Conference realignment discussion - v. 2015

[marquette]

I'm relatively sure that you're screwing with us, but if not then I admire your passion. Send a letter to Val Ackerman.

[JPSchmack]

^^^^^^^^

This bro wants us to add 2 more DePauls. That was honestly one of the dumbest arguments I have seen. "Water down the league so you can be more like the AAC and kill your RPI"

Also this whole Dayton conversation is absurd. As a Georgetown fan I see no value in adding them with Miller not staying long term. Same reason VCU should never be added.

RPI is nothing more than performance vs schedule. UD/Bona improves your RPI, adds more top 50 wins, gets more bids.

There's no watering down. Run the math. UD/Bona had the same OOC win pct as the rest of the Big East, and the conference is going .500 vs itself no matter what:

Instead of beating:
16-15 Seton Hall
16-15 Seton Hall
14-19 Creighton
14-19 Creighton
13-19 Marquette
13-19 Marquette
12-20 DePaul
12-20 DePaul

Your Hoyas would beat:
18-13 Seton Hall
18-13 Seton Hall
22-11 Dayton
15-18 Creighton
14-18 Marquette
13-19 DePaul
10-21 Bonaventure
10-21 Bonaventure

Your SOS goes up .0100, Your RPI about .0055

Nova’s the same NCAA seed
Georgetown gets a 3 seed, probably goes an extra round of losing to Utah (+1 NCAA Unit)
Butler and Xavier keep their 6 seeds
Providence gets a 5 seed, probably beat someone like Buffalo or Wyoming (+1 NCAA Unit)
St John’s gets a 7 seed, probably beats Indiana (+1 NCAA Unit)
Dayton gets the same 11 seed, but beat UCLA instead of Providence
Seton Hall gets a First Four spot, the home court advantage of UD fans rooting for the conference and picks up a win (+2 NCAA Units)

Two more bids, five more units. KILLING THE LEAGUE!

Or you add BYU and Gonzaga, which hands the 10 of you some road losses when you fly all the way to Spokane & Provo. BYU finishes 7-11 because they wan't win on the road and heads to the NIT, Xavier loses twice to Gonzaga and at 16-15 doesn't get an at-large; and when Gonzaga loses to Duke you have the same amount of NCAA Units as you did this year (only with increased travel costs and no increase in ratings because your fans don't stay up to watch 10 pm tipoffs out west, and the BYU/Gonzaga fans were stuck at work for 4 pm PT tipoffs).

[JPSchmack]

I'm relatively sure that you're screwing with us, but if not then I admire your passion. Send a letter to Val Ackerman.

I appreciate your lack of insults compared to your brethren, but again I ask you:

Why do you think you need the "best possible basketball programs" if you expand?
How would inserting a team that would finish THIRD in the Big East help the 10 of you?
Why are you following the "logic" of football conference expansion that doesn't apply to you, or A10/CAA conference expansion that doesn't apply to you?

[Bill Marsh]

what two programs would exist to kick start it at that point to such a degree that their inclusion is warranted at the margin?

Any additions have to be strategic, for the brand and accretive financially. There are no programs popping onto the radar from what's out there now that fits the bill.

Gonzaga and Dayton.

Wonder why those two Bill? How would you see them fitting in schedule wise? Remember you have other sports you have to play. I couldn't think of two other additions that would be more challenging logistically. Also not sure what markets or affinity you add as you are no less diverse.

So curious as to your logic.

Why those two?

1. Gonzaga is a perfect fit, is incredibly consistent, and is just coming off an Elite. Gonzaga games against Big East powers would move the needle. Imagine how this season would have been viewed differently with two top 10 teams in the league.

2. Check the WSJ: Most Valuable Colege Basketball Teams thread. Dayton is one of the 25 most valuable college basketball programs in the country. In the Big East, only Xavier and possibly Marquette rank higher. I don't see how the Big East can't ignore them if they plan to expand. The fan that they're just a year off an Elite 8 doesn't hurt. Their proximity to Xavier is no more of an issue than the proximity of Duke and North Carolina to each other. That rivalry fuels interest in the ACC and helps them to dominate their region. I have no idea why they would present a scheduling problem.

Scheduling isn't the issue that you think it is. As few as 6 teams are all any school needs to play regular conference schedules. The rest compete in a conference tournament in one location for the championship. Teams like men's and women's basketball can be scheduled together and can travel together on a charter, helping to minimize time and expenses. The fact is that it's one long road trip a year per team, which many teams do already. Just substitute this one for the longest road trip already on the schedule. The team facing the problem would be Gonzaga, not the other BE schools. Gonzaga has already indicated that they can handle it. So, where's the problem?

In today's world of modern travel in which planes travel at 500-600 miles per hour, a 2000 mile trip is no different in terms of time than a bus trip of 250 miles was in the days when bus was the primary means of transport for college teams. Travel time is the issue far more than distance or location.

When you consider that Omaha is about half way between New York and Spokane, travel becomes even less of an issue. Simply schedule Creighton and Gonzaga as a pair for East Coast teams on Thursdays and Saturdays. After the Thursday Creighton games, the East Coast team takes a flight of the same time to Spokane that it. Would have taken coming home. No extra flight. The one way flight home from Spokane to NY, or Philly, etc is the only extra trip that's been added. That's a schedule killer?

[billyjack]

Speaking of St Bonaventure, has there been a weirder, more mediocre yet-not-completely-awful coaching career than that of Bonnie alum Jim Baron...?

