Buzz Williams leaving Marquette for Va Tech

[jays911]

Buzz leaving had zilch to do with ratings. No loss, by the way. He had as much talent as anyone in the new BE, and didn't do squat. This league will be fine. The Jays will reload, Butler has a great class, SJ will be tough as hell, etc.

[PMThor]

After what he said about the Big East, then I say good riddance. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

[LeMoyne00]

If we only lose him this or next year... then it was him, if we lose more coaches... then it's a conference issue and the coaches don't have faith in it anymore.

Whether it's leadership, direction, the lack of visibility or whatever. Our presidents signed a deal with the devil for the $$$$$. Fox promotes its FS1 on all of its networks and its prime time ratings are up slightly, but its overall daily ratings aren't much higher than when it was the Speed Network. That won't pay the bills of the hundreds of millions / billions they've spent on product over the next decade. The semi-finals of the Big East tourney got soundly beat by regular season NHL hockey game in the ratings. The championship game pulled in 702,000 viewers making it the most watched college sports event on FS1. The next day Sprint race coverage, which is existing shows from when the network was Speed had over 3 million viewers. So the Big East Championship game only had 17.7% of the Sunday race crowd and UFC only had 257,000 viewers... so basically if its not afternoon/early evening race coverage viewership of FS1 disappears! That is a serious problem in my eyes - the types of people who watch one, aren't watching the other programs.

[stever20]

If we only lose him this or next year... then it was him, if we lose more coaches... then it's a conference issue and the coaches don't have faith in it anymore.

Whether it's leadership, direction, the lack of visibility or whatever. Our presidents signed a deal with the devil for the $$$$$. Fox promotes its FS1 on all of its networks and its prime time ratings are up slightly, but its overall daily ratings aren't much higher than when it was the Speed Network. That won't pay the bills of the hundreds of millions / billions they've spent on product over the next decade. The semi-finals of the Big East tourney got soundly beat by regular season NHL hockey game in the ratings. The championship game pulled in 702,000 viewers making it the most watched college sports event on FS1. The next day Sprint race coverage, which is existing shows from when the network was Speed had over 3 million viewers. So the Big East Championship game only had 17.7% of the Sunday race crowd and UFC only had 257,000 viewers... so basically if its not afternoon/early evening race coverage viewership of FS1 disappears! That is a serious problem in my eyes - the types of people who watch one, aren't watching the other programs.

very well put. You have one group of viewers- liking the NASCAR, UFC, boxing, etc. Then you have another group with more of the traditional sports. Neither group mixes much.

and like you said, if it's just him, ok an outlier. But, if we start losing coaches regularly, that's tough. We've lost now in the last 10 months 2 of our 4-5 best coaches in Buzz and Stevens.

[PMThor]

It's a brand new channel, promoting a "new" league.

It's gotta get it's sea legs people. You cannot seriously throw FS1 under the bus when the channel hasn't even been in existence for less than a year!

It will take time. And you know what will solve this supposed "problem"? Big East teams just need to win OOC, then win in the tourney. The more the conference wins, the more people will tune in.

And if FS1 fails? Big freaking deal really. The Big East is making some serious money from the contract, and no one can say at all that it's hurting recruiting (5 BE teams in the top 27 recruit classes directly contradict that), but we aren't on ESPN! Big whoop. The league is trending up, and FS1 is just finding its niche. These things take time.

[BEX]

wow. the league isn't even a year old yet. Remain calm.

[stever20]

If we only lose him this or next year... then it was him, if we lose more coaches... then it's a conference issue and the coaches don't have faith in it anymore.

Whether it's leadership, direction, the lack of visibility or whatever. Our presidents signed a deal with the devil for the $$$$$. Fox promotes its FS1 on all of its networks and its prime time ratings are up slightly, but its overall daily ratings aren't much higher than when it was the Speed Network. That won't pay the bills of the hundreds of millions / billions they've spent on product over the next decade. The semi-finals of the Big East tourney got soundly beat by regular season NHL hockey game in the ratings. The championship game pulled in 702,000 viewers making it the most watched college sports event on FS1. The next day Sprint race coverage, which is existing shows from when the network was Speed had over 3 million viewers. So the Big East Championship game only had 17.7% of the Sunday race crowd and UFC only had 257,000 viewers... so basically if its not afternoon/early evening race coverage viewership of FS1 disappears! That is a serious problem in my eyes - the types of people who watch one, aren't watching the other programs.

speaking to your 1st point- I think the absolute killer here would be if Jay Wright goes to the NBA now. That would be perhaps 3/4 best coaches in the league gone.

just was looking- only Wright and JT 3 have been at their schools for more than 5 years now.

[MooseFriar13]

Our conference is going to be just fine. Recruit talent and win games OOC and in the NCAAs. Public perception will change if we, as a conference, earn it by winning against the power conferences year in and year out. Cant wait to see who MU hires as their next head coach, im confident they will make a splash to maintain their status as a premier program in the nBE and college basketball as a whole

[billyjack]

Let's be real... the lack of basic knowledge by a couple of posters on this site is astonishing... regarding FS1 and its expectations, timelines and milestones... regarding strength of our league... regarding the probable success of our league... regarding how we stack up against any other league...

I feel like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, and it's like these couple of posters approach me every day like Ned Ryerson did, and it has to be explained daily why their overly-critical take on the Big East is insane... in hundreds and now thousands of posts all these issues have been discussed, and sky-is-falling hysteria has been countered with common sense answers...

Now I'm supposed to believe that Buzz Williams held the keys to the future of the Big East, as Buzz according to Stever has shoved us down the slippery slope to oblivion... I mean, geez, get ahold of yourselves... I like Buzz, loved his blowout of Miami (Fla) last year, and thought he was an asset for the conference, but wow, I guess we're going to collapse without Buzz's guidance...

Who the hell knows the reasoning at this point, but there's an overwhelming probability that it has nothing to do with FS1. And, hey, I think the Big East can survive without Buzz Freakin Williams... man, to think otherwise is insane.

[stever20]

I'm sorry, but this rose colored version of the Big East isn't realistic either. This year was a pretty mediocre year for us all in all.

And, this absolute love affair with FS1 is a joke. I think if you asked the Big East Presidents they would say they are disappointed in the ratings. I don't think they were expecting the ratings to be down as much as it is. And to act like it's almost certain that it had nothing to do with FS1- that's not reasonable either. And if he said he was disappointed in the new big east, well guess what, a big part of that new big east is FS1. That's the issue.

Also, got to remember part of FS1 not only is the ratings, but also like what SI said in their story tonight about Buzz, it's the schedule quirks and for Marquette a lot of late start times. Looks like 7 9pm or later start times for them by fox controlled by the Big East.. Year before they had only 2. We heard a lot of those issues during the season. Not sure what FS1 can do about that as the Big East is so big for their programming.