You should get season tickets to Temple football for as long as it lasts.Then you should visit Duke and Wake Forest football games on your free weekends.

TS2,

The day that I see ND listed in the BE standings, I'll humbly agree that you were right. Until then it's simply the convenient scheduling of a few games with BE teams as well as continued scheduling of Big 10, Pac 10 and maybe ACC and SEC teams to build a diversified geographic slate.

I think it's great that Army & Navy will also schedule some BE games. (Navy, for whom I root, can use the wins), and Army-Rutgers would be a good matchup. But it's not at all likely that Army, Navy or Villanova will actually be a part of the BE, and it's certain ND won't.

Yes convient scheduling,sounds like ND saying that bowl deals,affilated schedules and we are still independent.Likely by 2011 ND will playing 50% of its games vs BE and its independent group of Army and Navy.The new ND schedule will have 7 home games each year,1 game in the Meadowlands and 1 game in either Baltimore or Phillly.Its all about maximizing ND revenue.Yes there be h/a with Pitt and one other BE school plus h/a with USC and Michigan.

And Michigan St. And Purdue. And Stanford.

If Notre Dame is going to radically change their fb sceduling, then they may have to do some canceling of games they have already agreed to. It is not uncommon for schools to back-out of commitments for certain OOC games or when they leave one conference and embrace another. Notre Dame, while an independent, does have their regulars as Westwolf noted above. What has been heard in the press is that ND wants to play some neutral sites games (not limited to any one stadium or section of the country), have those seven or so home games, soften the slate, and play another school from the BE. They also are saying they want that national, Notre Dame image to be upheld/restored. That will all be challenging balancing act.

This will be an interesting quandry for Notre Dame if they want to radically change their football scheduling. How desirable will they be to NBC if they start paying smaller schools for home games? That said, any reports of a Big East "affiliation" really mean nothing. The reports I've seen state that ND may commit to playing 3 BE teams a year. ND plays at least 3 games a year against Big Ten schools (in many years, such as next season when they play Penn State, they play 4) and 2 to 3 games against Pac 10 teams every year. Yet, I don't see Big Ten and Pac 10 fans crowing about any supposed affiliation with Notre Dame.

Does anyone really believe that Notre Dame, the most powerful and richest football program in the country, is going to join a conference that Miami, Virginia Tech, and, worst of all, Boston College thought was inadequate? I say this (seriously) in great respect for Irish fans - there is not a more proud or arrogant group of fans in all of sports. I can guarantee you that vaunted Notre Dame will never take BC's sloppy seconds.

Illinibluedemon,

You made a good point about Notre Dame. However, in the case of BC, Notre Dame's refusal to embrace BE fb and using the conference for bb, was one factor, among others, why BC left for the ACC. BC knew they would be leaving Syracuse, Rutgers, and UCONN behind and would be doing a lot of travel down south. All this considered, they viewed the merits of the ACC outweighing a crippled (for the moment) BE for fb. Notre Dame's supposedly contribution to BE fb is promising another future game, making it three per year. In several aspects, BC's departure was more of blow to the BE than Miami and VPI leaving. It is a turf matter, and BC is deep into the northeast.

BE fb and the Big10 both need to forget Notre Dame if they plan any future expansion.

I agree with your sentiments re: BC. If BC was still in the BE, the conference could still lay a claim that it was the center for northeastern college football. Now, with Penn State in the Big Ten and BC in the ACC, that claim is severely weakened. Miami and VT joining the ACC didn't have the same geographic impact.

I've posted elsewhere that I think the BE needs a true radical transformation in order to retain its BCS bid. ND isn't joining a conference any time soon (I think they will eventually end up in the Big Ten because it makes too much sense for both parties, but that may be literally decades away or at least until ND can't get its own TV contract anymore) and no school like Penn State is going to leave the financial stability of the other 5 BCS conferences to join a BE conference in flux.

