NorwichCat11 wrote:
I have enjoyed reading these post's - being a newbie here. I have to agree that a 16 team model works here in jumping into Texas. This seems to be the most sound move to me. I am wondering if Houston[b] would be willing to partner with [b]U. Texas - E.P.[b] for a trip out west? If so, who would be the other two schools to come along? I am trying to keep in mind that [b]SMU[b] and [b]Tulsa[b] want to probably go play in the Big East with [b]Tulane[b]. The next schools in the area would be - [b]Rice, Texas State, U. Texas - S.A., U. North Texas[b]. Which of these schools might be the best fit? I am also bearing in mind that [b]Texas State[b] beat [b]Houston[b] in their opening game of the 2012 season. Does this make [b]Texas State[b] more or less a partner to be number 15 or 16?[/b][/b][/b][/b][/b][/b][/b][/b][/b][/b][/b][/b][/b][/b][/b][/b][/b]
Welcome to the board, quick tip, write everything you're saying then highlight what you want bolded and click the
BOLD button, that'll save you from all those ["b"]s. (if you're manually doing it put the ["/b"] at the end.)
IF we are talking 16 team MWC w/o the private schools like Tulsa/SMU I think Rice is also out, the nBE will want them to fill Houston's void so I think you're looking at UTEP, UTSA, North Texas, Texas St, and NMSU (not Texas but another option)
Immediately I think you pick UTEP over NMSU, and UTSA over Texas St. Those markets/demos are just too close together but they'd probably get a CUSA invite out of it so don't get bad for them.
So Houston is obvious #13 and I think UTEP is #14 when you take into account that they are in the Mountain Time Zone, with El Paso they'd help dominate Far West Texas/New Mexico with UNM, own the Sun Bowl Stadium, and have had great fan attendence for years. You can make an argument that UTSA is better already with record year 1 attendence, playing in the Alamo Dome, and big demo/market. Still I have a hard time thinking that UTSA/UNT or UTEP/UNT would be valued enough to warrent an invite as 15/16. Plus it makes it harder for BYU to ever come back...I know its a longshot but still.
I think 14 would be a solid number for the MWC who you could split into the Mountain division with UtahSt/WYO/CSU/AFA/UNM/UTEP/Houston and the West division Hawaii/SDSU/Fresno/SJSU/UNLV/Nevada/Boise
And while yes at 16 you can slide over Utah St and add 2 Texas schools I don't think its worth it at this time. When the TV contract is up and BYU has said no for 5 years then I'd think it might be time to expand again and one of the Montanas or UC Davis/CalPoly might want to come on board then.
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Fan of the Big 12 Conference, the Mountain West Conference and...
