Division 1 College Conference Realignment

[PrimalCookie]

On 9/10/2021 at 10:39 PM, See Red said:

 

I would be surprised if the SEC didn't go with a pods + annual rivalry setup. Sankey's already acknowledged they need to rotate schools to different campuses with greater frequency, which simply isn't possible by keeping the current structure after expansion.  Best setup I've seen is four pods of four teams.

 

A. Oklahoma, Texas, Texas A&M, Missouri

B. Alabama, Auburn, Vanderbilt, Tennessee

C. Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, Kentucky

D. LSU, Mississippi, Mississippi State, Arkansas

 

Each school would have one annual rival from each other pod.  This gets every school to every stadium at least once every six years, compared to the current setup where Florida hasn't played at Auburn since 2011 and won't for a while. 

 

Whatever two pods play eachother in a given year become a de facto division. 

 

Or do the same thing but with no permanent outside of pod opponents. Then you go to 9 conference games and do rotational divisions:

- Odd years: A and D, B and C (East/West)

- Even years: A and C, B and D (Outer/Inner)

The final 2 games come from the pods that will never be matched together in a division, in this case A and B and C and D.

 

With that system, everyone plays everyone in 2 years, and hosts everyone in 4 years. Georgia and Auburn will cry about losing their annual game, but it'll still happen every other year and it's best for the conference as a whole.

 

SEC Network proposed pods identical to yours except Texas A&M and Arkansas were swapped (the reasoning was that makes it so every pod has 2 traditional powers except for B), but if I were the SEC I'd swap Arkansas with Missouri, putting all the former SWC teams together (and Oklahoma, because you can't split them from Texas).

[kimball]

On 9/10/2021 at 6:56 PM, Geoff said:

You think $1M is a lot of money in this situation?

 

Heck, I'll pay 20% tithing for the next two years to help get BYU into the Big XII quicker.

[heavybass]

Pretty sure that would put the Sun Belt in prime contention to be the best Group 5 conference

[heavybass]

This puts the AAC in a position where they may have to act or miss out.

[Seadragon76]

Why in the world would Marshall, Old Dominion and Southern Miss move to the Sun Belt? Wouldn't that be a downgrade for each of them??

[Red Wolf]

33 minutes ago, Seadragon76 said:

Why in the world would Marshall, Old Dominion and Southern Miss move to the Sun Belt? Wouldn't that be a downgrade for each of them??

 

Conference USA isn't what it once was. They overexpanded and based that expansion too much on markets that didn't care. The Sun Belt has a far better media deal. This isn't the Sun Belt of 2001 where the only bowl team had a losing record (C-USA's North Texas). Things changed over two decades.

[heavybass]

Sun Belt is way better now in terms of football and media.

[Lights Out]

9 hours ago, Seadragon76 said:

Why in the world would Marshall, Old Dominion and Southern Miss move to the Sun Belt? Wouldn't that be a downgrade for each of them??

 

CUSA, the MAC and the AAC are all dumpster fires, the MWC doesn't make any geographical sense for these schools, and they're obviously never getting called up to the P5, so the Sun Belt is the only real option.

[Geoff]

Fort Worth Star-Telegram: Sources say Houston and TCU were ‘this close’ to receiving an invite to the Pac-12

 

Um... didn't see that coming.

[leopard88]

11 hours ago, Geoff said:

Fort Worth Star-Telegram: Sources say Houston and TCU were ‘this close’ to receiving an invite to the Pac-12

 

Um... didn't see that coming.

 

The article makes it sound like it is still a possibility if the Pac-12 decides to expand after all.  It would be interesting to see how that would play out.

 

Quote

On Aug. 26, the Pac-12 issued a statement that it would not expand “at this time.”

 

The “at this time” was included for a reason.

 

Although the Big 12 has formally extended invitations to Houston, BYU, Central Florida and Cincinnati, the prevailing thought is that both TCU and U of H would/will drop everything to run west to join the Pac-12.

 

*     *    *    *

 

Whatever the case, TCU’s immediate future is again linked with Houston, this time not in the Southwest Conference but the Big 12.

 

Don’t be surprised if their future moves west to the Pac-12.

 

[heavybass]

[CrimsonBull9584]

16 hours ago, Geoff said:

Fort Worth Star-Telegram: Sources say Houston and TCU were ‘this close’ to receiving an invite to the Pac-12

 

Um... didn't see that coming.

I was always under the impression that one of the reasons the PAC-10 didn't take BYU when Utah came in, was that the conference didn't want any religious institutions. This was the same reason why Baylor was left out when Texas, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, and Texas Tech were rumored to form the PAC-16. 

 

So what's the deal? Are they interested in religious school or are they not? And if they weren't previously, what changed?

[Red Wolf]

26 minutes ago, CrimsonBull9584 said:

I was always under the impression that one of the reasons the PAC-10 didn't take BYU when Utah came in, was that the conference didn't want any religious institutions. This was the same reason why Baylor was left out when Texas, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, and Texas Tech were rumored to form the PAC-16. 

 

So what's the deal? Are they interested in religious school or are they not? And if they weren't previously, what changed?

 

BYU won't play games on Sunday. That's the big issue there.

[GDAWG]

42 minutes ago, Red Wolf said:

 

BYU won't play games on Sunday. That's the big issue there.

 

I've heard that.  Is it a statewide thing? No games in Utah on Sundays or just for BYU?

[See Red]

2 hours ago, GDAWG said:

 

I've heard that.  Is it a statewide thing? No games in Utah on Sundays or just for BYU?

 

It's the school. It's part of its Honor Code to not play on Sundays because of the Sabbath.

 

[sportsfan7]

5 hours ago, CrimsonBull9584 said:

So what's the deal? Are they interested in religious school or are they not? And if they weren't previously, what changed?

As far as religious schools go, TCU is pretty non-religious

[Geoff]

Exactly. They're like UCF.

 

UCF is UCF, they don't want to be called the University of Central Florida. TCU has long been insisting on being TCU, not Texas Christian or Texas Christian University. It's ruffled some feathers with older alums but not enough to turn off donations.

[McCall]

24 minutes ago, Geoff said:

Exactly. They're like UCF.

 

UCF is UCF, they don't want to be called the University of Central Florida. TCU has long been insisting on being TCU, not Texas Christian or Texas Christian University. It's ruffled some feathers with older alums but not enough to turn off donations.

And LSU.

[BBTV]

Would there be any chance that the ACC would consider adding Temple?  It gets them into Philadelphia (not that anyone cares about college football), fills a gap between Virginia and Boston, and... well that's it.  Temple basketball hasn't been relevant in years but was once a top program, and Temple football hasn't been anything since Matt Rhule left.

[heavybass]

Would they only be known as a filler power team like Vandy and Wake Forest?