Miami and Florida St to the BIG10, and other realignment talk, might not be so wild anymore
This was talked about in a post yesterday as being wild speculation. But oh how 24 hours can change things. An article in the Omaha World-Herald today says Miami/Florida St to the BIG10, and other wild speculations, are likely what is going to happen.
What are the formerly wild speculations that may become reality?
-The BIG10 and SEC work together on TV deals, and NIL parameters
-The BIG10 wants to go National, so adding Florida schools is an almost certainty
-Notre Dame TV deal expires in 2024, they are a valuable chip in the game
-48 schools break away from the NCAA and make their own playoffs
-Big Ten Commissioner Tony Petitti, because of his TV experience, may have some cards up his sleeve to make it all work TV wise
University of Nebraska President Ted Carter:
“I’m on (several) national boards and I get to sit with a lot of top tier presidents,” Carter said. “And I can just tell you, this is the conversation that is happening now.”
LINK to this article with much more detail, and the reporter say more is coming in his article next week:
So, as it turns out, Greg McElroy was not off base in what he said:
He's also saying there's a huge change coming to the ACC in 2026, "wipe the slate clean":
What could save the ACC and it's huge TV deal:
-Notre Dame joins the ACC
-ESPN renegotiates
LINK: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1659562691566895104.html
We're still livin' in the college football wild west!
are going to allow the university situated in the state capital to join a conference with an overwhelmingly northern cultural orientation.
To be real honest, this type of comment shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the dynamic of this state. Is some of Florida “Deep South”? Yes. Do very few people live in those places? Yes. Are most people who live in Florida not from Florida (and thus carry values more aligned with where they came from)? Also yes. The ironic thing is that I’ve encountered more attitudes that some/many would consider “southern” in the state of Michigan than in the state of Florida. That’s a truth that is probably going to be hard to digest for some/many, but it’s a truth nonetheless.
Yeah I've seen confederate flags waving outside rural houses in Michigan. Florida is still tacky as hell tho, even if the weather is nice. The FL school coaching staffs will just need to accept the imperative of adding several layers to their tucked-in golf polos.
The conference is comprised of educational institutions in Ann Arbor, Madison, Evanston, Bloomington, Iowa City, and other college towns that virtually without exception far more liberal than the surrounding rural areas and small towns. U-M might be a state institution, but it is not Unadilla or Howell or Standish, just as Wisconsin is not Baraboo or Rhinelander.
Regardless, my comment about northern cultural orientation was specifically in reference to the views of the Republicans who control state government in Florida, and if you doubt that they overwhelmingly view the state of Michigan as a strongly northern “Yankee” state that is distinctly different from Florida, I think you’re fooling yourself.
Nobody believes realignment is done but I really don't get these discussions seemingly revolving around the assumption that Miami and FSU want to join a geographically distant collection of schools that aren't a great culture fit either. Yes, UCLA and USC are farther away but on paper you can point at both of them as they make sense on paper - big-name schools internationally as well as domestically with large alumni bases, lots of money, and high academics.
What the incentive for Miami and FSU to play Minnesota and Iowa frequently? It certainly doesn't expand their footprints much recruiting and they don't have huge alumni groups in those places. Money can make a lot of those concerns go away but hell, the Big 12 is closer and makes more sense culturally and with those two schools would probably get close to the same money.
I can think of about 30-50 million things a year that Miami and FSU think are great reasons to play Minnesota or Iowa more frequently.
Sure, but adding two teams likely means they'd have to split the current TV deal pot into more pieces, since I doubt they'd go back and re-negotiate another TV deal so close to the last one being finished. So if it's currently ~$55M/school now with 14 teams then it's ~$49M now with 16 teams. That's still a lot more than they're getting from the ACC but that's asking a lot of current teams to take a pay cut to let in two schools from the south who the SEC apparently don't want/don't want to join the SEC and have had somewhat dubious recent football success. Especially with respect to Miami, who I think people of my age remember as "Da U" and don't quite realize has won more than 9 games once since 2003.
Wow. That is impressive. B1G is able to pull off these deals even with the lack of national championships. I guess viewership with UM, OSU and PSU is quite attractive. Other colleges don't do too bad either.
