Latest ACC rumblings; ND involved
Also, an FSU insider (guy who owns Warchant) says that the SEC and FSU/Clems are in talks (to what extent, no one knows). Apparently he has a B10 source who says the B10 are working under the assumption that theose two schools are going to the SEC and thus the B10 is focusing on UNC/UVa.
I assume ND (do they really have a full vote?) wants to prevent Stanford from going to the B10 b/c that may put their USC or Stanford rivalry games in jeopardy. Team ACC expansion (ND and ???) are aiming for SMU as well, allegedly. It's been argued that there is safety in numbers: A conf with 17-18 that loses 3-4 programs is still a conference. Also, I've read that ESPN is brokering a deal for Syracuse, BC and Wake to take half shares, which will be passed to FSU, UNC, and Clemson. I'll be surprised if Syracuse agress, but IDK about the others. We live is strange times in the CFB universe.
The ACC looking to add the university of Hanoi and also perhaps the University of Australia (at Sydney)
To counter this, The B1G has reached out to the University of Tokyo and the University of Shanghai. UT would bring baseball and great academics but little else, from what I've seen. Both would be great additions to gymnastics!
Notre dame is a definitely a full " member" alright.
Username fits, should have knowledge...
I see this not as protecting their game with Stanford (which will go away after next year anyways unless it's extended), but rather as ND trying to save the ACC in order for them to stay independent. It's a fool's errand though. If this were about academic prestige or olympic sports, Stanford would be in the B10 now. This is about $$$ tied to football. Clemson and FSU don't care.
August 9th, 2023 at 11:47 PM ^
That’s what I think is weird. ND seems willing to make less money in the long term just to not be in the big ten. Are they afraid of Michigan and OSU? Are they just stubborn?
the economics say that cal and Stanford aren’t going to command big tv dollars. The acc will lose value if FSU, Clemson leave. They want SMU as well? Just so they can continue to be independent in name only and functionally an ACC school? It’s pretty short sighted. Because that conference they are envisioning isn’t going to be considered a power conference. They might as well join the MAC if all they want is to be the biggest fish in the smallest pond.
August 10th, 2023 at 12:34 AM ^
Kind of reminds you of Texas in the B12. And then look what happened. If they are going to join eventually, then Swarbick needs to be out and without influence once he's out, along with Jenkins. They're both leaving officially though. Swarbick was such a tool for handing a termination notice during a game.
I just don’t see UNC going anywhere without Duke. I know everyone wants to go on what football wants but that college basketball rivalry won’t be broken up.
Nothing stopping them from continuing the rivalry in separate conferences.
Sure they could keep playing but it won’t even be close to the same.
To Hell w Notre Dame!!!
Hope they get stuck in the cold playing the likes of Navy, Ball State and Marshall.
Fuck them and their pathetic fanbase...
McGill University vs Notre Dame!
Notre Dame can go eat shit.
The B1G will be absolutely fine without them. Hoping the ACC finally grows a set and tells Notre Dame that they are either in the ACC 100% or they can go kick stones.
I could see it coming, I knew sooner or later Wake Forest, the smallest P5 school, was going to get shit on in all of this. (I have family ties there.) Oh well, their golf program is still a powerhouse.
It is possible, but Wake gets relatively decent viewership all things considered. When you start doing the accounting for travel costs, they are reasonably well situated in the current ACC compared to Louisville and BC. The ACC will become the 4th conference after being raided soon. It was already the 3rd/4th conference in football over the last 20 years with only Clemson really relevant except one crab legs fueled year by FSU.
Does Wake Forest really get decent views? Every BigTen team got more than them last year and our worst (Rutgers) averaged nearly 100K more.
That Wake/Pitt ACC title game was one of my favorites and also such an anomaly in this day and age. Really hoping for a Beavs-Bears Pac12 championship game
Don't they have a pretty good baseball program too? I think they made the Final 4 equivalent in the tournament this past season.
Wake was in the final four, but had ten guys get drafted this year. I don't know much about the program so I don't know whether that's going to hurt them in the short term or whether they'll just quickly reload like Alabama in football.
Thanks for the info Baby Billy Freeman. Not surprised you follow Clemson.
I wonder how much money the ACC could offer versus the B1G. Could the ACC make an offer and the B1G swoop in and offer more?
And for those who were meh on Stanford and Cal to the B1G before, does it pique your interest more to know that ND doesn't want it to happen?
