper loops, we add 3 more teams to the league to get back to 14...

Gonzaga, BYU and Notre Dame.

Zaga is solid. BYU and Notre Dame both have huge national followings, plus the willingness to play independent football. Our best hope would be to get NBC on board to break ND from the ACC and break BYU from their ESPN agreement. Saturday's on NBC become an afternoon game for ND and night game for BYU. Maybe throw UConn a bone and get them an annual match-up with both. And put us on NBCsports (their tier 2 network). I would imagine Notre Dame's annual games against BYU and Michigan were way more profitable for the network than games against Wake Forrest or Duke football.

Then again, our league once again become beholden to football schools.

Total fantasy and not practical, but would be fun in theory.
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if you're going the fantasy route (and a more plausible fantasy at that) we leave the Big East in the rearview mirror completely and join a P5 (especially ACC)
 
Luigi Gonzaga (Gonzaga's namesake) has a sort of New York sound to it...
 
John said:
if you're going the fantasy route (and a more plausible fantasy at that) we leave the Big East in the rearview mirror completely and join a P5 (especially ACC)
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This is probably more realistic than what I proposed. Also a better outcome for UConn.
 
The Big East needs to expand to 12 teams at the very least for a number of reasons. First and foremost, one of the largest source of revenue for a basketball centric league like the BE are NCAA Tournament units. The more teams you have in conference, the more teams you are likely to have make the Tournament and advance. Had Georgetown not won the Big East Tournament this season, the BE would’ve had only three teams make the NCAA Tournament. That would have been a disaster not only perception-wise but money-wise.

By adding a 12th team, you can also go back down to 18 conference games without affecting the number of total League games. There is no need to have every team play each other twice; you just need to make sure that the right teams are playing each other twice (Villanova-UConn for example), but I don’t feel like we absolutely need to play Xavier, Butler or Depaul twice every season. This way the League reduces the chances of costing itself NCCA bids by beating itself up while at the same time increasing the chances to showcase itself against marquee teams OOC or at worst adding wins against low to mid majors.

Another reason to add a 12th team is to avoid teams from having byes during conference season. As currently constructed, one team will always have a bye during the last weekend of the regular season, while a different team has a bye during the last week. That is not ideal.

Adding a 12th team also means one more game during the BET. Might not seem like a lot, but that is certainly more money for the League.

Who should that 12th team be? That is the difficult question. Maybe VCU? How about Wichita State? Both have been better programs over the last decade than at least half of the teams currently in the BE.
 
@PRHusky , valid points for a 12th team, specifically the NCAA Tournament revenue.

But the league wants a 20 game conference schedule. All of the P5 conferences are going to 20 games. Our options are play 20 and have better games on the resume for selection Sunday or play 18 and fill 2 games with cupcakes that don't move the needle. We want to be playing Nova, Creighton and other Q1/Q2 opponents twice a year to help our metrics. The committee showed this year that "beating up" on each other in league play is rewarded with top seeds, as the undeserving Big 10 was rewarded with 5 top 4 seeds.

Granted, they could still do a 20 game schedule with 12 teams but it wouldn't be as clean.
 
for the hundredth time, there is no midmajor school that can join the BE that would proportionately increase the value of our TV contract. each of the teams would end up getting less revenue than they do now because it would have to be split more ways. UConn is/was able to do that. are there any other UConns out there willing to join? this is the only calculus that will ever matter.

basketball is not football, making the tourney is not the same thing as making a bowl game. a "unit" is worth 1.6 million over 6 years divided by 11 teams! that's 24k per year per school. not exactly breaking the bank...
 
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