That's the old TV deal. Here are the projections I saw. (NOTE: They were created in 2022, so things may have changed)
To your point, I think it has essentially nothing to do with recruiting in the north or appealing to alumni. It's all about the fact that they are stuck for 13 more years in a terrible media rights deal that becomes worse as time goes by. As the media $$$ gap b/t the B1G/SEC and other conferences continues to grow, the other conferences fall further behind in the arms race for 'resources' broadly defined. (Of course you know and understand all of this already.)
What is tough to tell is if the power broker football schools in the ACC (Clemson, FSU, Miami) are posturing in order to try and force an early termination of their terrible current media rights deal or if they honestly want to get out as soon as realistically possible and are soliciting invitations from the B1G and/or SEC.
Something's gotta give and from what I read there's sort of no way that that deal stays intact until 2036.
There's probably avenues in realignment that would make it better for ESPN to scrap the ACC deal, and write up new deals with the realigned conferences. Clemson in the SEC would make it more valuable. ESPN is going to have to roll with the times too. Sticking to the ACC and making the current deal stay in place might hurt them in the long run. After all, do the teams in the ACC have no options other than ESPN to go to?
Can we just merge all 60-some odd p5 schools together and have regional divisions that just function as the old conferences? Someone Photoshop Pete Rozelle holding a b1g and SEC football in 1970.
Every time there is realignment talk, I cut and paste the same note from my phone. EVERY time.
Note #1: This model would be replicated twice to create three levels of college football, all with the same number of teams, using the same structure, rules, etc.
"D1-A1," "D1-A2," "D1-A3." So if a team isn't included below, consider them a top team at their level. Generating even more interest across the country - imagine #6 Boise St. playing #9 Washington St. for a chance at the D1-A2 CFP. Or #2 Eastern Michigan vs. #5 North Dakota St. in a late November..."The Factory" would be rocking for that top 5 matchup.
Sorry soccer fans, no promotion/relegation... we will have to support the MLS and USL in order to get that in the U.S.
Note #2: Football only, keep existing conferences for all other sports (including MBB and WBB). In fact, undo some of the football based realignment (e.g., UCLA/USC to the B1G).
College Football Championship League (*Super Conference Model*)
North Division
- Cincinnati
- Illinois
- Indiana
- Iowa
- Iowa St.
- Louisville
- Michigan
- Michigan St.
- Minnesota
- Missouri
- Ohio St.
- Nebraska
- Northwestern
- Notre Dame
- West Virginia
- Wisconsin
East Division
- Boston College
- Clemson
- Florida
- Georgia
- Georgia Tech
- Maryland
- Miami
- NC State
- Penn St.
- Pitt
- S. Carolina
- Syracuse
- UCF
- UNC
- Virginia
- Virginia Tech
South Division
- Alabama
- Arkansas
- Auburn
- Baylor
- Florida St.
- Houston
- Kentucky
- LSU
- Memphis
- Mississippi St.
- Oklahoma
- Oklahoma St.
- Ole Miss
- TCU
- Tennessee
- Texas A&M
West Division
- Arizona
- Arizona St.
- Boise St.
- BYU
- Cal
- Colorado
- Oregon
- Oregon St.
- Stanford
- Texas
- Texas Tech
- UCLA
- USC
- Utah
- Washington
- Washington St.
(missing: Purdue, Duke, Vanderbilt, Wake Forest, Kansas, Kansas St.)
- 12 game regular season, 9 in division + 1 against every other division.
- Each division has a championship game.
- 8-team playoff (all 4 division champions + 4 at-large)
--------------------
College Football Championship League (*NFL Model*)
Northern Football Conference
- Michigan
- Michigan St.
- Ohio St.
- Notre Dame
- Boston College
- Penn State
- Pitt
- W. Virginia
- Cal
- Oregon
- Stanford
- Washington
- BYU
- Colorado
- Oklahoma St.
- Utah
- Iowa
- Minnesota
- Nebraska
- Wisconsin
- NC St.
- UNC
- Virginia
- Virginia Tech
Southern Football Conference
- Arizona
- Arizona St.
- UCLA
- USC
- Arkansas
- Oklahoma
- Texas
- Texas A&M
- Florida
- Florida St.
- Miami (FL)
- UCF
- Alabama
- Auburn
- LSU
- Ole Miss
- Clemson
- Georgia
- Georgia Tech
- S. Carolina
- Kentucky
- Louisville
- Missouri
- Tennessee
- 12-game regular season, H/A vs. teams in your division (6 games) + 1 game in every other division in your conference (5 games) + 1 "opposite-conference" game.
