But it's all about expanding the footprint!
Looks like Louisville did the job with this curb-stomping.
#bringbackrice
On just so many levels....
BIG TEN!
But they won the very first College Football game ever played.
I think it took them until like 1972 to notch their second win.
I live in Philly and am definitely excited to have 3 schools I can travel to to watch live Michigan sports.
I can appreciate it being convenient for UM's sizeable alumni base on the East Coast. But if that was important, why not schedule regular out of conference games there - Rutgers, Maryland, BC, Virginia, etc? For bball, it's even less important to add them, as we regularly play in NYC now (not to mention road ACC/B1G games).
Instead, we get to add Rutgers home/away in bball, and only get to play teams like Indiana, Wisky, Iowa, and Purdue once. That is not a good trade, in my opinion.
I will hate this move, always. I hope it falls on its face and we can spin these two schools off (Rutgers especially) to some super-duper ACC/Big East conglomerate mega-conference in 2025 or something (pipe dream, I know).
I am also excited about that - and there will be a strong contingent of Michigan fans at any of the Rutgers games, but with that said, I think it's still a terrible move. Everything about Rutgers athletically is a dumpster fire. What a mess. I guess their WBB team is decent, but they've even fallen off on that count in recent years.
Why can't Maryland be good in basketball? They've won a national title more recently than any B1G team and play in a new arena.
I wasn't thrilled with the recent expansion either, but what's done is done. All our complaining isn't going to do anything about it now.
This isn't all bad. These two do open up pretty fertile recruiting territory, and they give our East Coast fans chances to see us play (and non-East Coast fans an excuse to take little trips to NYC and DC). If these teams step it up, that helps the conference. If not, then our fans will just take the place over when we play there, and make it a quasi-home game, like when we play at Northwestern now.
The meme that expanding the conference "opens up recruiting grounds" is one of the most tired-out sayings there is. In recent years U-M has managed to pull football recruits from Utah, Missouri, Florida, Tennessee, Kentucky, California, Colorado, Texas, and Florida. All without a conference footprint.
Our 2014 basketball class is from Indiana, California, Florida, and Oregon. Three of those states aren't even close to the footprint. Spike Albrecht is from Massachusetts. Nik Stauskas is from Canada. Smotrycz was from New Hampshire. Hardaway from Florida. Darius Morris from California. We do not need a conference footprint to recruit.
Maybe it "opens up fertile recruiting grounds" for the Michigan States of the world. (Though I'm sure they don't need it for basketball either.) This is a bad thing, not a good thing. We will recruit where we feel like it, however, and do not need Rutgers's help in that regard.
March 13th, 2014 at 11:38 PM ^
Ah, Spike is from Crown Point, Indiana. He attended a prep school for a year in Ma.
It'll be nice for the mountains of Michigan alums in the DC and NYC areas to have 'home games away from home' every year. They'll be the new Northwestern...and I'm honestly half glad they're joining the conference for that reason as a former East Coast Alum
and am embarrassed to have Rutgers in our conference.
I still can't believe that happened.
We should have grabbed Missouri before the SEC did. Rutgers is so bad at everything. I don't care if they bring in the NYC market.
Rutgers won't make New York City "Big Ten Country". They will barely make New Brunswick, NJ "Big Ten Country".
that Scarlet Knights described a splatter pattern.
But can that even be considered a game?
They are tanking on purpose to get a better draft pick.
They're just loonies at Rutgers
CHICKEN !!!!!
Rutgers has TWENTY-SIX turnovers and a 29.35% effective field goal percentage. Wow.
Did someone happen to mention to them that the game has started? I mean, I would hate for the Scarlet Knights to miss their drubbing. Oh, wait...
They'll get better and be better than most of the other schools in the nation once they join the B1G!
Boom SEC'd!
The best RU has to offer-
Northwestern couldn't be more excited.
Louisville vs Rutgers
this footage is from the Jersey Shore...makes sense.
gets into the tourny every year. Put Rutgers on the schedule.
That is atrocious. Louisville was one point from TRIPLING them up!
7 - 6 with 16:46 left in the first.
and don't ever try to lead again.