How to Embiggen the Big Ten
The possibility of expanding the Big T1e1n (pronounced Tel-evan, or if you prefer, Ten-eleven) has become an off-season subject of blathering in the electronic and the dead-tree media. What’s at stake? Well, two things come to mind right away.
First of all, the college athletics cartel (that’s the NCAA, if your knowledge of sports comes from watching ESPN) requires conferences to have twelve members before they can hold a championship game in football. Football championships are big money, as anyone who has sat through the barrage of commercials that are broadcast during the Big 12 and Southeastern matchups will confirm. That money’s an incentive to any of the major conferences, and more than a few of the second- and third-tier ones as well.
Secondly, and I’m going to be very blunt about this, the level of competition in the Big Ten right now is pretty meh. Ohio State aside, the rest of the conference hasn’t lived up to its reputation during the regular season, and our bowl records haven’t been anything to write home about. On top of that, the stunning collapse of the Michigan football program in the last few years has left the Big Ten looking like the Pac-10, but with worse weather; essentially, a Big One with a bunch of average squads. Expansion can improve the image of the conference, if the right teams get the nod.
Someone who doesn’t know me might have to ask why I’m focusing on football. Well, to be honest, football is the college sport that matters the most. It’s why conferences were organized, and it’s also the most lucrative of college sports. Men’s basketball is next, but except for the NCAA tournament, it doesn’t draw the crowds that pigskin does. Nothing else counts from a revenue standpoint, not even women’s basketball at powerhouse schools such as Stanford or Tennessee. (Sisters, I’m not endorsing that situation; I’m just calling it as it is.)
Pacific Plans
Right now, the two majors that don’t have enough teams to offer one of these festivals of advertising are the Pacific-10 and the Big Ten. Let me get the first group out of the way, because it’s easy to discuss, and the Big Ten’s expansion is a more interesting puzzle in any event.
Utah and BYU are the most logical choices for an expansion of the Pac-10, and rumor has it that such a transfer is in the works. If they lack certain built-in recruiting incentives (such as easy access to women, or access to easy women), there is a geographic affinity, and both programs would fit in well with the existing teams’ level of play.
If anything, both schools have the advantage of altitude over their potential brethren. Remember, seven of the Pac-10 campuses (the California and Oregon members, and the U of Washington) are less than 250 feet above sea level. Wazzu and the Arizona schools are at somewhat higher altitudes, but none of them are even close to the 4000+ feet elevation of the Utah Basin. What advantage USC and the other coastal schools have in nicer weather is offset by the thinner air of Provo and Salt Lake.
Let’s move on to what ought to happen in the Big Ten.
Getting from T1e1n to Twelve (or More)
First, let’s settle some naming conventions. Yes, “Big T1e1n” mocks the choice the Big Ten made to keep its name when Penn State joined the lineup. That’s been an evergreen punchline, it needs to stop, and I have a plan.
The Big Ten started as the Western Conference, to stand apart from the so-called Ivy League. (The schools of the Ivy League didn’t organize under that name for almost 60 years after the Western Conference was organized.) It kept the Big Ten moniker even as Chicago dropped out and Michigan State and Penn State dropped in. There’s already a Big 12, so for the sake of this discussion, let’s call any expansion of the Big Ten the “First Conference.” (It’s fitting, IMHO, and I'm pretty sure that I have dibs on its use.)
No Irish Need Apply: The easiest answer to expanding the Big Ten is to get Notre Dame to sign up; but the Irish had a chance and turned it down in favor of playing the service academies year after year. Yes, Notre Dame has Michigan, Michigan State, and Purdue as regular rivals; but its leadership prefers to slate Pitt and Stanford to Northwestern or Illinois. Honestly, I don’t believe that Notre Dame deserves to be in the First Conference.
