Would UCONN accept a BB only invite from the Big 12

[Win5002]

Is that you Bob Bowlsby?

Shhhhhhhhhhhh. don't blow my cover.

 

[Win5002]

Honestly I’d take 1 home and 2 away every other year as well if it had to rotate that way

The idea was for the football to be home and home, so if the league could give 3 games to each team one year you would have 1 home game and the next year 2 home games.

 

[champs99and04]

I think it would help since Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas provide some cache. The fans will show up for OSU, Baylor, Iowa St and WVU too. KState, TTech and TCU are more of a stretch but still better than ECU, UCF, Tulsa etc.

Regardless, if you think the Big East would offer a more interesting basketball schedule in the eyes of our fanbase than the B12, that is reason to give the Big East a hard look. The B12 is a good conference.

Aside from Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas, are any of the other seven a shoe-in to find a safe landing spot if the Big 12 dissolves? You may know better than me as I'm not a conference realignment expert, but my impression would be no. Texas and Oklahoma are brands that would sell some tickets, but their appeal as basketball products is limited and save for KU and Iowa State, I'm not sure the sport is a priority for any of them (granted they've been very strong on the court lately despite this).

So yeah, I do think the Big East would appeal to our fan base more. The two leagues are fairly comparable from a performance standpoint and the Big East would generate a lot more natural rivalries. Seton Hall, St. Johns, and Providence have made big strides as programs since the formation of the new league and obviously they're all next door. Georgetown is going to sell tickets regardless because they're Georgetown, Marquette is a known entity, and the newbies - Creighton, Butler, and Xavier - are respected, albeit lacking in sex appeal, programs that would probably command more intrigue as league games than they would have back in the day as OOC opponents. The only real throwaway is DePaul.

The UConn/Big East thing will come to a head at some point. I also seriously wonder how much it would change the appeal of the job for a prospective coach in the event that we have to make a move. The questions are does the Big East want us and is UConn ready to abandon football. To the first one I say probably simply because the money will be too much of a factor. On the second, I still think we're a few years out. The investment the school and the state have made in the program is massive and the allure of joining a P5 conference is too much to pass up. I don't think Herbst and company could responsibly make that move right now. Over time, I think they will be open to going the independent route with football ala UMass if the athletic department continues to flounder. They're in a tough spot, though, because while the AAC has not been the primary reason for the basketball program's decline, it might be the primary obstacle to their recovery. You get the sense that if you meet with a big time coach the first thing they're going to want to do is clean up New England on the trail. That's far more likely in the Big East than the AAC and whoever the new coach is doesn't care about the P5 branching off in ten years, they care about right now. This situation is as messy as it is because a potential coaching change may occur in basketball way sooner than anticipated and now the school is going to have to determine whether a pivotal hire for the school's bread-winning sport is worth the end of the football dream.

 

[SouthBayHusky]

Count me in as a yes vote. I see this making sense financially for all interested parties, and I would personally would enjoy conference games regularly against Kansas, Texas, Oklahoma, West Virginia and Oklahoma State. Also being back in a P5 also can’t hurt basketball recruiting either. And while it’s not perfect on the football side it does guarantee some games and buys us some more time with hopes of a permanent invite for all sports down the road. I’m for getting a foot in the door, and it would be an immediate improvement, as long as it didn’t looked like the B12 was gonna disband in a few years.

 

[HuskyHawk]

The idea was for the football to be home and home, so if the league could give 3 games to each team one year you would have 1 home game and the next year 2 home games.

Need 4 football games plus a bit more money. Then it would work. I suspect we’d join any P5 but the Pac that offered such a deal. It’s similar to the ACC ND deal. Honestly, it would make more sense if the ACC did it, since they are unbalanced in non football sports.

But the Big XII wouldn’t do this. They like round robin hoops.

 

[auggie22]

The fan base is dwindling because we've sucked for the last four years and haven't had a truly consistent product since '09.

Maybe it's just me, but save for Kansas the Big 12 doesn't have much more cache than the AAC. From a basketball perspective, this would just be a half-step up from where we are now. And I'm not talking about quality of team, I'm talking about geographical alignment and potential rivalries. They wouldn't exist there any more than they do here.

Obviously the cash and potential football tie-ins change things, but as far as this rejuvenating the fan base I don't see it.

