Geoff

Kill. It. With. Fire. POTD! POTD! POTD! I think you misunderstand how POTD works...

That deal was dead by the end of Sunday so there's no more "serious talk."

*raises hand* Um, yeah, C-USA has guaranteed bowl tie-ins too. This argument makes no sense unless you meant both conferences are BCS AQ leagues. And if that's what you meant, there's no guarantee the new Big East (aka C-USA+) would retain it's AQ status.

Because Swofford is a Tobacco Road puppet and Tobacco Road doesn't want to admit that football pays the bills and they prefer to just focus on basketball.

Obviously not every person in Florida is going to watch the Gators. You must have missed the memo that I'm about as big a FSU fan as there is. FSU doesn't add households they add eyes. The households are already counted under the contract and the added eyes mean nothing. Yes the Noles bring in big ratings but the SEC already has big ratings with brands like UF, Bama, LSU, etc. They don't need FSU and FSU will not be going to the SEC unless the league goes to 16 and that's most likely not happening in this round of expansion. Can this all just be over with already?

The SEC gains nothing but another national name. You may see FSU as a little city all itself but the fact remains the SEC has the Tallahassee market already so FSU doesn't bring them that.

More Big East ineptitude: Conference not targeting schools in states that already have a Big East representative. Rules out Temple, UCF, Army, and Houston (if TCU stays).

I never heard a rumor of Miami being offered. Any mention of Miami was from Miami fans who were delusional thinking the SEC wanted a program that can't even fill a 75K stadium and is potentially about to be raped/made an example of by the NCAA. I think you maybe confused because the main 16-team SEC rumor was Texas A&M, Mizzou, FSU, and Clemson.

I understand that completely I just hate Marinatto. Why can't the Big East have an Oklahoma?

I know he let it get that bad but that's moot since Marinatto let the Big East get this bad. Beebe stepped down (although he was force a bit) Marinatto is still brown nosing the basketball schools and completely ignoring football and his conference's fate. Advantage: Beebe.

Who's the better commissioner? Beebe or Marinatto? I say Beebe simply because he realized he was killing the Big XII and instead of completely sinking the ship, he stepped aside and let someone try to save it. If Marinatto had any inkling of what he was doing we'd at least be hearing about some invites right now.

If you really think the C-USA is that much lower than the MWC. you're either: confusing the Sun Belt with C-USA or completely ignoring the MWC that exists below Boise and TCU.

A few steps? That would be the WAC. That's like saying the Central Hockey League is significantly lower than the ECHL. There's a dropoff but it's only slight. Define "meaningful". Last season: ECU beat NC State SMU beat Washington State Southern Miss beat Kansas Tulane beat Rutgers Tulsa beat Hawaii UCF beat UGA UTEP beat New Mexico This season: Houston beat UCLA Rice beat Purdue UCF beat BC Those lists include wins against AQ schools and current (or future) MWC schools. For reference, UTEP was the only C-USA team that played a MWC school (New Mexico). There's already 3 on the list for 2011 and we're just entering week 4. And since you're a fan of analyzing a current team's success, or lack there of, and what it means for a league they're no longer in, BYU is currently losing to UCF.

I could see the TV contract actually possibly being a reason they let deserters leave earlier. Contract size remains the same, number of pie slices decreases. It may only be for 1 or 2 years but it's more money per school at least for the short term.

I was referring to the current state. Syracuse isn't joining until July 1, 2014 most likely (unless the 27 month thing is negotiated).

Michigan is adding varsity men's this season (women's in 13-14), Northwestern has women's and competes in the American Lacrosse Conference, Ohio State has men's (competing in the Great West Lacrosse League) and women's (in the ALC), Penn State has both men's (Colonial Athletic Association) and women's (ALC). The ACC is content with sponsoring a 4-team lacrosse championship. I could see the B1G doing the same with 4 in men's and women's. That said Maryland can't afford to leave the ACC right now but if the B1G came calling (just like if the phone rings in Clemson or Tallahassee and the caller ID says "SEC"), it could be negotiated and they'd likely find themselves on the way out of the ACC. Really? Where does the revenue go? Football and basketball revenue goes to non-revenue sports. And if there is anything left over it goes to profit but remember only about 22 schools in the entire nation turn a decent profit on athletics meaning the booster's money is already being well used. That's not to say some booster's can step in and donate more if needed (ex. FSU is trying to fund their new indoor practice facility that will cost between $12-15 mil and to get the fund raising started there were 6 individuals dropping $1 mil each) but schools like Maryland don't have gigantic booster bases to draw from. Not every school is blessed to have boosters like Florida, Texas, and the like.

A UNC fan saying WVU seems like an obvious choice seems like a contradiction. The Schools like Dook, UNC, Wake, and UVa do not want a school with the academics of a school like WVU in the fold. Then again, WVU isn't horrible at basketball and the Tobacco Road schools still seem to have their head in the sand and are adding teams to benefit the basketball side of things but not really do anything for football.

Nova's biggest opposition was Pitt so maybe the Big East has them move up. Add in Big XII scraps and you kinda sorta salvage the football side of things. You know, in the sense that they'd still have a league.

Contacted, not applied. The ACC has been contacted by 10 schools but so far only Pitt and Cuse have applied.

Maybe their "boosters" and players but Miami doesn't have money. Hence why they only have decent facilities and no on-campus stadium. Hell, they used a 20k high school/soccer stadium for their spring game.

As long as this level of athletics is associated with universities and colleges, academics will play a factor in conference makeup.

In effing wrestling. This very topic has been beaten to death on this forum and in this thread before. The PAC-12 has not problem admiting Boise as an associate member for wrestling but they do not want and are publicly against a school with the academic stature of Boise State joining as a full member.

Ok-State isn't going to wait until midnight because OU and OSU are a package deal.

This looks bad on the Big XII schools, IMO. The league and all it's members were fine with A&M going to the SEC and gave the league their blessing. Ish actually gets real and Baylor says, "We lied, we're gonna sue." Then everyone else in the league except Oklahoma says "YEAH! Me too!" If they really cared this much they wouldn't have taken the "ok, whatever" mentality when A&M said they were leaving and they would have worked with them to keep them in the league. Instead they made no response the A&M's letter and just sat back and watched.

I honestly don't see how they didn't see this coming. Baylor and Iowa State may have been content to be quiet and take their money but Nebraska, A&M, and others wouldn't be silent and subservient forever. Hell even Stoops doesn't see the need to continue the Red River Rivalry if OU and UT end up in different conferences.