Conference Realignment

[GoJacketsInRaleigh]

The only way anyone leaves the ACC any time soon could well be as part of a package deal. In order to obviate the GOR, the ACC would have to disband. The surest way, and perhaps the only way for that to happen is for the conference to fall below the minimum 7-team threshold set by the NCAA for a conference in Division I. The ACC has 14 teams, so if 8 left, the conference would be no more.

If, say, the B1G and the SEC were to divvy up the best 8, with 4 going to the SEC and 4 going to the B1G, we might well end up as one of the 8. If that happens, hope we're not one of the 6 left behind.

Agreed but will be tricky to get there. Despite the rumors I think the SEC would want Clemson and FSU and two of Miami, NCSU, and Va. Tech. The B1G would want GT, UVA, UNC, and ND but ND has to agree and they aren't one of the 8 needed to disband anyway.

Someone amongst BC, Syracuse, Pittsburgh, Duke, Wake Forest, Louisville, and the Miami/NCSU/VT loser in the SEC would have to find a home. Maybe they would run to the Big 12

 

[bobongo]

Agreed but will be tricky to get there. Despite the rumors I think the SEC would want Clemson and FSU and two of Miami, NCSU, and Va. Tech. The B1G would want GT, UVA, UNC, and ND but ND has to agree and they aren't one of the 8 needed to disband anyway.

Someone amongst BC, Syracuse, Pittsburgh, Duke, Wake Forest, Louisville, and the Miami/NCSU/VT loser in the SEC would have to find a home. Maybe they would run to the Big 12

Yeah, forgot about ND. Notre Dame would be the fly in that ointment. They've got to end up somewhere, and it's not going to be in a Tier 2 conference.

Our last best hope might just be for ND to join the ACC and cement our conference as Tier 1.

 

[Jazzchaz]

To your point you are correct. And it’s coming. A vastly expanded playoff system will be here soon. Now, the definition of soon in college football is not the normal definition because the back door money is still flowing and always will. But the fairly quick expansion from 2 teams to 4 and now already talk of expansion shows us the future. And expansion won’t be because of the reason you stated, ie. fairness or keeping interest. Those are by products. The true reason, like every other expansion in any sport is about more money. The NFL and MLB expanded not to give the good people of those new cities a chance to see games in person. It was to get them to repeatedly open their wallets. Look at the Braves move. They didn’t move because the nice people on the north side “deserved” to anything. They moved because that’s where the money is.

The TV people see the numbers when big programs play big programs in meaningful games. That’s what is driving conference realignment and the playoff system which is why both will expand. The days of watching Bama play MTSU or FSU playing Samford are coming to a close because those games are leaving money on the table. I think it’s great. In my adult life I’ve gone from waiting to see how the editor at the Tucson Beacon votes to being able to watch 4 top teams play it out on TV. We’ll be at 20 plus team soon enough and then we’ll finally have a fair system brought to us by greed. Just like every other sport.

The greed is what drove me away from pro sports. I was a Braves season ticket holder for thirty years and I only saw an inning last year with friends in a restaurant.
I suppose schools left out of the Money Division will drop non revenue sports or leave funding the responsibility of the more affluent parents some of those sports tend to have. I'm not going to sweat it if we're in 'Tier II'. I'll still watch our football team and attend all the basketball home games. But I'd kick in more money to women's volleyball to help keep it going......and not spend a minute or a dime watching Money Division.

 

[SOWEGA Jacket]

The greed is what drove me away from pro sports. I was a Braves season ticket holder for thirty years and I only saw an inning last year with friends in a restaurant.
I suppose schools left out of the Money Division will drop non revenue sports or leave funding the responsibility of the more affluent parents some of those sports tend to have. I'm not going to sweat it if we're in 'Tier II'. I'll still watch our football team and attend all the basketball home games. But I'd kick in more money to women's volleyball to help keep it going......and not spend a minute or a dime watching Money Division.

And you are perfectly fine doing that. It’s all about personal choices. I personally approve of greed because that is what drives innovation and brings us more options. For sports, we disagree. I love bigger playoffs because it gives me more excitement season to season that my team has a shot. Like you, I don’t spend money on pro sports outside a Braves game here and there because I hate the unions and players. But I have no issue with others spending big on pro sports. I prefer to spend my money on GT where I can wander campus and think about my days of brown hair and abs. If GT drops down or stays in a weakened ACC we’ll all have to adjust to it.