I disagree with your conclusions concerning the need for a BE re-make in order to keep the BCS.You are neglecting a number of items.The most important is the tv market served by the BE is not served by any other conference.The advertisers who support the BCS do want to forget about the NE.The next strongest conferences do not have strong tv markets.CUSA is in direct competition with the SEC/Big 12.And MWC is in direct competition with the PAC10/Big 12.Neither of these conferences are outstanding sports conferences.
Also the BE has stregthened itself by getting rid of Temple and by adding UConn and the best of CUSA to its ranks.While,ND is unlikely to join the ND and its fellow independents Army and Navy are in the process of establishing significant scheduling alliances and bowl relationships(ND already has one with the BE)

There is no conflict between the MWC and the Big 12 in Utah, New Mexico, Nevada and Wyoming. The MWC can claim nearly 1/2 of Colorado and has parts of Idaho. The MWC and the Pac 10 are not in conflict in these same states as well. The only states where there is a conflict and where the MWC footprint is burried, is in California behind the Pac 10 with SDSU and in TX with TCU with the Big 12. However, TCU could easily be the 4th TX school in the Big 12 instead of Baylor, and has a National Championship, a Heisman Trophy winner and several Cotton Bowl appearances and wins. It is one of the most traditional schools not in the BCS conferences. CUSA, MAC, and Sun Belt can't claim this out-front footprint in their conferences, the WAC as well, although they could claim the entire state of Idaho and Hawaii. All of these MWC states are growing too.

Metty,don't blur things B12 controls Texas not TCU.Colorado(B12) is the main school in Colorado not a MWC.Also the PAC 10 does pretty well in Las Vegas.Where the deer and antelope roam the MWC is king.

UNLV does well in Las Vegas. UNLV is "The Team" of Vegas. The Pac 10 does not travel well to the Las Vegas Bowl.

The MWC has 45% of the market in Colorado, as CSU is the "Iowa State" of Colorado, throw AFA and UWyo in there, and you get 45%, nearly equal. CSU's attendance is 30K, CU's attendance is 47K, AFA's attendance is 35K (with the crowd a mix of locals and national Air Force people). 30 divided by 77 is 39%. Add AFA and UWyo, which does have some support in Colorado and you get 45%, nearly equal. Things are only blurred in your brain.

Yes, the Big 12 has the Texas footprint. But TCU has a national championship, a Heisman Trophy winner and several Cotton Bowl appearances and SWC championships. It is one of the most traditional schools outside of the BCS conferences.

Texas its kind of hard to say who the 4th team really is. Alot of schools could make the case. Just depends on the time. But traditonally, the team that is probally the worst right now has had the most support in the past, SMU.

They're all relatively equal, BU, TCU, SMU, Rice and Houston. But TCU has the national championship, and the most recent SWC championship. SMU has 1 Heisman winner, as does Houston as well as TCUs. But none, except TCU has a national championship. Of all these 4, TCU has been the most competitive. Their support is all relatively the same in size. However, I believe most would say it was between Baylor, TCU and Houston for the 4th TX Big 12 school.

To the contrary, the BE is in the most competitive region in the country when it comes to media markets. Almost every BE school is trumped by another BCS school in its home market. The BE (at least for football, not basketball) provides TV markets on paper but don't deliver them in reality. The proximity of Rutgers and Syracuse to NYC means nothing - if NYC has any favorite college football teams at all (it's really not a good college sports town), they would be Notre Dame and Penn State. Philadelphia's favorite college football team is Penn State. Boston's favorite college football team is BC. Washington DC is split between Maryland, Virginia, and Virginia Tech.

Penn State is more popular than Pitt in Pittsburgh. Kentucky is more popular than U of Louisville in Louisville. Ohio State is more popular than U of Cincinnati in Cincinnati. USF garners almost no attention in the land of Miami, FSU, and Florida.

The only BE team that can claim to be #1 in its own home market is West Virginia. I don't think the TV networks are going to pay much of a premium for that. The Big Ten, ACC, SEC, and Notre Dame cover every other eastern market better than the Big East does.