Knowing that football money does fuck all for any of us Id rather have Stanford and Cal than any of the others. 4 legit shots at losses per season? What is our record going to the west coast? Id take two pretty solid wins vs great academic schools any day. Now Oregon and Washington can go back into the SoCal market and recruit. Before the invite it wouldve been rough for the Duck$ and even Washington to field elite players.
August 9th, 2023 at 11:31 PM ^
Knowing that football money does fuck all for any of us
It does help us hire/retain good coaches.
August 11th, 2023 at 5:36 PM ^
We need Oregon and Washington to make the money to afford our coaches? Hell home tickets sales can buy us any coaches we need.
No this money helps us with our white collar jobs programs for friends of the program... uh more admin positions excuse me.
Stanford and Cal, not so much. Now if it were Stanford and Navy, that would be awesome… All of Notre Dame’s rivals in the B1G while the Irish are on the outside looking in would make me very happy.
As much as I love seeing Notre Dame scramble, adding Navy to the B1G is NOT desirable. Having to spend valuable practice time on the triple option offense, not to mention the added risk of injury due to cut-blocking, would be terrible for the football program.
I totally understand, wasn’t being serious there.
ND (full membership), Stanford and Cal to the ACC ------ I wouldn't necessarily like it, but this seems more and more like a very plausible "end game" (at least for the time being: e.g., next several years) to this latest expansion flurry.
I don't think the SEC is as interested in going beyond 16 (w/ the same caveat: at least for the time being) as many think they are. Honestly, they already have a very powerful array of schools. And a number of SEC member schools have a vested interest in excluding FSU/Clemson from the bunch.
If that happens, the effect of this round of realignment would mean we went from a "power 5" of 65 schools to...a "power 4" of 67, and Oregon State and Wazzu getting the boot (and BYU, Houston, Cincy and UCF getting called up). But the divide between the 34 schools in the super 2 and the 32 schools in the other 2 is vast and growing.
But it still feels dumb we are doing all this to basically screw over 2 schools and make life more difficult for 2 others, and also for a host of other schools but they're richer now I guess.
Yep - the overall number of "power" schools is staying roughly the same. To date, it always has.
The number of power conferences has never increased.
We're reaching the point where (1) the number of power conferences can't decrease further with (2) the raw number of schools staying roughly the same. For all the 8.0 earthquakes to date, THAT will be the real big one. And that 9.5 quake probably isn't too far away.
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1995: Power 7 (67): ACC (9), Big East (8), Big 8 (8), B1G (11), Pac-10 (10), SEC (12), SWC (8), ND (1)
1996: Down to Power 6 (63): ACC (9), Big East (8), Big XII (12), B1G (11), Pac-10 (10), SEC (12), ND (1). Good-bye TCU, SMU, Rice & Houston.
2005: Still a Power 6 (66): ACC (12), Big East (8), Big XII (12), B1G (11), Pac-10 (10), SEC (12), ND (1). Hello Cincinnati, South Florida, UConn & Louisville. Good-bye Temple.
2011: Still a Power 6 (67): ACC (12), Big East (8), Big XII (10), B1G (12), Pac-10 (12), SEC (12), ND (1). Hello Utah.
2016: Down to Power 5 (65): ACC (14), Big XII (10), B1G (14), Pac-12 (12), SEC (14), ND (1). Hello TCU. Good-bye Cincinnati, South Florida & UConn.
2024: Presuming Stanford & Cal to ACC: Down to Power 4 (67): ACC (16), Big XII (16), B1G (18), SEC (16), ND (1). Hello BYU, Cincinnati, UCF & Houston. Good-bye Oregon St & Washington St.
Well said and put together, but it's not necessarily even among the power 4 now, as the TV contracts aren't even.
Going by last year's numbers, the SEC and Big Ten now have 11 of the top 15 most watched teams in 2022 in their new lineups. The top 15 watched teams aren't necessarily static, (2021 and 2015-19 for reference), but what is consistent is Michigan and Ohio State are in the top 3 and the Big Ten and SEC perform very well with viewership. This gives them a lot of bargaining power in TV negotiations.
In those numbers ND is usually up in the top 5 as well, so they are still relevant, but they also hold more power than the ACC does because of that. I don't see why ND would want to become a full member and leave themselves open to being a part of the ACC's negotiation. I know FSU is pushing for imbalanced compensation, and maybe that's what draws ND in, but that also would destabilize the ACC because a lot of schools wouldn't like it.
