PonyFans.com

If we're concerning ourselves with joining a conference that includes the likes of UNC-Charlotte, UTSA or UMass our leaders are dropping the ball big time. No disrespect to the schools mentioned above but we all want and expect SMU to join the big boy table, and joining a conference with schools that have never been there is going to do nothing to help our cause.

As of now, SMU, Houston and Rice are the only schools in the nation in the modern era that have been in and played in "major conference" college football, and are now on the outside looking in. My apologies to Rice, but SMU and Houston should have smart enough people with all we have to offer to get us there. Athletically, the next couple of years are the most crucial in the history of the school. We shall see......

LA_Mustang wrote:As of now, SMU, Houston and Rice are the only schools in the nation in the modern era that have been in and played in "major conference" college football, and are now on the outside looking in.

Was not Tulane in the SEC at one time not all that long ago?

PK wrote: Was not Tulane in the SEC at one time not all that long ago?

Yeah, they got booted. Amazing their home stadium (bulldozed) seated 80,000.

I keep seeing UMASS and TULSA as the 2 possible additions should the BE expand. I do not understand those 2 additions. If the BE thinks that UMass = UConn, they are sorely mistaken. And Tulsa, while having great on-field success, does very little to move the needle on market, TV sets, or attendance.

Losing UCONN and CINCY, only to be replaced by UMASS and Tulsa, is a lose-lose. USM, while located in a smaller tv market, has that rural, rabid cfb fanbase (much like ECU). I like mixing in some of those schools with the urban schools.

Tulsa has won 8+ games in Football 8 times in a little over a decade. They are also competitive in BB over the years. This is getting silly.

WOW! I wasn't aware that Tulane was in the SEC at one time but they were from 1932-1966.

Tulane was a charter member of the SEC (as was the Universtiy of the South "Sewanee", GaTech and Vandy). In 1966 the university president decided to quit the SEC as he felt his school was at a disadvantage with its high academic requirements as compared to the other SEC schools.

This may have been the second dumbest decision in college football after Pye's decision to try to eliminate football at SMU by institutional overregulation.

Why do you think the 80,000 seat Sugar Bowl was on their campus?

ponyte wrote:In 1966 the university president decided to quit the SEC as he felt his school was at a disadvantage with its high academic requirements as compared to the other SEC schools.

This may have been the second dumbest decision in college football after Pye's decision to try to eliminate football at SMU by institutional overregulation.

You got that right.

Bergermeister wrote:

PK wrote: Was not Tulane in the SEC at one time not all that long ago?

Yeah, they got booted. Amazing their home stadium (bulldozed) seated 80,000.

Tulane, in possibly the single worst all-time decision in terms of conference affiliation, voluntarily chose to leave the SEC for the admitted reason that they didn't want to have to compete. Here is the reasons that Sewanee, Georgia Tech, and Tulane left:
http://blog.al.com/bn/2008/02/southeast ... harte.html

After they left, not only did they devalue athletics, but they were a land-locked university (and still are) and needed more space for academic buildings and dorms. This, and the recent building of the Superdome, led them to level Tulane Stadium, where they had played Sugar and Super Bowls in.

Sometimes I sit back and wonder who is more incompetent... Is it the leaders of the Big East, or is it our own administration? I understand the move of telling the MWC we are committed to the Big East for '13 however to tell them that we aren't interested under any circumstance is laughable and just stupid. If we have to pay an exit fee either way, it makes sense to at least play one year with the big boys instead of paying the fee for nothing at all. I can even see the argument that what is left (even after all the defections) is about even with what MWC currently has (that’s without San Diego State) so we might as well play in the Eastern Time zone etc... Problem is that in about 2 weeks SDS will be back in the MWC and in less than 2 years Cincy/Uconn will be gone. At that point, not only is MWC a superior conference, it isn't even close. I love SMU and have 2 degrees from there however I am not even delusional enough to think that we have any shot of being selected by a power conference. We are about a decade to late and TCU took the "little kid-ill take you because of where you are spot" from the pool of applicants. The quicker everyone realizes that, the better off we will be. So when the Big East crumbles (and it will) the MWC will have the "best of the rest" spot at the BCS table every year and we will be on the outside looking in. So telling the MWC conf to shove it is idiotic considering we may be begging them to consider us in 18 months.

Also, we have now completely given the keys to the car to the University of Houston in conference realignment caravan. If Houston decides to bail on Big East tomorrow and go to MWC, what do we do then? Now that we showed our cards, U of H is basically the New Boise St on determining what happens to the Big East when I think we would all agree that we should be the ones in that position.

Bottom Line: We almost by a miracle made it into a relevant conference... bad timing and unforeseen defections turned our really good situation turn into a really bad one. Now an argument could be make that our situation is worse than before if we get left out in the cold and spend tons of money on exit fees and upgrades. It is likely that the winner from the MWC will be in the BCS year in and year out and we just told them to shove it... Way to go Turner and Co!

PK wrote:

LA_Mustang wrote:As of now, SMU, Houston and Rice are the only schools in the nation in the modern era that have been in and played in "major conference" college football, and are now on the outside looking in.

Was not Tulane in the SEC at one time not all that long ago?

They left the SEC in 1966 to go independent...............

LA_Mustang wrote:As of now, SMU, Houston and Rice are the only schools in the nation in the modern era that have been in and played in "major conference" college football, and are now on the outside looking in.

In addition to all the Tulane mentions, Idaho and Montana played in the predecessor of the PAC-12 before effectively being kicked out in the 1950s.

Additionally, one of the reasons they left was because of the 'Katie bar the door' cheating in the SEC. Can you just imagine that - the SEC cheating?! LOL!!!

How quickly we forget our past. We were bascially screwed over by the MWC teams when they left the WAC. Our fans have no interest in playing at Wyo, UNM, Reno, SJSU, CSU etc. We have NOTHING in common with the MWC schools. We would be the only private. We would be about 100 spots up acadmically from the closest member (AFA notwithstanding). We would be a geographical outlier. We are urban, they are range schools. I could go on and on. This is not the MWC of Utah, TCU, BYU and Boise. This is the WAC.

I have zero interest in the MWC, stability be damned. Go East, stcik with like-minded institutions. Big East has been and will always be the call up league to the Power 5. Aside form Utah, no one has gone straight from the MWC to the big time. Big East can point to Pitt, Cuse, Louisville, WVU, TCU, Rutgers, Louisville (and likely Cincy/Uconn at some point).