 

[bigrabbit]

Agreed but will be tricky to get there. Despite the rumors I think the SEC would want Clemson and FSU and two of Miami, NCSU, and Va. Tech. The B1G would want GT, UVA, UNC, and ND but ND has to agree and they aren't one of the 8 needed to disband anyway.

Someone amongst BC, Syracuse, Pittsburgh, Duke, Wake Forest, Louisville, and the Miami/NCSU/VT loser in the SEC would have to find a home. Maybe they would run to the Big 12

I was also wondering about this math, at what point does the ACC disband. The list below, happening simultaneously, would do it.
SEC: Clemson, FSU, Miami, VT
B1G: GT, UVA, UNC, Pitt

Not saying it will happen, but this list is not crazy either.

I have a Duke grad degree - Duke seriously thought about throwing in the towel on Div 1 football in the early 90s, become like Georgetown and play Div 1 basketball only. Maybe they do something like that now in B1G. NCSU is a pretty good fit for SEC. That would be a total of 10 leaving.

One other passing thought I’ve had is: I can imagine how The Hill probably views all this as a huge PITA, probably perfectly happy to play tier 2 football. They might wish otherwise when the interest and excitement level of entertaining potential donors in the President’s box drops off - although I’m not sure how much impact, if any, our football really has on academic development.

 

[Augusta_Jacket]

I don’t spend money on pro sports outside a Braves game here and there because I hate the unions and players.

Unions will be here in the not too distant future. Now that college football players are becoming employees, the unions will follow.

 

[RonJohn]

One other passing thought I’ve had is: I can imagine how The Hill probably views all this as a huge PITA, probably perfectly happy to play tier 2 football. They might wish otherwise when the interest and excitement level of entertaining potential donors in the President’s box drops off - although I’m not sure how much impact, if any, our football really has on academic development.

I'm not sure the academic side would view joining the Big 10 Academic Alliance as a PITA. Also, from a donor side, the academic side of the school dwarfs athletics. The " Ernest Scheller Jr. College of Business" was so named because he made a $50 million donation to the school. On this forum we focus on athletics. There are plenty of people who care about and financially support that academic side of the school irrespective of athletics.

 

[Jazzchaz]

And you are perfectly fine doing that. It’s all about personal choices. I personally approve of greed because that is what drives innovation and brings us more options. For sports, we disagree. I love bigger playoffs because it gives me more excitement season to season that my team has a shot. Like you, I don’t spend money on pro sports outside a Braves game here and there because I hate the unions and players. But I have no issue with others spending big on pro sports. I prefer to spend my money on GT where I can wander campus and think about my days of brown hair and abs. If GT drops down or stays in a weakened ACC we’ll all have to adjust to it.

But our team doesn't have a shot if we're Tier II, correct?...or perhaps they might include a token team? I'm for larger playoffs (combined with cutting regular season) and like competition to heighten excellence. But I still get lost in where amateur sports at a school of higher learning ends and anything goes big business begins.

 

[ScGold]

Screw the ACC jump to the Big now. The money owed can be paid back in installments. The way that conf prints money that shouldn't be an issue recouping what it cost to exit after exit negotiations. The Acc is a dead conf walking. They messed up not making ND join earlier. Tech is going to join the Big sooner or later.

 

[Techster]

Georgia Tech also has the potential to be a football powerhouse with the right coach and good administrative alignment.

One day GT fans themselves will realize what outsiders have been saying. "Administrative alignment" is the key.

 

[bigrabbit]

I'm not sure the academic side would view joining the Big 10 Academic Alliance as a PITA. Also, from a donor side, the academic side of the school dwarfs athletics. The " Ernest Scheller Jr. College of Business" was so named because he made a $50 million donation to the school. On this forum we focus on athletics. There are plenty of people who care about and financially support that academic side of the school irrespective of athletics.

So you think joining the B1G academic alliance would be a major factor motivating Cabrera to jump from the ACC? Any thoughts about why it didn’t matter enough when we turned down the B1G invitation in 2012?

