It is official: Boise State to Big East.

[Dark Bohner]

http://espn.go.com/college-sports/s...tate-broncos-beat-deadline-bolt-mountain-west

I know they are probably going to get a decent bump in TV revenue, but talk about a dumb move. They join a Basketball super-conference, but not in basketball. They actually don't even have any conference lined up yet for their olympic sports. In football, the only conference partner that is even remotely close is San Diego State. I think with the large amount of travel that is now going to be required for the football team, we are going to see Boise State lose a lot more games. Easily the dumbest conference switch, along with San Diego State who at least has a home for their olympic sports.

Edit: It is also fun to see CSU fans all butt-hurt about the move as it instantly downgrades the MWC as a football conference.

 

[sackman]

That USF/Boise St matchup is gonna be a barn burner!

 

[MtnBuff]

Now the question is how long this last.

The Big Least is dying in football. Inviting Boise and SDSU was a last ditch try at maintaining some claim to being a significant football conference but it isn't going to work. With the changes going on in the BCS and the raids that have gutted the Big East they have slipped backwards on the food chain.

It is going to be hard for them to maintain lucrative bowl ties including a connection to the BCS level bowls. Their next TV contract will be better than what Boise shared in the MWC but nothing near what the big conferences are making.

The two questions now are will that money be enough enough to justify spending half their time on the other side of the country and playing most of their conference games against teams that are not considered elite level teams. The other question is will they be able to make enough money to support their aspirations of maintaining an appearance of being a top level contender in football.

 

[Buffnik]

Dominoes are going to fall.

Big 12 will raid the ACC and maybe the Big East (Louisville is attractive) and make a big play for Notre Dame.

SEC will join in to grab 2 more teams (I think it will be Virginia Tech and either North Carolina or NC State).

BiG will add 4 teams. Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina and Notre Dame are all in play. They'd also have a lot of interest in Pitt, Rutgers, UConn, Syracuse and Boston College, depending on how the chips fall (Syracuse leading that second list.)

ACC will become primarily a basketball conference with high academic standards. (Duke, Wake, Villanova, Georgetown, etc.). It wouldn't surprise me if they dropped football down to a Colonial Conference level of competition and emphasis. I actually think we'll end up with a level of football that's in between our current FCS and FBS.

Boise State and San Diego State are positioning themselves to be 2 of the programs the Pac-12 would target for a move to join the 16-team superconference party. This move to the Big East is to step up competition and exposure in hopes they won't be left behind.

 

[Darth Snow]

Dominoes are going to fall.

Big 12 will raid the ACC and maybe the Big East (Louisville is attractive) and make a big play for Notre Dame.

SEC will join in to grab 2 more teams (I think it will be Virginia Tech and either North Carolina or NC State).

BiG will add 4 teams. Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina and Notre Dame are all in play. They'd also have a lot of interest in Pitt, Rutgers, UConn, Syracuse and Boston College, depending on how the chips fall.

ACC will become primarily a basketball conference with high academic standards. (Duke, Wake, Villanova, Georgetown, etc.). It wouldn't surprise me if they dropped football down to a Colonial Conference level of competition and emphasis. I actually think we'll end up with a level of football that's in between our current FCS and FBS.

Boise State and San Diego State are positioning themselves to be 2 of the programs the Pac-12 would target for a move to join the 16-team superconference party. This move to the Big East is to step up competition and exposure in hopes they won't be left behind.

SDSU makes sense $ wise (eventually), Boise does not.

 

[SuperD]

Well the Big 12 looks safe now. Bowlsby confirmed in a WVU newspaper article yesterday that the 13 year GoR has been signed. So if anybody does get picked off its going to be from the ACC or the Big Least.

 

[Dark Bohner]

Dominoes are going to fall.

Big 12 will raid the ACC and maybe the Big East (Louisville is attractive) and make a big play for Notre Dame.

SEC will join in to grab 2 more teams (I think it will be Virginia Tech and either North Carolina or NC State).

BiG will add 4 teams. Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina and Notre Dame are all in play. They'd also have a lot of interest in Pitt, Rutgers, UConn, Syracuse and Boston College, depending on how the chips fall (Syracuse leading that second list.)

ACC will become primarily a basketball conference with high academic standards. (Duke, Wake, Villanova, Georgetown, etc.). It wouldn't surprise me if they dropped football down to a Colonial Conference level of competition and emphasis. I actually think we'll end up with a level of football that's in between our current FCS and FBS.

Boise State and San Diego State are positioning themselves to be 2 of the programs the Pac-12 would target for a move to join the 16-team superconference party. This move to the Big East is to step up competition and exposure in hopes they won't be left behind.

Some of what you say makes sense, but it sounds more like expanding just to expand. Conferences have been doing cost analysis on adding new teams, and Notre Dame is the only team worth adding that would create a net positive in TV revenue per team in conferences with 12+ members. I think major conference expansion is done for a while and the 12 year playoff format will lock us into some stability for the time being.