Goodbye, State College: I have been watching college football for the last 30 years, and although I respect and admire JoePa and his program immensely, I never liked having Penn State in the Big Ten. For starters, it’s too far away from Iowa City and Minneapolis and too remote for easy travel. Then there’s the Governor’s Cup, an artificial rivalry to end artificial rivalries; does anyone who didn’t go to MSU or PSU (or is a Sav-A-Lot Spartan/Less2Pay Lion) watch that game? I didn’t think so. Facts: the Big Ten is a Midwestern conference and Pennsylvania is an Eastern state. Remember, Penn State-Pitt was one of the great rivalries until PSU joined the Big Ten in 1993. Face it, Penn State belongs in the Big East for reasons of geography and history.
So now we’re back to ten teams. Where do two teams with decent football programs come from?
MAC Daddies: The Mid-American Conference has good football programs, and Lord knows that anyone of those teams is capable of unloading a can of whoopass on any Big Ten team, including Ohio State. But, week in and week out, the MAC teams are a notch below the Big Ten, and their histories support that description. Miami’s the only one of the conference that isn’t an overgrown teacher’s college.
On My Planet, 12-5=16: Naming issues aside, there are natural affinities with a couple of Big 12 schools, in particular, Iowa State and Missouri. However, I would hate to see Mizzou and KU’s rivalry go by the wayside. One way to create an instant super-conference would be to have Iowa State, KU, KSU, Mizzou, and Nebraska join the existing Big Ten. That would give the First Conference 16 teams, which would at least be an even number. But that plan leaves Colorado and the Oklahoma and Texas schools at a loose end, which isn’t going to please Disney.
Texas Mess: Dear God in Heaven, why does anyone who doesn’t work for a TV network think that Texas is a good fit for a group of Upper Midwestern schools? Austin is over 1000 miles away from the northernmost members of the Big Ten, and although I certainly want quality in any additional members of the First Conference, Texas would be a 900-pound fox in the henhouse. Texas would be a better fit for the SEC than for the First Conference. (Am I lying to anybody? I didn't think so.)
Ohio River Options: If you’re just trying to get to twelve schools and insist in keeping Penn State in the First Conference, Pitt is an obvious fit. But there are two other schools that are even better choices, especially if Penn State were to move to its natural home in the Big East: Cincinnati and Louisville. Both schools are public universities of decent size and standing, and are good fits from a geographic perspective.
Cincy Plus the ’Ville Is Smart for Both Conferences
Cincinnati has been playing football for longer than all but four Division I programs, and it produced Sid Gillman, who was running a West Coast Offense before anyone gave it that name. With plans to remodel its venerable stadium and back-to-back Big East titles, Bearcat football is back on the map.
Louisville has a recently-remodeled stadium and is located in a metro area that’s larger in population than Bloomington, Iowa City, Lafayette, or Lansing. They’ve had ups and downs recently, but have generally been playing pretty good football for many years. You might have heard of some guys named Ray Buchanan, Johnny Unitas and Ted Washington; all of them played for Louisville.
I admit that trading Cincinnati and Louisville for Penn State doesn’t help the Big East get any closer to its goal of a championship game of its own. But the Big East isn’t going to find another four or five schools to get to the cartel-mandated dozen in the foreseeable future, so I don’t know why anyone would raise that objection. (A Big East championship game is strictly a hypothetical, at least until the ACC dissolves under the weight of its own suck.) For football season, which has the greatest travel expenses due to the size of the squads, it saves the teams in both conferences a big chunk of money, so from that perspective, it’s a win-win.
With this plan, we have some natural rivalries of instant interest. Louisville-Cincinnati, Cincinnati-Ohio State, and Louisville-Indiana are the obvious ones, but there could be others. For starters, Michigan-Cincinnati would pair two of the five oldest programs in Division I. (Tell me that game would be any more artificial than Penn State-Northwestern, I dare you.) We’d also get some good Big East matchups out of the arrangement; Penn State-Pitt and Penn State-West (By God) Virginia used to be two automatic classics, while Rutgers-Penn State and UConn-Penn State would bring some regional powerhouses together.
But this switcheroo makes too much sense to get any support from the people who make these decisions. We’ll just have to live with the wishes of the athletic directors and Disney, since they’re the only ones whose opinions matter. Le sigh.
