westwolf,

I have been upset with the ACC for nearly a decade because the ACC like the current Big 12 had a potential chance to minimize or stop the expansion cycle(raiding other conferences to get to the required number of 12 to play a football championship games). When Duke and NC voted against initial ACC expansion to 12 schools, there was a compromise to only take Miami for 10 schools. Both Duke and NC were in agreement with this compromise and would have voted for Miami only for a 10 school alignment.

The ACC could not resist and just had to keep up with Jones (SEC). Ironically you had schools like Florida State pushing for this ACC championship game and 12 teams when the same school fled the SEC plans when expansion to avoid the 12 team type alignments. South Carolina became the SEC school in place of Florida State.

This is the same Florida State that is now posing threats to possibly imploding the ACC to jump to and push the Big 12 back to 12 schools. Something the Big 12 is in public resisting expansion back to 12 schools to allow a championship game.

Had the ACC expanded with 10 schools and latter pushed the NCAA to change this most destructive rule ever created that serves no purpose but to destroy conferences, and allow a championship game with 10 members, the Big Ten and Pac 10 may have realized we do not need 12, 14, or 16 members and can still play a championship game if necessary. Ditto Big East!

I do not understand why the ACC could not have taken the time to push the NCAA to change the rule and allow championship game with 10 members.

Just think with 10 members we could still have round robin ACC basketball which made that conference so special. See I do not hate the ACC.

It will not take long and maybe in the first year of new BCS playoff a higher ranked team is going to lose to a lower ranked team in the conference football championship game and miss out on the BCS final four championship playoff as a result of having to play this overrated game. The ACC is primed for this to occur if history repeats itself.

Resisting the urge or push for expanding back to 12 is going to potentially make the Big 12 the envy of the other power leagues.

If the Big 12 someday changes its mind and wants a championship game, then take the time and push the NCAA to change the rule a split into five team divisions.

I mean what is wrong with playing round robin football and having two division team champions face off in five team division split.

Northwest: Oklahoma, Okla State, Kansas, Kansas State, Iowa State
Southeast: Texas, Texas Tech, TCU, Baylor, West Virginia

If the other leagues that have expanded to 12 or a ridicules size of 14 do not like it let them go pound salt and shed some dead weight if they want to get back to a perfect conference size of 10 members.

There's nothing wrong with it, Lash, but the die has been cast. I just hope that they can stay at a maximum of 14 (12 preferably) with 2 divisions and the prospect of playing all other conference members at least once during a student's expected term at the college. (Granted that seems to have moved from 4 years to almost 6 these days).
The SEC has already moved to a 6 year cycle. When this wave of expansion started with the Big 10 announcement, I wrote that if you didn't play all other schools regularly, what was the point of having a conference?
IMHO superconferences would ruin CFBas we have known it and enjoyed it so much.

Interesting take on the disinterest among ACC recruits in playing against Big 12 schools

http://csnbbs.com/showthread.php?tid=573984

Yeah...this is something that runs against the "go national" approach of certain conference expansion pundits, fans, and market thinkers who don't see value in picking up a school in the same state or something adjacent that doesn't necessarily add the perceived large value conferences assume they would (think Pitt or Missouri to the B1G). And the schools, conferences, and networks are the ones not getting it, not the kids.

The grim and telling truth of today's economics-savvy yet infantile myopia would do away with a Pittsburgh-WV game if it wasn't known as the Backyard Brawl through its long and storied life. Today, it would be seen as economic suicide putting these schools in the same conference because they dilute an already marginal market. It's regional. Niche. Irrelevant.

All that is to say...if Clemson and Florida State aren't entertaining these overtures, they are truly wise...because they, unlike many, get it.

This is an interesting article from CBS’s Dodd which got me to thinking about Notre Dame rumor connections to the Big 12. The article also mentioned Tulane’s undefeated team that missed out on the BCS championship game.

http://www.cbssports.com/collegefootbal ... ess-access

The Big 12 so far has been decisive with preferring 10 members and round robin schedules with the exception of Notre Dame. If Notre Dame called the Big 12 has explicitly stated they would answer. Of course most leagues would obviously do the same.

If Notre Dame joined the Big 12 as a full member would the conference hold up at 11 or expand back to 12?

This may be a scenario where the rumor of Tulane could make sense if the Big 12 wanted or needed a 12th school.

Cutter, certainly a good point on the "go national" saga.
I understood that Pitt expressed a couple on months or so back they would not be playing the backyard brawl due to their new ACC scheduling and preference to continue playing Notre Dame instead as an OOC game.

Edit: After look up, Pitt does not have (yet) future games with WVU scheduled.
Pitt-Penn State play in 2016 & 2017.
WVU will be playing Maryland and East Carolina for an extended period.