 

[MtnBuff]

Dominoes are going to fall.

Big 12 will raid the ACC and maybe the Big East (Louisville is attractive) and make a big play for Notre Dame.

SEC will join in to grab 2 more teams (I think it will be Virginia Tech and either North Carolina or NC State).

BiG will add 4 teams. Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina and Notre Dame are all in play. They'd also have a lot of interest in Pitt, Rutgers, UConn, Syracuse and Boston College, depending on how the chips fall (Syracuse leading that second list.)

ACC will become primarily a basketball conference with high academic standards. (Duke, Wake, Villanova, Georgetown, etc.). It wouldn't surprise me if they dropped football down to a Colonial Conference level of competition and emphasis. I actually think we'll end up with a level of football that's in between our current FCS and FBS.

Boise State and San Diego State are positioning themselves to be 2 of the programs the Pac-12 would target for a move to join the 16-team superconference party. This move to the Big East is to step up competition and exposure in hopes they won't be left behind.

This is all assuming that the conferences decide to go to 16 teams each. This looked to be the trend a couple years ago but as time goes by I think it is getting less likely all the time.

I think the conferences have looked at the additional revenue potential and balanced it against the distributions and don't like what they see. Expansion to 16 makes no sense for the PAC and outside of Notre Dame none of the teams mentioned bring more to the Big 10 than they would cost. If the PAC and the Big 10 aren't on board then it isn't going to happen.

The problem for Boise is that they just don't provide the revenue enhancement to justify a full conference share. They have a small TV market and are not bursing the seams out of a 35k seat stadium. They certainly aren't going to travel well and they don't have a record of drawing large national TV audiences.

All of what was said about Boise applies moreso to SDSU. They should have a big TV footprint with San Diego being one of the nations larger cities and one that is growing fast and has great demographics. Trouble is nobody in San Diego cares enough to watch them play, live or on TV.

Lots of schools are making a desperate play to stay "involved" in the top level of college football but the time is coming when the club is going to shrink. Those that can't compete financially are going to be out, no matter what they want. It is all going to come down to how much revenue they bring to the table.

Unless Boise manages to come up with a whole bunch more paying and viewing fans they are going to be out, as will a bunch of other teams. A few might slip in as TCU and Utah already have but a lot more are going to be dissapointed.

The idea of a level between the big schools and FCS is a very possible solution, at least in the interem. If they can generate enough money to support themselves will be the big question. Eventually I think a lot of them will slide down to FCS and some of the bottom FCS schools will get pushed down to D2.

 

[sackman]

Having four 16-team conferences would effectively kill the NCAA, though. If that's the desired end result, continued expansion is in our future.

 

[Darian3Hagan]

I wouldntnmind seeing ND play in folsom.

 

[Buffnik]

Having four 16-team conferences would effectively kill the NCAA, though. If that's the desired end result, continued expansion is in our future.

I think that's the idea. There's so much money on the table and the NCAA is designed to put everyone on equal footing. It's become a cash cow for schools to make the move up to D1 even when they have no business being in the same division of competition as an Ohio State or Texas or Alabama or USC or etc., etc. The big boys are responding by saying that either the NCAA is going to stop this move toward parity or the NCAA will no longer be running things. For example, stipends for scholarship athletes. It makes no sense for Kent State to pay a couple million a year for its varsity athletes. It makes all the sense in the world for Florida State to do so. The big boys are trying to raise the bar so that it takes a lot more to join the club. Wouldn't surprise me at all if the next move was a 40k stadium capacity minimum or 25k average attendance minimum (used to be 30k capacity, replaced with averaging at least 15k at games once every 2 seasons).

Whatever it is, things are changing.

Either big time college football is going to be 64 teams splitting off in an NFL-like setup or we're going to see requirements for NCAA FBS football status become impossible for at least one third of the current FBS to meet.

 

[Highlander27]

Good call nikk. All that makes great sense.

 

[Dark Bohner]

I think that's the idea. There's so much money on the table and the NCAA is designed to put everyone on equal footing. It's become a cash cow for schools to make the move up to D1 even when they have no business being in the same division of competition as an Ohio State or Texas or Alabama or USC or etc., etc. The big boys are responding by saying that either the NCAA is going to stop this move toward parity or the NCAA will no longer be running things. For example, stipends for scholarship athletes. It makes no sense for Kent State to pay a couple million a year for its varsity athletes. It makes all the sense in the world for Florida State to do so. The big boys are trying to raise the bar so that it takes a lot more to join the club. Wouldn't surprise me at all if the next move was a 40k stadium capacity minimum or 25k average attendance minimum (used to be 30k capacity, replaced with averaging at least 15k at games once every 2 seasons).

Whatever it is, things are changing.

Either big time college football is going to be 64 teams splitting off in an NFL-like setup or we're going to see requirements for NCAA FBS football status become impossible for at least one third of the current FBS to meet.

