ACC Expansion

[Dan Stack]

This'll means nothing to you non-college sports fans.

For everyone down in ACC country, is there any turth to the rumor that the ACC will also be adding the Universities of Hawaii, Alaska, and Vilnius to bring the conference to 15 teams?

[Balok]

Absolutely untrue. Who wants to go to Vilnius?

In fact, the University of Guam has accepted the ACC's invitation to join. Warm, sunny climate, nice road trip...

[Sea Tyger]

And here I thought this was a serious sports thread...shoulda figured....

Hey, what's this Univ. called Rio de Janiero State on the list of accepted schools? And why is the entire basketball schedule being played down there?

[Dan Stack]

Well as a UConn alum, I'm pretty seriously disgruntled about the whole expansion thing...

[Balok]

My brother, who has followed it more than I have, tells me the expansion was about increasing the number of teams to the point where a conference championship was lucrative. Apparently, "12" is the magic number for that.

Typically, it's all about the benjamins.

[Dan Stack]

Yup, years and years ago a bylaw for Division II (which at the time also counted for other Divisions) was passed allowing for a championship football game for conferences with at least twelve teams. The reason had nothing to do with money - it was because conferences that big have a hard time having a schedule where every team plays every other team once in a given season. That championship game allowed the leaders of two divisions in a conference to play each other to make sure the championship is decided on the field, not just in conference standings between two teams that might never have played each other that year.

It seemed harmless enough at the time, but the Division I schools soon saw how much cash they could make with that championship game. And therefore the ACC moved to destroy the Big East. Not that I'm bitter, being a Big East fan (mainly for basketball).

I actually didn't object to Miami going - geographically it makes a lot of sense. And in the initial expansion I thought Syracuse showed class, when they were being considered. But Virginia Tech and Boston College behaved in a manner which I view as reprehensible, even by "corporate", to say nothing of academic, standards.

[Dan Stack]

So for those of you playing at home...

The ACC wants $$$ from a championship game. They raid the Big East of three teams.

The Big East needs to resupply to keep its status as a division I football conference (needing at least 8 teams for Football), eyeing Conference USA and possibly the Atlantic 10 (for some non-Football teams).

Conference USA preemptively takes teams from the WAC. The WAC eyes resupplying by raiding the Sunbelt Conference.

One of the schools in play is Hawaii. So because of an east coast expansion the University of Hawaii is involved in a conference shakeup.

It is, of course, all about what is best for academics, no?

[Sea Tyger]

Originally posted by Dan Stack
It is, of course, all about what is best for academics, no?

No. Anyone who believes that the conferences have ever had anything to do with what's "in the best interest of academics" should be checked for hallucinogens.

The Big 8 expanded into the Big XII because the old Southwest Conference collapsed in the mid-90s. The Southeast and Western Athletic conferences also both absorbed old SWC teams, expanding to 12 and 16 teams respectively. The WAC couldn't support the superconference setup, because the conference was shut out of the Bowl Coalition and, later, the Bowl Championship Series.

This led to the best eight teams of the WAC to form their own conference, the Mountain West. The MWC still isn't in the BCS picture, but has a great deal more "respectability" after shedding the lesser WAC teams. The WAC still exists, but is truly a "minor" conference, now that all of its "teeth" have been removed.

There's a push to further restrict the national championship setup by this coalition of super conferences. The Big East is the hardest hit, because it's a BCS conference that will almost certainly lose its status when the contract is renegotiated in a couple of years. Conference USA and the MWC will probably remain on the fringe.

The Big Ten is hoping to expand to 12 schools by luring Notre Dame into its fold. And the Big East is trying to retain its status by doing the same thing. Conference USA and the Metro Athletic Conference are both looking at taking hits (although Conference USA is already losing Army, because the academy is returning to its Independent roots...the original service academies just can't compete at a conference level) as the Big East will probably attempt to get the top conference schools to either supplement its Notre Dame pickup (if it happens) or keep some semblance of competitive football on the national level (you have to feel for schools like Syracuse and Pittsburgh, two schools that will be hit the hardest by this move).

I don't think the shake up will bother the Big East much in basketball (Miami was a good team in the conference, but still a second-tier program in my eyes...BC and Va Tech are mostly footnotes there), unless the Big Ten is able to steal Notre Dame away (and the Irish will probably play basketball in the Big Ten if their football team goes there).

Of course, there's no guarantee Notre Dame is going anywhere. They continue to maintain that they want to remain independent in football. Of course, the renegotiated BCS may influence them ($$$). I'm certain that the Big Ten will pursue a top or mid-level school to fill out its roster if ND decides against it (although I ultimately believe that ND will join the Big Ten).

So, at the end of the day, you'll have four 12-team conferences (Big Ten, ACC, SEC, Big XII) and a single 10-team power conference (Pac-10, which seems largely unconcerned with ever expanding) in the new BCS. Perhaps they'll appease those screaming for a college football playoff by allowing for the highest BCS-ranked school from the other conferences an automatic berth, which may also appease teams like Syracuse and Pittsburgh. That would still allow for two at-large berths from the power conferences.

Me? I want a playoff. I've even come up with a ranking system to determine at-large berths and seeding. Not that the BCS conference heads will listen, since only 58% or so Div-1A coaches support a playoff system (as of a poll earlier this year, IIRC). Will it happen? Maybe, if there's a complete disaster in the ranking system between now and 2005 (please let Oklahoma and Miami both lose one game! ) and five or six major schools start calling for heads when they're left out of the national championship. If not, it may be another decade before we can come up with a fair way to install a CFB playoff system.

[REG]

Originally posted by Dan Stack

For everyone down in ACC country, is there any truth to the rumor that the ACC will also be adding the Universities of Hawaii, Alaska, and Vilnius to bring the conference to 15 teams?

So far there is no official word coming out from the University of Hawaii campus. They are looking at the replacement schools to see if the conference will have an economic future with regards to attracting sports networks to air WAC games (especially featuring UH for more exposure).

The UH athletic director have been in an informal discussion with Mountain West but nothing concrete have come out of the talk, not even an invitation.

http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/ar.../sp/sp01a.html

[First of Two]

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First of Two to Three of Fourteen!
Three here.
We have sighted 'football.'
Football?
Football.
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Make them go *BOOM*
Aye.