FSU sees the writing on the wall that if you're consistently pulling in less than teams in your own backyard, you're eventually going to get outspent and outclassed. The gap between the SEC and Big Ten and the rest of college football will grow as the teams in those conferences will be consistently making 10s of million more than the rest of college football. ND will likely take their chances as an independent as they know they still have power in TV negotiations (and don't have other, less-watched schools to drag down their dollar value).
The only thing that could save this is if the power 4 (or maybe better yet, all of D1) negotiated TV contracts as a group, but the Big Ten and SEC have no incentive to do that, as it would just be giving up power (and money).
August 9th, 2023 at 10:17 PM ^
Ah, 2011, when the Big 12 had 10 members and the Big 10 had 12 members!
August 10th, 2023 at 12:05 AM ^
I think this is recently true BUT if we are going further back - before 1990, everyone in D1A thought they were major. Before 1978, there was no difference between what's now FBS and FCS, technically. Before 1968, there was no D1, D2 or D3 - I know this is way back but once upon a time, Boston College's main rival was Holy Cross. Penn football was a bigger TV draw than Penn State. Carnegie Mellon was a regular feature in the top 15. The fact that those 3 schools once thought they were major, one is now D3 and 2 are FCS, well we may be at another inflection point where there's a super 2 and a middle 2 and a G5.
August 10th, 2023 at 1:38 AM ^
Number of thoughts/items:
- From 1946-1989 (anything prior to 1946, pre-War and pre-TV, simply can't be talked about similarly) ...... there were, of course, a shit-ton of D1/D-1A independents. Independents make classifying D1 teams into "power" and "non-power" less clear but I'd argue if you look at 1946-1989, the number of "power" teams was always in the 60-75 range. E.g., same range as 1990-2022.
- The D1A/D1AA split occurred in 1978, FWIW. D1 became rather wildly large (160-ish teams!) in the 1970s. But many, many, many of them were several tiers below (SoCo, MVC, Southland, SWAC, several Independents like Colgate, W&M, Richmond, NW State, etc) and their reclassification was well overdue.
- I think there was more overall flux between "power" and "non-power" (amongst D1/D-1A) in the 1946-1989 era. Take 1956, the first year D-2 and D-3 existed and a good proxy for the 1950s as a whole. PSU, FSU, Tx Tech (all Independents), OK State (MVC Conference), WVU & VT (both SoCo) & the Arizonas (Border Conference) were all D1 but still mostly off-the-grid and mostly out-of-mind. But Idaho & Montana (!!!) were D1 and in the Pac-10 equivalent. Tulane was a competitive SEC team, Army & Navy were always good.
- Ivy League: last year they had a ranked team was 1970 (Dartmouth). They were a "power" conference in the 1950s. But they drifted down: most of them weren't "power" by 1970 and none were "power" by the D1A/D1AA split. They're really the only historical case of an entire "power" conference losing that status.
- As you mention Carnegie Mellon, they were last ranked in 1938. They are a curious case. They played ND & Pitt regularly pre-War, but they didn't play them even once post-War. They simply chose a different, lower level of competition from 1946 onward.
August 10th, 2023 at 12:10 PM ^
Yea I think that's fair. In 1989, the line between major and mid-major/non-major was drawn much clearer than it had been in year's past. People had been trying to draw that line for, well, maybe some 30-40 years at that point. I think since then, the superpowers of college sports have been trying to further draw that distinction, but mostly have not been successful. Yet the transition from the power 5 to the super 2 may be one of those more impactful moments.
I guess what's going on with the Pac12 isn't unprecedented. Although the 4 left behind were all more competitive than the left behinds of the old SWC (with the maybe exception of SMU) and more blue blooded than the Big East left behinds. But is the flagship NW and LA schools staying together but abandoning the NorCal and NW "state" schools really that different than, say, Pitt and WVU going separate ways?
I still hate this, but this is a tradition as old as my fandom, with roots that stretch back to the birth of the platoon system. Basically, this really is as old as CFB. I still hate it.
August 9th, 2023 at 11:38 PM ^
We know nothing.
I'd love to be in the rooms when these calls are taking place. Has to be chaos at times. ACC deadline to declare for next season is the 15th so I'm guessing there will be some wild swings between now and then. Sankey mentioned awarding a number one seed in the new CFP to an at large school with all the recent movement. That definitely plays into ND's decision. I'd like to see Cal and Stanford to the B1G just for the sake of the non football athletes so they could establish regional divisions to help with travel.
To the impartial, neutral, 3rd party observer, Notre Dame and Stanford to the Big 10 makes the most sense.