Baron has coached for the last 28 seasons.
He's had 2 NCAA bids... 1991 with St Francis of PA, and 2000 with St Bonaventure.

St Francis - 5 years, 74-71, so a .510 winning pct and 1 bid in 1991.
St Bonaventure - 9 years, 132-131, so a .502 winning pct and 1 bid in 2000.
Rhode Island - 11 years, 183-167, so a .523 winning pct and 0 bids.
Canisius - 3 years, 59-42, so a .582 winning pct and 0 bids.
Total - 28 years, 448-411, so a .522 winning pct and 2 bids.

He spent 20 years in the A-10 and got 1 bid.
He was hired away from 1 A-10 school to another A-10 school.

URI fans were battered by him. Did just well enough to maintain his job for 11 years... with no NCAA bids...!
Weak in-game coach with just head-scratching game management. Would spend critical late timeouts yapping at the refs instead of strategizing with his players.

He was hired to clean up the URI program, which was coming off 2 years of Jim Harrick corruption and 1 worse-than-Gordie-Chiesa-year from Jerry DiGregorio (no relation to Ernie).

He survived for so long at Rhody by saying he graduated his players and cleaned up things in Kingston.

Anyway, all this St Bona talk reminded me of him. Nice enough guy. A little quirky. I met him once in a parking lot outside a Staples, and he was really nice to my 2 young sons. His sons were great kids and players.

By the way, Dave Gavitt by-passed St Bona mainly because it's so remote. He wanted teams and announcers to be able to fly in and out quickly for Monday night telecasts. St Bona had some good to great years in the 60's and 70's, but Syracuse (along with having the AD being friends with DG) was the dominant Upstate NY team by 1979. St Bona had a nice tradition of playing Providence annually in the 60's and 70's, whereas Syracuse never played PC, so they had that advantage... but not enough to overcome both their remoteness and Syracuse's dominance.

Also, on a family trip a few years ago we passed thru Olean. Gorgeous setting and campus against some mountains. Olean itself was pretty small, and nearby Jamestown was struggling. But St Bona was a great place. It's on an interstate-type highway, but it's so remote.

[gtmoBlue]

To follow up on the question of why Creighton got into the Big East, as opposed to someone like VCU, it's worth noting that Creighton's president is on the Marquette board of directors. It matters who you know with these things, just as it does with most things in life. (I'm not saying this was the only reason, just that it makes a big difference).

http://m.omaha.com/news/big-east-how-cr ... l?mode=jqm

That article is good reading for background leading up to the formation of the reconfigured BE. Steve(r) might learn something?
Should be noted:
1) Fr Lannon was the president at St Joe's (Philly) prior to coming to Creighton in 2011, so he knew a few of the BE Presidents.
2) Creighton is the top rated academic regional university in the Midwest (US News/World report) for the last 10-12 years running. (Ahead of both BU & XU)
3) Creighton had won 20+ games annually 17 of 20 years prior to entry in the BE.
4) Since 2000, the Jays had won 4 RS conference championships and 7 conference tourney championships.
5) Since 2000, Creighton earned 8 NCAA bids and 3 NIT bids.
It is called building a program with sustained performance.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creighto ... basketball.

...just to clarify for some of the "why Creighton?" latecomers.

[stever20]

Creighton had won 20+ games only 14 of the 20 years before entering the Big East (that would be 1993-94 to 2012-13 seasons).

To act like Creighton would have been a lock had VCU been private is a joke. They wouldn't have been a lock at all. I think they probably wouldn't have been in. VCU's location and better postseason success would have meant everything. The fact that in the 10 prior years VCU averaged almost 2.5 more wins than Creighton, had 2 more NCAA appearances, and did more in the tourney- Creighton couldn't compete with that. And the location thing, I totally think the eastern C7 teams would have pushed hard for a private VCU in Richmond.

The question for Creighton would be would the Big East have gone with 12 instead of 10.

[anXUfan]

I don't think the conference should expand, but if it does, it should look for large, rabid fan bases.

[Bill Marsh]

I don't think the conference should expand, but if it does, it should look for large, rabid fan bases.

Dayton it is then.

[myopicraiderfan]

I have to say I am impressed with the zeal for the Bonnies, but why would the average basketball fan watch a single game on TV involving them? I mentioned moving the needle and that with the exception of UConn and maybe Gonzaga, no team can pull their own weight which would require the existing teams to give up money, but lets say two doormats are added and with it two additional NCAA shares.

Right now, not including league fees, 500 million / 12 years / 10 teams = 4.16 million per team
Add two teams 500 million / 12 years / 12 teams = 3.46 million per team
Full 6 year share 250 * 6 years = 1.5 million * 2 extra shares = 3 million
500 million / 12 years + 3 million / 12 teams = 3.72 million
So even if there was a guarantee that every year two additional teams made the NCAA tourney each school would lose around 450K compared to status quo.

Lets get crazy, lets suppose that adding two teams who are great non con, but terrible in conference get added and that causes 6 more NCAA share per year!
500 million / 12 years + 9 million (6 shares * 1.5m) / 12 teams = 4.22 million per team
So if every year adding bottom to middling teams added 6 extra shares each school would get a 60K raise per year! That is significant risk with little reward.

The fact is unless you can come up with two teams worth 8.32 million combined per year to Fox, expansion isn't a priority.