TStan must report to Cabrera (Peterson intro’d me to TStan the week he was hired). But I don’t really know Cabrera, maybe he’s more fired up to push big time football than most of the folks on the hill I’ve known over the decades.

Of course academic donations dwarf athletic - but donors are invited to big games and the president’s box and all the academic boxes are staffed by development people. Football has been an important venue to round up and schmooze (mostly academic) donors like me, so there is a linkage.

 

[tmhunter52]

Georgia Tech also has the potential to be a football powerhouse with the right coach and good administrative alignment.

One day GT fans themselves will realize what outsiders have been saying. "Administrative alignment" is the key.

He had me at “the right coach”…

 

[RonJohn]

So you think joining the B1G academic alliance would be a major factor motivating Cabrera to jump from the ACC? Any thoughts about why it didn’t matter enough when we turned down the B1G invitation in 2012?

TStan must report to Cabrera (Peterson intro’d me to TStan the week he was hired). But I don’t really know Cabrera, maybe he’s more fired up to push big time football than most of the folks on the hill I’ve known over the decades.

Of course academic donations dwarf athletic - but donors are invited to big games and the president’s box and all the academic boxes are staffed by development people. Football has been an important venue to round up and schmooze (mostly academic) donors like me, so there is a linkage.

I don't have any inside information. I do think that the people on the academic side who don't care much about athletics would still like to be part of an academic/research consortium like the Big10's. I think it would add prestige on the academic side which is something they seem to care about a lot. I was responding to your statement that they would think it is all just a PITA. I think many would think it worthwhile to be a part of the academic side of the Big10. Many fans seem to think that football will be the only thing involved in conference affiliation. To this point, the Big10 has considered academics and research to be very important, up to the level that they have a prestigious consortium that includes every member. The ACC used to value academics, but as far as I know have never had any such affiliation. Then they added Louisville, which was obviously only for football and basketball.

I haven't met Cabrera and don't know too much about him. I would hope that a person in his position would not be pushing and advocating internally for the direction of the football program. He should depend on the AD and athletic department to determine what would be best for athletics and make recommendations to him. If joining the Big10 was such a recommendation, then he should consult with the academic and research areas to get their input into the value of the Big10. If a decision to join the Big10 was made internally, then he should push and advocate externally for the school. I just think he has too many things to do to get involved with reading and analyzing contracts, potential schedules, etc. The university president should rely on departments and department heads to handle the grunt work, he should be overseeing and managing the entire organization.

That isn't to say that GT or any ACC school will leave the ACC. There are still significant hurdles in place and there is no public indication that the Big10 nor the SEC are actively looking to add more teams. I am only saying that academically it would be a step up to be in the Big10 vs the ACC.

 

[Vespidae]

do think that the people on the academic side who don't care much about athletics would still like to be part of an academic/research consortium like the Big10's.

Good Lord.

There has been ZERO interest on the academic side to support athletics for 40 plus years. The Hill sees their peers as MIT, CalTech, Urbana, Berkeley, Carnegie-Mellon, etc. The President of Tech gets ZERO bonus for the performance of the athletic teams, but mucho dinero for how much GTRI bills out.

THAT is, and has been, the major problem for Tech athletics since the Petit days. Peterson himself quipped (paraphrasing), "We have roughly 400 student-athletes at Tech. And I'm not going to spend more than a few minutes a year pondering that."

It is NOT 1960. Or 1970. Or 1980. Tech, and how the leadership is measured, has fundamentally changed and it's never going back.

 

[orientalnc]

A friend who is a partner at one of the large law firms in NC chatted with me briefly today about the ACC GOR. First, a school would have to notify the ACC it is leaving and is revoking its grant of rights. He assumes they would also refuse to pay the exit fee. The reasons could be weak or very sound, but would be stated as if the ACC is at fault. That will start the court proceedings and the legal fees will start flowing. Presumably, the school would already have been burning a large amount on legal prep.