East: Rutger, Md, PSU, OSU*, Ind
Central: UofM, ND, PU, MSU, NorthW
Plains: Ill, Wis, Minn, Iowa, Neb**
West: USC, UCLA, Stan, OU, UofW
The problem with this (from Notre Dame’s perspective) is that it shatters the illusion that ND is special after they have a few seasons of finishing in the middle of the pack. Playing their current schedule of patsies plus 1-2 tough games allows them to pretend they are nationally relevant. But whenever they reach the playoffs and lay a 38-0 style egg, the truth is revealed. That would happen (getting blown out by blue bloods) every single year were they to join the big 20.
*I’m ambivalent about separating UofM and OSU into separate divisions. But if we’re dispassionately applying logic, the East division is as I’ve shown it.
**The Plains is a joke, but if Nebraska can regain their historical place, they can anchor this division with Wisconsin. There’s no super power, but there’s no bottom feeder, either.
Yeah, likely being relegated to the status of Iowa-with-nicer-helmets status would be a death knell to their sense of importance and, more importantly, how they brand themselves and recruit.
I don't really see the value of adding Stanford all things being equal; I'd rather add a UVa or UNC if we're picking names that may be available. That way you can UVa or UNC in the East, bounce IU to the Central (sorry Hoosiers/Jamie), NW or PU to the Plains, and, I guess, Nebraska to the West. The West is always going to be weird but the Plains with Wiscy, Minny, and Iowa has the potential to be a tough out at least. I have no faith that Nebraska will ever be more than pretty good going forward; like Miami it feels like a lot of their advantages have been co-opted by everyone else and now they're just hanging on.
The death knell for Nebraska was when the rest of college football discovered steroids. I see your point about UVa and UNC. I’ve just been operating under the assumption that the ACC’s deal has a poison pill, so no one is getting out of there until 2036.
Other programs knew about steroids (*cough*MSU under Perles*cough*).
There are rumors that NU started cleaning up their act under Solich, but I think the biggest factor is that the game changed and the triple option stopped being attractive for recruits.
August 9th, 2023 at 10:20 PM ^
Iowa's helmets >>>>> ND's helmets.
If adding Stanford and Cal opens up the ability to void the grant of rights and leave without penalty FSU is gone, Clemson probably too. Who knows what other schools might get poached.
in short, lol Notre Dame.
August 10th, 2023 at 11:40 AM ^
That might be exactly what they want with the new tournament format: an ACC with no other good teams so they can play all of their good teams outside of the conference and guarantee themselves a conference championship and spot in the playoff each year. The ACC benefits from having ND buoy their TV contracts and ND can get a larger payout to offset their loss of their NBC deal.
College football: where ncaa and conferences no longer matter.
How did it get to where long-standing conferences are dying because media outlets are controlling the narrative? It’s gotten out of control where now we need to have some event almost weekly to keep fans entertained. Pageantry and history all seems dead when talking about college football nowadays considering the vast change in direction.
Supreme Court 1984 ruling.
I have a hard time believing any team would take less money from their current deal, especially if it's being negotiated by ESPN, unless there's some concessions elsewhere. I guess ESPN might say they're willing to blow up the media deal and re-negotiate with the ACC if there are some changes made but...that's a reach.
Notre Dame getting all the benefits of conference membership but none of the risks is why I found it so ironic a number of media types were talking about how great it was ND didn't get involved in the realignment discussion. They've got everything they want and can submarine other deals without risk of losing their easy path to the playoffs and their personal TV deal; if anything they're a big reason why a bunch of schools have been trying to secure big-money deals for their leagues recently because they want to enjoy those perks.
I'd much prefer UVa and UNC over Stanford and Cal because of geographic reasons in addition to competitive benefits. I don't see any value for the ACC outside of ND to get Stanford and Cal in league but I can also see why they know the sharks are circling and want to protect themselves. But if FSU and Clemson go to the SEC (which would sort of surprise me since they'd definitely lose an easy path to the playoffs) then the ACC is wide open so I get wanting to reinforce your ranks.
It makes sense that the BigTen will move to 10 game schedules with such a large conference and because the TV companies will want more big time match ups and fewer Michigan vs Bowling Green match ups. A 12 team play off will also make teams more willing to play a 10th conference game.
If I'm right about 10 conference games the BigTen teams, which includes USC, will be less likely to want to schedule Notre Dame and they'll lose their biggest traditional rivals.
If we go to a 10-game Big Ten schedule, we're pretty much never again going to play an interesting non-conference game, since we want seven home games per year.
Well since half the schools are in the big ten they don’t need to do it as much