Non BCS conference holding summit meeting

[JayM]

Arkansas Democrat article from the CUSA board.

Like it is : Mid-level conferences watching out for themselves
Wally Hall

It isn’t a top-secret meeting, but they are not exactly trying to attract attention either.
Next weekend the commissioners of the five football conferences that aren’t in the Bowl Championship Series will meet to discuss their futures.
The Atlantic Coast Conference’s raid on the Big East — which has resulted in a lawsuit — has sent a tremor through college athletics from coast to coast, especially in the smaller conferences such as the Sun Belt, Mid-American, Western Athletic, Conference USA and Mountain West.
If Miami, Boston College and Syracuse jump from the Big East, that league has two choices: auction off the furniture and padlock the door, or lure teams from another league.
The recruiting would be vicious. It would make the old Southwest Conference look like a glee club.
It could go on and on until some league was forced to cease to exist.
One example — Louisville, Cincinnati and Memphis are three schools that would jump to the Big East in a heartbeat. In fact, Memphis has hired a gunslinger just to pull off the deal.
If that happens, Conference USA would immediately look to the Mid-American and Sun Belt for schools that have football and basketball.
We’re not talking a trickle here, but a possible meltdown of a conference.
It could be that Conference USA could implode. There has long been talk DePaul, Marquette and St. Louis would like to start a smaller conference made up only of Jesuit schools.
If that happened, Charlotte, East Carolina, Houston, South Florida, Southern Miss, TCU, Tulane and Alabama-Birmingham would be looking for a home.
All of that is why those five commissioners have agreed to a summit meeting.
They may very well take their 61 schools and divide them up geographically, which would be a smart thing to do economically.
New Mexico State might switch places with Louisiana Tech, for instance.
It never made sense for Tech to jump from the Sun Belt to the WAC anyway.
Those leagues need stability, and sometimes that comes from playing within your own parameters because you can save tens of thousands of dollars by making a two-hour bus ride to an away game instead of flying across the country.
Understand, the six BCS conferences need those five conferences for nonconference Division-I games so certain schools can get bowl eligible. The Rich Six don’t want or need those others leagues folding.
What might be an even better solution would be if the NCAA told everyone to hold their horses and the governing organization made the realignments for all 11 conferences.
No doubt, some would see that as Big Brother interfering, but in this case it is going to take an organization that is at least somewhat objective to pull this off.
Until the SEC expanded with Arkansas and South Carolina, most of the leagues were geographical, dating to the days when players rode trains to games.
Granted, not everyone would be happy with a complete realignment, but the NCAA could look at it and say, "OK, everyone wants a conference championship game and the TV dollars that come with it, then this is what we are going to do."
The NCAA could give the ACC Boston College, Cincinnati and East Carolina.
Slide Iowa State from the Big 12 to the Big Ten, which would then have 12 teams.
Move Arkansas to the Big 12, have Miami move to the SEC along with Louisville (make him smiling Rick Pitino), and South Carolina goes to the Big East, which would also get Notre Dame as a football member.
The Pac-10 continues to do its own thing.
Then the NCAA moves on to the other five conferences and sets them up so that the studentathletes are spending more time in study hall and less time in an airport. That’s some academic reform that would actually help.
Of course, none of that will ever happen. It makes too much sense.
So five commissioners from the mid level will meet next weekend and try to determine a way to keep from having their life sucked out just because the ACC wants more TV money.

This story was published Sunday, June 08, 2003

[Charleston Pony]

The writer hits the nail on the head when he concedes that geographical realignment is much too practical for it to actually happen.

Has the time come when SMU & TCU realize they should be competing against UNT? Will So. Miss & UAB welcome Troy St into their league? How about Memphis & Ark St? La Tech & La-Lafayette? Will UTEP admit they are a natural conference mate for NMSU? How about Boise St & Idaho? BYU, Utah & Utah St? Nevada & UNLV? For that matter, will UConn & Rutgers realize they should be aligned with Temple?

There are a lot of regional conferences that could be put together that could generate more local interest, but this BCS inclusion thing has everyone foaming at the mouth. It really is a shame.

[MeanGreenGem]

But Charleston Pony, how many of us (all 3 Metroplex D1-A schools included) who cannot average even 30K per home game every year really feel we have a future in any BCS conference? We must all hold on to our dreams for our respective alma maters, but some things are just not going to happen concerning the BCS in most of our life times, ie, inclusion in a BCS league. They are a greedy sort they are!

Someone once said, though, "Bloom where you are planted?"

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR><font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Charleston Pony:
<B>The writer hits the nail on the head when he concedes that geographical realignment is much too practical for it to actually happen.

Has the time come when SMU & TCU realize they should be competing against UNT? Will So. Miss & UAB welcome Troy St into their league? How about Memphis & Ark St? La Tech & La-Lafayette? Will UTEP admit they are a natural conference mate for NMSU? How about Boise St & Idaho? BYU, Utah & Utah St? Nevada & UNLV? For that matter, will UConn & Rutgers realize they should be aligned with Temple?

There are a lot of regional conferences that could be put together that could generate more local interest, but this BCS inclusion thing has everyone foaming at the mouth. It really is a shame.</B></font><HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

[untgrad88]

I just hope they come out of these meetings with some regional conference ideas that puts UNT, SMU, TCU and others in the same regional conference--or at least paves the way for such to happen if the dominoes actually begin to fall. Let common sense AND cents rule for once.

[This message has been edited by untgrad88 (edited 06-10-2003).]

[OldPony]

Please don't expect the NCAA to do anything. They have lost almost all of their influence. They have the power of a popcorn fart.
The BCS schools have taken over. The only way the NCAA could do anything would be a battle to the death-most likely of the NCAA.

[EastStang]

If the NCAA goons started treating some of those BCS schools like they treated us, there would be about six teams playing next year in the SEC. I suspect that there are some skeletons which might wash up in the PAC-10 soon. You think that Nebraska wants to pay players legally for no reason at all? You're right the NCAA losts its will in our case and now can't get the genie back in the bottle.