The discovery and hearings would take years, but he predicts the ACC would ask the court to withhold the school's media payout from their new conference until a final decision is rendered. They would likely also withhold the school's share of the ACC media payout. A school and AA like GT would have a hard time funding this process. Where it might get interesting is if UNC decided to step away. Since the ACC is a NC based organization, UNC (with its huge class of practicing lawyers in the state, many whom are now judges) might have more confidence fighting this out in NC courts. UNC also has a large reserve fund.

Asked about Clemson leaving, he laughed. He said fans might be more interested in the SEC than Dabo. He also wondered why the SEC would want Clemson or FSU when they already own the media market (which isn't huge).

The bottom line for him is that the risk for anyone jumping from the ACC is incredibly large, even with the potential gains. And, the ACC is still a very attractive media product with its five or six games with ND every year.

Last, ND cannot join the the B1G until 2036, even if they were to change their minds about being an independent. He is convinced the B1G is standing pat until ND joins a conference. The only thing that will force ND to join a conference is NBC not renewing their deal with ND.

 

[RonJohn]

Good Lord.

There has been ZERO interest on the academic side to support athletics for 40 plus years. The Hill sees their peers as MIT, CalTech, Urbana, Berkeley, Carnegie-Mellon, etc. The President of Tech gets ZERO bonus for the performance of the athletic teams, but mucho dinero for how much GTRI bills out.

THAT is, and has been, the major problem for Tech athletics since the Petit days. Peterson himself quipped (paraphrasing), "We have roughly 400 student-athletes at Tech. And I'm not going to spend more than a few minutes a year pondering that."

It is NOT 1960. Or 1970. Or 1980. Tech, and how the leadership is measured, has fundamentally changed and it's never going back.

Maybe you missed that I was taking about them being interested in academics instead saying they care about athletics.

 

[SOWEGA Jacket]

But our team doesn't have a shot if we're Tier II, correct?...or perhaps they might include a token team? I'm for larger playoffs (combined with cutting regular season) and like competition to heighten excellence. But I still get lost in where amateur sports at a school of higher learning ends and anything goes big business begins.

Well, I can’t help you with that one. If you didn’t realize 20 years ago that all schools including GT were admitting morons and paying players under the table in some form or fashion then I can understand where NIL is a shock today. I wish I was lucky enough to have had my eyes closed until now. I accepted college sports as shams and totally disconnected from the school when I was sitting in class with many players from the 1990 football team and Final Four hoops team and saw up close that athletes were in a totally different class and basically hands off. I remember sitting there thinking of a good friend who got denied from GT who was pretty darn smart while I watched these athletes struggle to write a paragraph or add anything to a project. But people pay big money to watch someone run, jump, throw, catch, and shoot, including me.

 

[bobongo]

Last, ND cannot join the the B1G until 2036, even if they were to change their minds about being an independent. He is convinced the B1G is standing pat until ND joins a conference. The only thing that will force ND to join a conference is NBC not renewing their deal with ND.

Why can't ND join the B1G until 2036?
Also, their deal with NBC isn't all that lucrative. It's $15 million a year. They'd get more in a conference, no?

 

[wrmathis]

Why can't ND join the B1G until 2036?
Also, their deal with NBC isn't all that lucrative. It's $15 million a year. They'd get more in a conference, no?

the deal with ND and the ACC is that ND cant join any conference unless its the ACC. the deal expires 2036

 

[Jazzchaz]

Well, I can’t help you with that one. If you didn’t realize 20 years ago that all schools including GT were admitting morons and paying players under the table in some form or fashion then I can understand where NIL is a shock today. I wish I was lucky enough to have had my eyes closed until now. I accepted college sports as shams and totally disconnected from the school when I was sitting in class with many players from the 1990 football team and Final Four hoops team and saw up close that athletes were in a totally different class and basically hands off. I remember sitting there thinking of a good friend who got denied from GT who was pretty darn smart while I watched these athletes struggle to write a paragraph or add anything to a project. But people pay big money to watch someone run, jump, throw, catch, and shoot, including me.

Yeah, that's been going on, probably from the beginning. One Tech athlete from my class in the 70's with a long pro career could barely read. Another big name sitting next to me was upset that my exam had different answers and tapped me on the arm continuely the whole hour asking me to do work his problems too. Ah, but I guess it all gets fixed in the end.