Little Danny wrote:

goosebumps wrote: Just seems strange to me seeing all the BE bashing done on this forum then they open their arms for one of their teams.

Goosebumps,

You know as good as I do it is acceptable to trash the Big East, its teams, its players, its coaches and it's schools academics. That is why everyone wants the teams (Pitt, Rutgers, Syracuse, UCONN) and its former and current coaches (RichRod, Brian Kelly, Dantonio, Schiano, Edsall and soon to be Charlie Strong, Butch Jones).

The Big East was supposed to fold after Miami, BC, and VT left. Pretty much every analyst is afraid to eat crow and admit that theyre legitamate. Most College Football "fans" don't watch games and just regurgitate what they hear from the analysts. Who are proven wrong again and again. Cincinnati losing the last two BCS bowl games doesn't help the BE argument, but I know of other conferences that don't do so well in BCS games...

The perception is what it is and not getting the coon dog snot kicked out of you against Florida further hi-lighted what people think. Now if you want, you can go back and find all the bowl games that the Big East played before New Years Day over the last five years and their records and thump your chest about it, but at the end of the day the perception won't have changed one bit. This remains the Big East's biggest problem concerning football.

The question is what are they doing about it? I thought I read where their bowl tie-ins were going to improve, but I don't recall what it was. More importantly, I think they need to do what is necessary to keep what schools they have. It's obvious that the vultures are looking to add to their conferences, I think the move to larger conferences is something not only the Big 10 is looking to do. The BCS will be looking at AQ status at the end of '11 season to add additional conferences, not to exceed 7 in total. The BE as well as the rest of the conferences contracts run through '13. If the BE wants to keep that status they need to do something IMO, cause the wolves are at the door.

There are other issues too concerning pre-season rankings that are also based to a degree from the perception the conference has. As Danny pointed out, there are a lot of coaches coming through the Big East, what is the conference doing to keep from being anything more than a stepping stone to bigger and better things?

You're right, the Big East does need to take action... and soon.

I read an article on ESPN not long ago about how (Maybe Schlabach?) thinks college football will evolve over the next 10 years. Basically he thinks The Big Ten will steal Mizzou, The Big 12 will replace them with TCU. The Pac 10 takes in Boise and Utah. The Big East take UCF, ECU, Memphis, and Nova transitions to FBS.

Personally I think that the Pac 10 wins in that scenario.

Mizzou won't win the Big 10, but will help with depth a little bit.

The Big 12 doesn't change really. Except maybe some more rivalry games in the state of Texas. TCU improves its recruiting by becoming a bcs team.

The Big East improves. UCF is in very fertile recruiting territory and should really improve as a team.
ECU, Memphis, and Nova would all benefit greatly by becoming BCS schools.

Personally I think The Big East picks up Temple (again) Tries to get Boston College back (they regret leaving) and goes after ECU and UCF.

I don't think the Pac 10 get boise or Utah, but rather Boise and Fresno go to the MWC.

Gaining those I doubt helps the perception at all, but that said it won't be enough for the Big East to lose AQ status, the conference does make substantial money, and the evaluation begins following '11 season so they should be safe. There will be some moves though I think that is damn near a lock.

Azubuike24 wrote: Kentucky would make sense in the Big Ten geographically and as an overall athletic program, it would be a quality addition. However, I just don't see them wanting to leave the revenue they get from the SEC and being able to promote themselves as an SEC football school. I actually think for other sports, they would be much better off, especially in basketball, baseball and a few others.

I thought Missouri made the most sense, but Pittsburgh is a solid choice. There were certainly many other "worse" choices in my eyes.

In terms of geography and athletics yes, Kentucky makes sense.

BUT as an institution of learning they absolutely do not. There is not one school in the Big 10 that UK can be considered better than academically which is going to be a big deal for the Big 10 as it is not only an athletic conference. The academic reputation of any school up for consideration is going to play much bigger in the expansion talk than a lot of people want to give credit.

Besides they are fine in the SEC. [/i]

ytownfootball wrote: The perception is what it is and not getting the coon dog snot kicked out of you against Florida further hi-lighted what people think. Now if you want, you can go back and find all the bowl games that the Big East played before New Years Day over the last five years and their records and thump your chest about it, but at the end of the day the perception won't have changed one bit. This remains the Big East's biggest problem concerning football.

The question is what are they doing about it? I thought I read where their bowl tie-ins were going to improve, but I don't recall what it was. More importantly, I think they need to do what is necessary to keep what schools they have. It's obvious that the vultures are looking to add to their conferences, I think the move to larger conferences is something not only the Big 10 is looking to do. The BCS will be looking at AQ status at the end of '11 season to add additional conferences, not to exceed 7 in total. The BE as well as the rest of the conferences contracts run through '13. If the BE wants to keep that status they need to do something IMO, cause the wolves are at the door.

There are other issues too concerning pre-season rankings that are also based to a degree from the perception the conference has. As Danny pointed out, there are a lot of coaches coming through the Big East, what is the conference doing to keep from being anything more than a stepping stone to bigger and better things?

The BE needs to a) split from the basketball only schools and b) increase revenue through a TV package c) stengthen their OOC play (this means you Rutgers) and bowl bids and d) gain large market teams with interest in the BE and who will bring some credence to BE athletics, ie. BC, MD, Navy or possibly UCF or Temple. Please note, the revenue side of it is the most important in keeping the BE together. As it stands right now, the BE is very unstable. Any of the eight football teams would be foolish not to take an invite to either the B10, ACC or any other AQ conference.

paulspadafora wrote:

mucalum49 wrote:While in football Pitt may have up and down seasons the fans boast that the men's basketball team has the 4th best record of any college in the past decade.

Thank you for pointing that out; everyone else seems to have missed that. Pitt has some nice facilities but the lack of their own football stadium will hurt them not to mention they will rarely be the biggest show in town. College athletes aren't worshiped in Pittsburgh like the are in other big 10 cities. They will always be out-recruited by most of those schools.

i remember when the likes of , marino , dorsett, mark may , hugh green bill fralic just to name a few played at pitt . these guys walked on water in the burgh. i find it difficult to believe that college athletes arent worshipped in the pittsburgh

so no pitt?

I would rather have Missou or Nebraska, but Pitt is better than nothing. If it's going to happen I'd say it won't be until early 2011.

yeah...what ever happened to this february 4th announcement?

NOL fan wrote: yeah...what ever happened to this february 4th announcement?

+1

Looks like the big ten and Texas have been talking about Texas joining the Big10.

http://www.elevenwarriors.com/2010/02/source-big-ten-texas-exchanging-numbers.html

File this under tenuous at best, but sources tell Tom Keenan at the Lawrence Journal World that very preliminary talks about Texas joining the Big Ten have taken place. This wouldn’t mark the first time, as the two first flirted almost 2 decades ago. Regardless of the seriousness of the talks, at the very least, this represents the baby steps in a necessary dialogue with easily the best potential target out there.

Make no mistake about it: Texas is the whale, not Notre Dame.