Respectfully disagree. An annual home slate with some or all of Kansas, Texas, OU, WVU and ISU would be measurably better than the AAC.

 

[polycom]

Big12 is the next conference to get blown up...All Texas has to do is leave with their TV money and there is no more Big12

 

[pj]

Yes, we would do that ... but we'd have to be able to exit freely for a full conference spot, or have a path to a full B12 membership. We couldn't agree to a permanent second class status with no ability to normalize status. But, the scenario you propose is a definite step up from where we are.

 

[August_West]

No.

 

[BlueMAB]

Why would the AAC let us park football and take basketball elsewhere?

 

[Dream Jobbed 2.0]

Why would the AAC let us park football and take basketball elsewhere?

I feel like there’s an unspoken part of this where football goes Indy thus the bargaining for games vs big 12 football. But as you said I don’t think that’s feasible. Plus the big 12 does not sponsor one of our strengths in men’s soccer. I don’t think we’d see a “basketball only” ever. Too often people think football and basketball are the only sports when they talk about this.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

1) Anyone who would say no to this is clueless. It would be a an immediate, enormous boost in level of conference play and visibility (two things most on thhis board gripe about continually).

2) I would love to hear the excuses about our attendance after such a move as the narrative at the moment is tghat there are no opponent schools within our current conference to get excited about (leaving out the premise that we should want to see our school, not who our school is playing).

An added bonus would be a very nice bump in football's non-conference schedule.

 

[Hoophound]

We’ve played at Missouri, Baylor, ND, Michigan and ISU to name a few. Their stadiums were packed and loud. A solid UConn team doesn’t scare the opposition’ss fans away. As I’ve said a million times, we have a brand name, winning fixes our reputation way faster than it would other G5s. If UConn plays good football, it will take a year or two for us to be a worthy power program opponent.

 

[djct1999]

Typical Big 12. Sure, we will help you achieve your goals at our expense. Thanks, but no thanks.

 

[pj]

The B12 would have a better chance at a network with UConn as a full member. That would bring the state plus part of NYC. B12 football would be hot in New England.

UConn would more than pull its weight, SNY brought in an extra $30 million in annual cable revenue thanks to UConn sports, that would move directly to a B12 network.

I think the problem is finding a #12 that would pull its weight.

 

[Caronimo]

Simply no... unfortunately. Would make no sense

 

[BlueMAB]

I feel like there’s an unspoken part of this where football goes Indy thus the bargaining for games vs big 12 football.

If football goes Indy stick a fork in the program.

 

[Win5002]

Need 4 football games plus a bit more money. Then it would work. I suspect we’d join any P5 but the Pac that offered such a deal. It’s similar to the ACC ND deal. Honestly, it would make more sense if the ACC did it, since they are unbalanced in non football sports.

But the Big XII wouldn’t do this. They like round robin hoops.

Keep in mind you would play the other basketball only schools also each year so if that was 4 teams that would provide 3 games and if it was 6 teams it would provide 5 games. If its a 10 team Big 12 in football they would need to get the next tv deal to be 8 conference games. If the 8 teams other than OU & Tx. played 2 games against the bball only schools that is 16 games available and add 2 for 1 game each from OU & Tx. You might ask why only 1 from OU & Tx.? Matchups against an Ohio St. or USC or ND are too valuable to the contract to give up, so I'm just being realistic. That is 18 games, If you have 4 bball only schools you could provide 4 games, 5 or 6 bball only schools 3 games.

As an overall fan of the Big 12 I really liked the idea of a UCONN and either BYU/Houston or Cincy addition, but when you dive into the tv ratings of football it unfortunately doesn't support adding 2 schools. I just came up with the idea because getting a conference network was important to OU it seemed when they looked at realignment, and I can see where UCONN can carry its weight with a conference network that provides a lot of basketball games and lesser viewed football games but creating enough football value to cover $30M of T1/T2 football revenue is another thing. As delivery methods of content change maybe they could show that kind of value or possibly conferences find a way to monetize basketball content better in the future.