Chip Brown article discussing today's BCS meetings in Chicago and possibility that ND may decide to move non-FB to Big 12 if they are "frozen out" of FB playoffs.Link at http://texas.rivals.com/content.asp?CID ... &PT=4&PR=2

This article actually makes a lot of sense and is based on actual comments that have come from the Big 12 commissioners backing up these comments.

Let the BCS four team playoff decisions get worked out and see if Notre Dame needs to change conferences.

If Notre Dame does not have to join a football league based on the new BCS changes currently getting ironed out, the school never will need to give up football independence for the foreseeable future.

Having Notre Dame join any league would make any school envious to be the other member of an expansion pair. Hey

It would very hard for Florida State to turn down admission into any league that included Notre Dame football. It could very well be the Big Ten jumping in to try and expand with both of these schools. Or there was the rumor another ACC school approached the Big Ten about possible membership when all the instability issues started to service concerning the ACC losing schools.

Could the Big Ten make a last pitch and go after the U of Maryland as an expansion pair with Notre Dame?

Without Notre Dame, Florida State may find it too difficult to overcome the challenges of leaving the ACC and paying such a high price to do so. It is a no win situation. Remain in the ACC and fall further behind your major competition in the SEC or move to the Big 12 and face other type of obstacles.

Regardless of what happens with the current BCS changes, the ACC and all of its members have huge mountain to climb in reaching football respectability. Having the ACC champion play every year in the Orange Bowl is not going to help improve ACC perception with football.

If Notre Dame remains independent and the ACC schools decide it is too much of a change to move to another league.

The Big 12 can then sit back and evaluate its options which is probably to expand back to 12 schools and play a championship game.

There is the old standby rumor of expanding with Louisville and BYU or taking the academic route with expansion that could include both Rice and Tulane.

North: Oklahoma, Okla State, Kansas, Kan State, Iowa State, WVU
South: Texas, Texas Tech, Baylor, TCU, Rice, Tulane

-or-

East: Oklahoma, Okla State, TCU, Baylor, WVU, Louisville
West: Texas, Texas Tech, Kansas, Kan State, Iowa State, BYU

-or- if the Big 12 gets lucky

East: Notre Dame, Florida State, WVU, Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State
West: Texas, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, TCU, Baylor, Texas Tech

Any of three options would be very good for the Big 12 to get back to 12 members and be consistent with the other power leagues.

No matter how much we restate the value of 10 members and round robin football, Texas Cowboy Stadium is just waiting to host this potential conference championship game with winner advancing to the BCS final four or Champions Bowl and Plus one.

Perhaps more than the playoff model itself, how the revenue distribution will be determined and enacted, will be a source of considerable tension.
This is where Notre Dame excels, assuring themselves a nice chunk of the pot as a lone institution; never mind there are other independents such as Army and BYU.

The Big12 offering Notre Dame housing for non-fb sports without playing conference fb would have to have a catch. Those Texans and Okies are savvy when it comes to this stuff; and the implication would be ND "eventually" joins in fb also. The B12 shall allow all sorts of tier and individual TV rights for ND, but there will be expectations.

It won't be a BE situtation of delusional and disappointing expectations per fb contributions.

Notre Dame wants to stay fb independent; hope that the BE does not lose any more all-sports members (plays into the L'ville factor) such as UCONN & Rutgers; keep bb, etc. in the BE which still has some decent competition/exposure; get favorable access to any playoff/top bowl arrangement; and get their healthy and unique distribution from the playoff process, including distributions in sub-par years.

ND will get what they want. Too many enablers for anything otherwise. ND can play one against the other in the politics of it, commit to nothing from new suitors, and add a few more "zeros" to the left side of the decimal point for what's headed to the bank.

Because that's not why the rule was put in.

It wasn't put in to make money. It was put in to ensure that schools who decide to form conferences could fairly determine a champion. The idea was that with 7-8-9-10-11 you had enough games in the then 10-game NCAA schedule to determine a conference champion via round-robin play.

With 12 teams, an 11-game conference schedule was impossible in a 10-game season. So the idea was round-robin divisions and a conference championship to decide the overall champ.

It's incredible that these types of things have morphed into what they are now (in all sports). The schedule in MLB was dictated by playing everyone the same number of times. They went to 162 games when they added teams. Somewhere, they decided "we can't add games to continue our fair play, so we have to make divisions" and THAT was fair for a while... but it's not anymore.

Now, no league in the Big Four North American pro-sports, and very few college conferences in football and basketball have fair schedules. The Big XII with 10 teams is one of the few that do: single-round robin in football, double-round in basketball.

I don't see why the NCAA should change the rule solely to let conferences more easily manage the additions to their conferences, which were made for purely monetary reasons.

This rule is the last bastion of "fairness comes before money" administrative rules we have in college sports. And it should continue.

If anything, the rules should go back the other way.

_________________
1897-1898 | 1900-06 | 1926-27 | 1929-30 | 1939 | 1942

Hockey will have very close to a balanced schedule next year when they go to 8 + 8 + 7 + 7.
There will actually be 4 conferences.
The one thing not yet figured out will be the 3rd round of playoffs, when the champs of each of he 4 conferneces are paired (somehow) into the 2 Stanley Cup Semi-Final rounds.