First of all, the college athletics cartel (that’s the NCAA, if your knowledge of sports comes from watching ESPN) requires conferences to have twelve members before they can hold a championship game in football. Football championships are big money, as anyone who has sat through the barrage of commercials that are broadcast during the Big 12 and Southeastern matchups will confirm. That money’s an incentive to any of the major conferences, and more than a few of the second- and third-tier ones as well.
Secondly, and I’m going to be very blunt about this, the level of competition in the Big Ten right now is pretty meh. Ohio State aside, the rest of the conference hasn’t lived up to its reputation during the regular season, and our bowl records haven’t been anything to write home about. On top of that, the stunning collapse of the Michigan football program in the last few years has left the Big Ten looking like the Pac-10, but with worse weather; essentially, a Big One with a bunch of average squads. Expansion can improve the image of the conference, if the right teams get the nod.
Someone who doesn’t know me might have to ask why I’m focusing on football. Well, to be honest, football is the college sport that matters the most. It’s why conferences were organized, and it’s also the most lucrative of college sports. Men’s basketball is next, but except for the NCAA tournament, it doesn’t draw the crowds that pigskin does. Nothing else counts from a revenue standpoint, not even women’s basketball at powerhouse schools such as Stanford or Tennessee. (Sisters, I’m not endorsing that situation; I’m just calling it as it is.)
Pacific Plans
Right now, the two majors that don’t have enough teams to offer one of these festivals of advertising are the Pacific-10 and the Big Ten. Let me get the first group out of the way, because it’s easy to discuss, and the Big Ten’s expansion is a more interesting puzzle in any event.
Utah and BYU are the most logical choices for an expansion of the Pac-10, and rumor has it that such a transfer is in the works. If they lack certain built-in recruiting incentives (such as easy access to women, or access to easy women), there is a geographic affinity, and both programs would fit in well with the existing teams’ level of play.
If anything, both schools have the advantage of altitude over their potential brethren. Remember, seven of the Pac-10 campuses (the California and Oregon members, and the U of Washington) are less than 250 feet above sea level. Wazzu and the Arizona schools are at somewhat higher altitudes, but none of them are even close to the 4000+ feet elevation of the Utah Basin. What advantage USC and the other coastal schools have in nicer weather is offset by the thinner air of Provo and Salt Lake.
Let’s move on to what ought to happen in the Big Ten.
Getting from T1e1n to Twelve (or More)
First, let’s settle some naming conventions. Yes, “Big T1e1n” mocks the choice the Big Ten made to keep its name when Penn State joined the lineup. That’s been an evergreen punchline, it needs to stop, and I have a plan.
The Big Ten started as the Western Conference, to stand apart from the so-called Ivy League. (The schools of the Ivy League didn’t organize under that name for almost 60 years after the Western Conference was organized.) It kept the Big Ten moniker even as Chicago dropped out and Michigan State and Penn State dropped in. There’s already a Big 12, so for the sake of this discussion, let’s call any expansion of the Big Ten the “First Conference.” (It’s fitting, IMHO, and I'm pretty sure that I have dibs on its use.)
No Irish Need Apply: The easiest answer to expanding the Big Ten is to get Notre Dame to sign up; but the Irish had a chance and turned it down in favor of playing the service academies year after year. Yes, Notre Dame has Michigan, Michigan State, and Purdue as regular rivals; but its leadership prefers to slate Pitt and Stanford to Northwestern or Illinois. Honestly, I don’t believe that Notre Dame deserves to be in the First Conference.
Goodbye, State College: I have been watching college football for the last 30 years, and although I respect and admire JoePa and his program immensely, I never liked having Penn State in the Big Ten. For starters, it’s too far away from Iowa City and Minneapolis and too remote for easy travel. Then there’s the Governor’s Cup, an artificial rivalry to end artificial rivalries; does anyone who didn’t go to MSU or PSU (or is a Sav-A-Lot Spartan/Less2Pay Lion) watch that game? I didn’t think so. Facts: the Big Ten is a Midwestern conference and Pennsylvania is an Eastern state. Remember, Penn State-Pitt was one of the great rivalries until PSU joined the Big Ten in 1993. Face it, Penn State belongs in the Big East for reasons of geography and history.
