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Guest #1Stunner

Conference USA on the verge of collapse?

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The change that will be coming which no one wants to admit is within probably 10 years or so we are going to see Division I split once again. So then what we will have is Division I, Division I-A and then Division I-AA. With each playing by their own rules.

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1 hour ago, #1Stunner said:

The article says what you are saying (G5 expansion) is a mistake.  Contraction into smaller regional conferences, not expansion, is what they are talking about.  Even the Big12 avoided expansion because of geographic proximity.

If the MWC contracted into smaller leagues, with easier travel, it'd look something like this.

 

PACIFIC COAST CONFERENCE (would lose the front range for a focus on CA, ID, NV, and UT)

1--UNLV

2--NEVADA

3--SDSU

4--HAWAII

5--SJSU

6--FRESNO

7--BOISE

8--USU

9-- ?? IDAHO

 

Wannabe elitist fukkers...

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I think the MWC is well situated as far as travel goes. For the most part. Hawaii throws it off a bit, but at football only, it's not a huge deal. Expanding to Texas is, IMO, a mistake. That increases things quite a bit. But right now, Boise to New Mexico (maybe?) is about the largest travel we have for Oly sports. That's not too bad, considering other conferences.

I do think big changes are coming, but our conference may actually stay intact. Unless we do something stupid like expand (unless it's BYU, which is the only real option inside of our current geographical footprint).

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27 minutes ago, UofMTigers said:

but didn't the MAC just get a bump in pay from ESPN?

I know CUSA was reduced, but that was expected as all of their money making programs left for the AAC.

I believe they did, but it was a few years ago.  I don't believe the MW is looking at an increased deal.  ESPN is cutting fat right and left. 

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1 hour ago, UofMTigers said:

"All of these mid major programs betting on increasing funds from future TV deals will fall by the wayside. "

I do not agree. If I'm ESPN I would rather give the MAC, AAC, and MWC small bumps in pay to air their cheap inventory on ESPN2/U/News as they still draw viewers...I would start cutting back on these obnoxious P5 TV deals...that's where you can save your money.

We'll see what happens when he MW and AAC deals come up again but I don't think it is going to be good news for either conference.  The AAC will be a little better positioned due to population but I doubt your deal goes higher, or if it does it will be minimal.

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2 hours ago, #1Stunner said:

They said their league is "unsustainable".

They are basically talking about breaking up their league into smaller, more regional conferences.   Or alternatively, combining conferences, to make pseudo "small conferences", by playing in regional divisions in a large conference.

This would save them a lot of money on travel.  

Basically says there is no reason for a G5 conference, with much less money, to have teams in Texas and teams in Virginia.  That model of covering a huge area only makes sense in leagues like the ACC, B1G, or SEC, which have a lot more money.  

It's interesting, though because the American and MWC has that spread out geography.

Yeah, I don't think "collapse" is too strong a word.

Good find but you should have included all of the column. The more talk there is of consolidating things to try to keep conferences financially solvent the more likely it is to happen and become a trend which eventually results in creation of an NCAA BOR division. Not a case of if but when and as I've said for months, the dominoes are likely to begin falling in about 2025.

Boom goes the dynamite.

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Conference USA and the Sun Belt are both situations where the majority of the schools would be better served with 65 scholarships rather than 85.  FCS is still Division I and football is an expensive sport so I see no reason to deride schools who play football; feel free to deride schools without a football team all you want ;[)

The Sun Belt is actually in a better spot than CUSA because they are more geographically compact.  It's possible the Western CUSA schools and the Sun Belt would be a pretty decent mid major.  Marshall is really the one in trouble if CUSA collapses - they spent so long trying to not be in the MAC and now that would be an absolutely ideal situation for that school.

Nothing in this story is real until the leagues meet in late May, but the article makes you think that administrators are laying the groundwork now to do what the article describes in some form or fashion.

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2 hours ago, UofMTigers said:

CUSA went from a TV deal of 1.1 million per team, per year, with programs like Memphis basketball and Houston football...to a TV deal that pays under 250k per team, per year...I just don't see the attraction for the Sun Belt schools anymore.

What the Sun Belt schools have going for them is the great love for football in the South which just doesn't exist elsewhere. Take a look at the map and you can pretty much color in 14 states from West Virginia through Ohio (not technically a southern state, I admit) down through Tennessee into Arkansas and then Oklahoma and Texas and the statewide love for college football is much greater than in the rest of the country. The conclusion to be drawn is that SBC schools will always play football even if they drop back down to the FCS level and the same is true of the CUSA schools. In contrast, I can see about 25% of the MAC schools just dropping the sport rather than playing it at the FCS level and I see absolutely no way that a school like SDSU would ever seriously consider playing at the FCS level. I know that as an alumnus I'd much rather we just drop the sport and funnel whatever money is saved into men's basketball and baseball.

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Boom goes the dynamite.

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1 hour ago, wolfpack1 said:

The change that will be coming which no one wants to admit is within probably 10 years or so we are going to see Division I split once again. So then what we will have is Division I, Division I-A and then Division I-AA. With each playing by their own rules.

You mean somebody else besides me on this board has finally come to admit that? Damn have things changed.

Boom goes the dynamite.

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1 hour ago, Dimwhit said:

I think the MWC is well situated as far as travel goes. For the most part. Hawaii throws it off a bit, but at football only, it's not a huge deal. Expanding to Texas is, IMO, a mistake.

Not a mistake at all if there was somebody worth adding but Rice, UTEP, North Texas, UTSA and probably also Texas State would be next to useless.

Although perhaps not to Craig Thompson if he can convince his idiot bosses to add a couple of them while bumping up his salary.

Boom goes the dynamite.

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26 minutes ago, SleepingGiantsFan said:

Not a mistake at all if there was somebody worth adding but Rice, UTEP, North Texas, UTSA and probably also Texas State would be next to useless.

Add SMU to that list.

I think Houston is the only possible team that would be a positive addition, and they just have no reason to want to move conferences.

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34 minutes ago, SleepingGiantsFan said:

You mean somebody else besides me on this board has finally come to admit that? Damn have things changed.

I have been saying it for a while, however I think only once or twice on the board

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Just now, Dimwhit said:

Add SMU to that list.

I think Houston is the only possible team that would be a positive addition, and they just have no reason to want to move conferences.

Agree. SMU might be the most overrated G5 in the country. Granted SMU has an endowment bigger than God's but it has never expressed an intention to use the endowment on its sports teams, the Mustangs don't draw flies for their football games anymore (<21K per game in 2015), their enrollment is #107 of the 128 FBS schools and just how long are the Pony Excess guys going to continue to fund a $2M contract for losing head coaches?

Boom goes the dynamite.

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4 minutes ago, Dimwhit said:

Add SMU to that list.

I think Houston is the only possible team that would be a positive addition, and they just have no reason to want to move conferences.

Houston and SMU are going to end in the Big 12

 

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Just now, SleepingGiantsFan said:

Agree. SMU might be the most overrated G5 in the country. Granted SMU has an endowment bigger than God's but it has never expressed an intention to use the endowment on its sports teams, the Mustangs don't draw flies for their football games anymore (<21K per game in 2015), their enrollment is #107 of the 128 FBS schools and just how long are the Pony Excess guys going to continue to fund a $2M contract for losing head coaches?

SMU just spent over 45 million to renovate Moody Coliseum...It's very nice.

Moody.jpg

they have a nice football facility in Gerald Ford Stadium.

b10cff70e6cbaa950af233ef28c7e806.jpg

massive metro population, in a wealthy area of Dallas...

mem skyline sig.jpeg

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