Baseball has a chance to balance the schedule next year, as well. The Houston Astros will be moving to the AL West, to give each division 5 teams.
Inter-league play will be happening contnously for some teams to avoid having BYEs. the details have not been announced yet, but I suspect each division will play one division from the other league.
The current inter-league format is GROSSLY UNFAIR, and I think there was a lot of sentiment to ditch it.

The best format in my opinion is round-robin (or better, double-round robin for sports that have enough games per season).
Once you go to divisions and lose the round robin, you almost have separate conferences.
If the SEC, ACC... went to 16 and had two 8-team divisions, they'd be effectively two conferences under one umbrella.
Not sure that is a bad thing.
However, any cross-division games create an un-balanced schedule that can be unfair.
I think Spurrier suggested at the last SEC meeting to treat cross-division games as OOC games (not counting in league standings).
His suggestion would make it fair. Alabama gts to play Tennessee every year (as rivals), yet Tennessee would not be
penalized in the standings for having to deal with Alabama every year. That seems fair.

And it is consistent with the SEC divisions effectively being treated as two conferences under one umbrella.

Once confernces went beyond 10 (SEC did it first), you lose the round-robin.
And we all see the symmetry of brackets and powers of 2. So a playoff works out best with an even number of conferneces.
2,4,8,16.... Maybe 8 conferences of 10 (with round robins) works great, but we can't revese realignment, once everyone is going beyond ten schools.
But 4 conferneces with two divisions of 6,7,8,9,10 do work in terms of plugging into brackets.
It's just that each division really doesn't interact that much iwth the other, effectively 2 conferneces instead of one.

In 14 or 16 conference, could give some meaning to cross division games that would not regularly count in the divisional championship. Let the cross-division record serve as a tie-breaker rather than just head to head wins.

One problem with cross-division games that would not count other than the overall record, is that some SEC schools are hooked with "preferred rivals" (for at least one of the two), while others less so, particularly those that may be less central geographically. Also, the conference "no count" cross-over games(s) for the divisional record, gives such games less meaning and could, in certain situations, generate less interest and viewership.

In the SEC, it's some of the big powers that complain most about cross-division games involving MSU, Ole Miss, Kentucky, Vandy, etc., those that are in the running for divisional titles less frequently.

Yet, some of the biggies will pad their schedules with 3 or 4 OOC games that look almost shameful. Of couse, that's not all unique to the SEC.

I'd like to see all BCS-type schools play at least one BCS type from another conference each year. In the SEC, certain schools already have one: UGA-GT, UF-FSU, So. Car.-Clemson, UK-L'ville, and even Vandy-WFU. Alabama, Auburn, Tenn., LSU, MSU, Ole Miss., Ark., can escape the permanent OOCs'. To be fair, each does play at times high-powered OOC's such as LSU-Oregon, or Alabama-Penn State.

End of season OOC rivalry games are often hurdles for UF, UGA, and So. Car., whereas others are finishing up with a divisional rival.

OOC's for Texas A&M (UT) and Mizzou (KU), would be nice to see implemented (renewed rivalries) and could be a part of a scheduling requirement per OOC games.

The B1G and PAC12 are planning on coop scheduling. The problem for the SEC to do such, it could make sense with five to seven ACC schools, but the mostly western SEC schools would have a better association to do such with B12 types.

I for one really miss the round robins of 10 members. But for different reasons than most. I miss them because they represented what to me was the most important thing in order to eventually fix the overall college football system: equality.

With round robins, you could play all the members of your conference. No advantages for anyone other than the luck of being at home in a given year. But everyone has the opportunity to play all the same teams every year to decide the conference winner.

But no more.

It's why I like the idea of 16 school conferences. 8/8 membership means you play all 7 of your division mates and 1 game versus the other division. Even better would be 18 or 20, with 8 or 9 division games and ZERO cross division.

Many hate the idea. I like it.

What needs to be embraced for it to work is that you CAN have TWO conferences for all intents and purposes, but operating under ONE banner. The almost Pac-16 was an example: you could have had the Texas 2, Oklahoma 2 and the Arizona 2 in a single division.

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Agree with your sentiments, Quinn.

I think the PAC-16 was shot down largely because Colorado and Utah (who would 've been in the PAC-16 East with the Az, OK, and TX schools) were vehemently opposed.
I think they worried about becoming perrenial doormats.
Jon Wilmer wrote about it in the aftermath, and said that those 2 schools felt they wouldn't get the California recruits because Utah & Colorado wouldn't have many cross-division
games vs. west coast schools, and the TX and OK schools would gobble up all the best recruits from Texas.

Clemson pops the balloon.



Wilkins is the BoT Chair.

...and the WV boards still don't believe it. Fools.