So now we’re back to ten teams. Where do two teams with decent football programs come from?
MAC Daddies: The Mid-American Conference has good football programs, and Lord knows that anyone of those teams is capable of unloading a can of whoopass on any Big Ten team, including Ohio State. But, week in and week out, the MAC teams are a notch below the Big Ten, and their histories support that description. Miami’s the only one of the conference that isn’t an overgrown teacher’s college.
On My Planet, 12-5=16: Naming issues aside, there are natural affinities with a couple of Big 12 schools, in particular, Iowa State and Missouri. However, I would hate to see Mizzou and KU’s rivalry go by the wayside. One way to create an instant super-conference would be to have Iowa State, KU, KSU, Mizzou, and Nebraska join the existing Big Ten. That would give the First Conference 16 teams, which would at least be an even number. But that plan leaves Colorado and the Oklahoma and Texas schools at a loose end, which isn’t going to please Disney.
Texas Mess: Dear God in Heaven, why does anyone who doesn’t work for a TV network think that Texas is a good fit for a group of Upper Midwestern schools? Austin is over 1000 miles away from the northernmost members of the Big Ten, and although I certainly want quality in any additional members of the First Conference, Texas would be a 900-pound fox in the henhouse. Texas would be a better fit for the SEC than for the First Conference. (Am I lying to anybody? I didn't think so.)
Ohio River Options: If you’re just trying to get to twelve schools and insist in keeping Penn State in the First Conference, Pitt is an obvious fit. But there are two other schools that are even better choices, especially if Penn State were to move to its natural home in the Big East: Cincinnati and Louisville. Both schools are public universities of decent size and standing, and are good fits from a geographic perspective.
Cincy Plus the ’Ville Is Smart for Both Conferences
Cincinnati has been playing football for longer than all but four Division I programs, and it produced Sid Gillman, who was running a West Coast Offense before anyone gave it that name. With plans to remodel its venerable stadium and back-to-back Big East titles, Bearcat football is back on the map.
Louisville has a recently-remodeled stadium and is located in a metro area that’s larger in population than Bloomington, Iowa City, Lafayette, or Lansing. They’ve had ups and downs recently, but have generally been playing pretty good football for many years. You might have heard of some guys named Ray Buchanan, Johnny Unitas and Ted Washington; all of them played for Louisville.
I admit that trading Cincinnati and Louisville for Penn State doesn’t help the Big East get any closer to its goal of a championship game of its own. But the Big East isn’t going to find another four or five schools to get to the cartel-mandated dozen in the foreseeable future, so I don’t know why anyone would raise that objection. (A Big East championship game is strictly a hypothetical, at least until the ACC dissolves under the weight of its own suck.) For football season, which has the greatest travel expenses due to the size of the squads, it saves the teams in both conferences a big chunk of money, so from that perspective, it’s a win-win.
With this plan, we have some natural rivalries of instant interest. Louisville-Cincinnati, Cincinnati-Ohio State, and Louisville-Indiana are the obvious ones, but there could be others. For starters, Michigan-Cincinnati would pair two of the five oldest programs in Division I. (Tell me that game would be any more artificial than Penn State-Northwestern, I dare you.) We’d also get some good Big East matchups out of the arrangement; Penn State-Pitt and Penn State-West (By God) Virginia used to be two automatic classics, while Rutgers-Penn State and UConn-Penn State would bring some regional powerhouses together.
But this switcheroo makes too much sense to get any support from the people who make these decisions. We’ll just have to live with the wishes of the athletic directors and Disney, since they’re the only ones whose opinions matter. Le sigh.
Labels: Big East, Big Ten, Cincinnati, conference expansion, football, Louisville, Penn State, pipedreams
posted by PJ at 6:41 PM
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