The Disaster Scenario

[SMU89]

http://www.courant.com/sports/uconn-foo ... ory?page=1

New York-based sports media consultant Lee Berke believes that history will show that the Big East was wise to wait.

"As tempting as it may have been, the marketplace has only gotten hotter in the interim," Berke said. "There are only a relatively fixed number of major college and professional sports out there, but there is an increasing number of potential outlets bidding for those properties. … Honestly, I think there they are going to do substantially better. They've added some strong up-and-coming football schools in strong markets throughout the country. I think that's going to pay off for them, with the caveat that they remain stable."

And, indeed, representatives from NBC Sports and Fox met with Big East officials in Florida at the annual conference meetings last week. ESPN was also present, and it seems that all three outlets have strong interest in the conference.

[SMU1990]

I hope that the Big East can stabilize the conference and sign a lucrative TV contract. The best hope in saving the Big East would be to convince Notre Dame to join the conference for football.

If the conference collapses with more defections. Then here is what I would like to see:

1) Pac 12 needs 4 more teams. They have already shown they are interested in Texas.
It's hard to ignore the size of the Dallas TV market. Our academics should meet Pac 12 standards.

2) SEC will need more teams too. They might as well expand their footprint in Texas.

3) Big 12 will also need to expand. I think it would be best if we could play our regional rivals once again.

4) MWC the last hope if no one wants us. Not too bad of an option. An upgrade compared to CUSA. As I live in Nevada. This scenario would be good for me as I would get more opportunities to see the Ponies.

The other real issue to discuss is this plus one championship deal.
I think the best solution would be this.

8 Team Playoffs

Conference champions from ACC, Big East, Pac 12, Big 10, Big 12, MWC, CUSA and SEC all qualify. I think that would be the fairest solution to this problem. You lose your conference and you're out! It makes the regular season much more important and the conference games a must win situation.

How about Revenue Sharing
It is sad that the 4 big conferences are once again trying to capture all the money. How can everyone compete in that environment. Perhaps College Football should do revenue sharing like they do in MLB.

That's my two cents. Can't wait to hear what ya'll think.

[East Coast Mustang]

I hope that the Big East can stabilize the conference and sign a lucrative TV contract. The best hope in saving the Big East would be to convince Notre Dame to join the conference for football.

If the conference collapses with more defections. Then here is what I would like to see:

1) Pac 12 needs 4 more teams. They have already shown they are interested in Texas.
It's hard to ignore the size of the Dallas TV market. Our academics should meet Pac 12 standards.

2) SEC will need more teams too. They might as well expand their footprint in Texas.

3) Big 12 will also need to expand. I think it would be best if we could play our regional rivals once again.

4) MWC the last hope if no one wants us. Not too bad of an option. An upgrade compared to CUSA. As I live in Nevada. This scenario would be good for me as I would get more opportunities to see the Ponies.

The other real issue to discuss is this plus one championship deal.
I think the best solution would be this.

8 Team Playoffs

Conference champions from ACC, Big East, Pac 12, Big 10, Big 12, MWC, CUSA and SEC all qualify. I think that would be the fairest solution to this problem. You lose your conference and you're out! It makes the regular season much more important and the conference games a must win situation.

How about Revenue Sharing
It is sad that the 4 big conferences are once again trying to capture all the money. How can everyone compete in that environment. Perhaps College Football should do revenue sharing like they do in MLB.

That's my two cents. Can't wait to hear what ya'll think.

I really doubt ND would consider the BE for football. They'll have three considerably better options on the table- Big Ten, Big 12, and ACC. Unless they're too prideful and insist on being the top dog in their conference (like Texas is to the Big 12) then I don't see them joining the Big East for football.

We don't make a lot of sense for the Pac-12, because we don't "deliver" Texas TV markets. Not enough people in TX care about SMU football for us to be attractive for that reason. Academically we're on par with the Pac-12, but so was BYU, and they were shunned for ideological reasons. We might be as well.

I've always thought the SEC in a 16-team format would be our best option, and there were far-fetched rumblings about it last fall- but it really doesn't make sense on their end, at least not right now. We don't bring anything to the table in terms of TV markets that A&M doesn't already bring. We'd just be another mouth to feed, I think. We would give teams a game to travel to in one of the best recruiting hotbeds in the country though, so I don't think it's out of the question entirely. We just need to work on winning games in the CUSA and Big East and, almost as importantly, filling Ford Stadium on Saturdays.

The Big 12 probably won't happen either, unfortunately. Why should they? They took TCU out of desperation, but now they're in a position of power. Clemson, FSU, Miami, Louisville, Cincy, BYU would all be ahead of us in terms of desirableness from the Big 12's standpoint. They already have the TX market completely covered.

We need to hope and pray the Big East stays together. UL and Cincy could easily be poached by the Big 12, and Rutgers and UConn will be prime ACC targets if some of their current members bail.

[Pony81]

IMO the ACC is the most likely landing place for SMU if the dominoes start falling.
The ACC will get raided by the Bg 12 and be looking for teams to replace their loses. The BE is the most likely source for those teams and since football / recruiting/ media markets rule the roost - SMU would have to be attractive to the ACC. Especially after we have shown a commitment to hiring coaches capable of winning FB and MBB.

Forget PAC 12, Big 12, SEC we do nothing for them.

[SMU89]

http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118054673?refCatId=14

[SMU89]

http://ucf.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=1370666