UCONN, BYU, Cincy, Houston, Memphis, New Mexico would be the ones I would look at and probably in that order. You might ask why Houston? One the football games against Texahoma schools are pretty good ratings when Houston is involved. Also, even bball games against the Texas schools would probably drive up value for a network in a wide area of the conference and content may be more important than a gaining a team in a new area that has a hard time capturing its market. Houston does as a member of the AAC but playing Big 12 schools especially the Texahoma schools would give it better success. Everyone outside of Houston is a pretty solid basketball addition.

 

[Chief00]

The fan base is dwindling because we've sucked for the last four years and haven't had a truly consistent product since '09.

Maybe it's just me, but save for Kansas the Big 12 doesn't have much more cache than the AAC. From a basketball perspective, this would just be a half-step up from where we are now. And I'm not talking about quality of team, I'm talking about geographical alignment and potential rivalries. They wouldn't exist there any more than they do here.

Obviously the cash and potential football tie-ins change things, but as far as this rejuvenating the fan base I don't see it.

Not a truly consistent product since 2009? Come on, I know the regular season won/loss was not the great - but 2 National Championships in these 8 years - is something just about any school would trade for! You are not a casual fan, so you are being spoiled not ignorant about this question.

 

[BlueDogs]

News flash, no P-5 is interested in our football program. All of our other sports would add value to a P5 conference except foooosball.

Uhm, at UConn basketball' s apex it still couldn't move the needle for P5 conference realignment. Unless you fix the football program, it simply doesn't matter.

 

[NEforceUConn]

Maybe if the deal was UConn and Villanova bb only with the thought of perhaps a future fb offer for both.



Its lets make a deal time for UConn, hell maybe we could partner with App State fb and talk to the B1G.

Sri - Am I vivid dreaming or is this reality.

 

[Danzz]

Without a football invite or at least the prospect of a future invite I'd pass. It would make more sense to join the NBE if we are going to go independent in football. No way the AAC lets us stay without basketball.

 

[BY06518]

Without a football invite or at least the prospect of a future invite I'd pass. It would make more sense to join the NBE if we are going to go independent in football. No way the AAC lets us stay without basketball.

Just like a horse who has come up lame its time to kill the Football program.

 

[huskyrob1]

I'm a Big 12 fan and respect your basketball program quite a bit, but I can't say I have followed UCONN football that much. The Big 12 would like a network, wanted expansion but the networks don't seem to be willing to pay for it and unfortunately it doesn't seem like adding G5 schools would cover their tv revenues for football.

So if the Big 12 offered UCONN among 4-6 schools a basketball only membership with a scheduling agreement for 2/3 games a year against a Big 12 football school, and then a cut of the conference network( based on the ability of that school to get cable companies or streaming subscriptions in a future delivery model). Unfortunately, the AAC only pays 1-2M for football tv revenue, so if in turn for any bball only member schools signing the rights to their football games to the network the league matched that type of a payout for football and then received T1 basketball revenue like the Big East got around 5M a year. If the bball only schools had 3 Big 12 games, played each other bball only member for football, that fills 6-8 games of the schedule and they could be an independent in football. It would give the conference network the bball only schools basketball and football content on the network to see if they could do a good job selling the conference network in their state/region.

If bball only schools could get 5M for bball plus 2M for football + %share of the network it would seem you come out ahead revenue wise. Also, if schools demonstrated they could do a good job selling network maybe in the future they would be added as full members. I think basketball has a good value for conferenece networks and maybe in the future with more streaming it would enhance the value of basketball increasing the T1 revenues also which would help these schools.

Teams like UCONN, Memphis, Cincy, Temple(?), BYU, New Mexico, UNLV, Houston(not a great bball school but playing Houston in football makes sense for the league) could be considered. SDSU & FSU might be a little too far west but who knows.

The Big 12 is a very good basketball conference and some of the teams mentioned above draw great for basketball so it wouldn't hurt the leagues basketball product overall. Its hypothetical but what do UCONN fans think of this arrangement if inclusion in a current P5 league for full membership is not available?

UCONN's basketball program is a clown show now, they would never invite us with loss after loss, players transferring out, losing out on recruits, etc. I think if the Big 12 wanted a basketball only member they'd look at Gonzaga or Xavier.

 

[Nostical]

The fan base is dwindling because we've sucked for the last four years

Not if you listen to some on this board. They actually think our fan base is down because our ticket prices are too high. Absurd.