- NO "division" championship games.
- 16-team playoff (6 division champions in each conference + 2 at-large in each conference).
--------------------
College Football Championship League (*Regional Model*)
North Division
- Cincinnati
- Illinois
- Indiana
- Michigan
- Michigan St.
- Minnesota
- Ohio St.
- Northwestern
- Notre Dame
- Wisconsin
East Division
- Boston College
- Florida
- Maryland
- Miami
- NC State
- S. Carolina
- Syracuse
- UCF
- UNC
- Virginia
South Division
- Alabama
- Auburn
- Baylor
- Florida St.
- Houston
- LSU
- Mississippi St.
- Ole Miss
- Texas
- Texas A&M
West Division
- Arizona
- Arizona St.
- BYU
- Cal
- Oregon
- Stanford
- UCLA
- USC
- Utah
- Washington
Mid-East Division
- Clemson
- Georgia
- Georgia Tech
- Kentucky
- Louisville
- Penn St.
- Pitt
- Tennessee
- Virginia Tech
- West Virginia
Mid-West Division
- Arkansas
- Colorado
- Iowa
- Iowa St.
- Memphis
- Missouri
- Nebraska
- Oklahoma
- Oklahoma St.
- TCU
(missing: Texas Tech, Washington St., Oregon St., Boise St., Purdue, Duke, Vanderbilt, Wake Forest, Kansas, Kansas St.)
- 12-game regular season, 9 in division + 3 outside of division.
- Each division has a championship game.
- 12-team playoff (6 division champions + 6 at-large)
Swap teams in/out at your pleasure...it's the model that is the point of the post.
Nebraska is a great example of how a team can quickly go from being considered elite to not even making a bowl game for 6 straight seasons. Nebraska is no longer elite, and with the addition of USC and UCLA that road back to elite just got much tougher.
Miami is also a good example. They were on another planet as an independent, then joined the Big East, did marginally worse but still dominated, then they joined the ACC. They've had one year sense joining the ACC where they reached 10 wins.
That's going to happen to a lot more teams when these big name programs are no longer able to prop up their records by only playing 1 or 2 tough games a year.
Despite a modicum of effort this Sunday to find something "regional" in the big ten's mission, if it ever existed it doesn't seem to anymore.
If the mission of the new commish is to nationalize the conference as a pre-emptive strike to keep the conference in the pole position for revenues, it appears this new found interest in carpetbagging is real and adding FL/deep south teams is probably unavoidable.
Nothing left but faith regarding Men's college football. If women are tough enough to play and enjoy rugby, I think it's time for women's college football. Who's with me?
I’m kinda sick of hearing about expansion. I understand it’s going to happen, I just think it’s too much too fast, I am not a fan of the Big ten being a coast to coast conference. I kinda like the regional feel of college football and I think we are losing or have lost that.
The traditional layout is done and gone.
Sag - I think it was lost when Penn State was added to the conference. Then, was "officially" lost - with Nebraska, Rutgers, and Maryland.
It's feeling saturated but take the best schools available before the SEC does.
At this point take FSU, Miami, UNC, and UVA (establish a solid southeast-Atlantic footprint and further the west coast connection with Oregon, Washington, Stanford and Cal.
Consider adding GA Tech, Utah, Arizona, Colorado and the likes...a Texas team (TCU ((ducks)) maybe Houston or Baylor) should also be considered.
what can possibly go wrong? 
I hate expansion like this but if it means ND gets left out in the cold I am all for it.
I love the idea of Oregon and Washington. I also like the idea of bringing in Miami and FSU. I don't want to bring in any awful programs like Rutgers and Maryland. We need top tier schools if we're going to be the premier conference. I'd also like Cal and Utah. We need great schools to strengthen the conference. I'll never understand people who want to play nothing but weak teams with the hope of running the table just to make it into the playoffs. There's nothing more boring and embarrassing than UM beating up on tomato cans. Let's get the best players and best teams and best coaches together and enjoy the ride.
This image, IMO, is very representative - and accurate.
It's in the Atlantic Ocean - and seems to be an ideal representation of where the ACC is headed.
Maybe this image can become the official logo for the conference.