You make a lot of sense, but I honestly don't think the Presidents in the PAC 12/B1G do want to go to the 16 team superconferences. And if they don't want to, then we aren't going to superconferences. The might SEC can only push so far.

 

[sackman]

You make a lot of sense, but I honestly don't think the Presidents in the PAC 12/B1G do want to go to the 16 team superconferences. And if they don't want to, then we aren't going to superconferences. The might SEC can only push so far.

I don't think the PAC does, but the B1G has better options for expansion than we do. It could work out that the PAC stays at 12 while everybody else expands. That would be the best case scenario for us.

 

[MtnBuff]

I don't think the PAC does, but the B1G has better options for expansion than we do. It could work out that the PAC stays at 12 while everybody else expands. That would be the best case scenario for us.

The Big 10 does have better options than we do, Notre Dame, Syracuse, etc. The question is which teams will bring in enough money to justify their share of the conference payouts. In other words if the (just throwing numbers here) conference media package pays each school $30 million, conference payout for bowls per team is $4.5 million, conference payout for BB tourney proceeds is $2.5 million, which schools are going to add $37 million to the revenues the conference generates for distribution. Anything less than $37 million in this scenario means that all of the other schools have to reduce their conference revenues to pay for the new schools.

I could see Notre Dame bringing that kind of value, a couple of other schools might get close. I think they would have a very hard time finding four schools that would generate that kind of added revenues. For the PAC finding four schools in or close to the league footprint is simply not an option.

 

[Buffnik]

The Pac doesn't? We're the only conference that has already made an attempt at 16. We started this.

 

[Darian3Hagan]

The only expansion scenario that would benefit us would involve ND.

 

[MtnBuff]

The Pac doesn't? We're the only conference that has already made an attempt at 16. We started this.

Actually the B10 started it by adding kNU with the PAC close behind.

That said times change and situations change. In my statement about adding revenue I wasn't refering to schools already in major conferences. As much as we hate them and and bad as they are as conference mates, Texas would bring in enough revenue to justify their share of conference proceeds and then some. In the scenario that the PAC was looking at UT and aTm give you a lock on the Texas TV market justifying their inclusion, Colorado gives you the strongest revenue producer in the Mountain Time Zone, OU gives you Oklahoma and another school that is a "national brand," Okie lite falls short of the others but is a significant revenue producer to the point of at least not being a drag on confernce payouts.

aTm is now gone to the SEC. Texas has a conference they can control and exclusive control of their third tier rights. That package is no longer in play.

 

[Buffnik]

Actually the B10 started it by adding kNU with the PAC close behind.

That said times change and situations change. In my statement about adding revenue I wasn't refering to schools already in major conferences. As much as we hate them and and bad as they are as conference mates, Texas would bring in enough revenue to justify their share of conference proceeds and then some. In the scenario that the PAC was looking at UT and aTm give you a lock on the Texas TV market justifying their inclusion, Colorado gives you the strongest revenue producer in the Mountain Time Zone, OU gives you Oklahoma and another school that is a "national brand," Okie lite falls short of the others but is a significant revenue producer to the point of at least not being a drag on confernce payouts.

aTm is now gone to the SEC. Texas has a conference they can control and exclusive control of their third tier rights. That package is no longer in play.

BiG was at 11. They just wanted to get to 12. The Pac was the first conference to try for 16.

Just because the ideal model for getting to 16 is off the table does not mean that there aren't other strategies in the works.

 

[sackman]

The Big 10 does have better options than we do, Notre Dame, Syracuse, etc. The question is which teams will bring in enough money to justify their share of the conference payouts. In other words if the (just throwing numbers here) conference media package pays each school $30 million, conference payout for bowls per team is $4.5 million, conference payout for BB tourney proceeds is $2.5 million, which schools are going to add $37 million to the revenues the conference generates for distribution. Anything less than $37 million in this scenario means that all of the other schools have to reduce their conference revenues to pay for the new schools.

I could see Notre Dame bringing that kind of value, a couple of other schools might get close. I think they would have a very hard time finding four schools that would generate that kind of added revenues. For the PAC finding four schools in or close to the league footprint is simply not an option.

You're forgetting the NCAA angle. If the desired end result is the elimination of the NCAA, conferences will admit non-acretive schools in order to push that agenda. In that scenario, Boise, SDSU, UNLV and UNM all become potential candidates for an expanded Pac.

 

[MtnBuff]

BiG was at 11. They just wanted to get to 12. The Pac was the first conference to try for 16.

Just because the ideal model for getting to 16 is off the table does not mean that there aren't other strategies in the works.

I'm sure that they are considering every possible option. Trouble is that they aren't going to 16 just to go to 16. If they do it, it will be because they stand to make more money because of it. So far I haven't seen a single option that doesn't reduce the payouts for the existing PAC members other than one that includes UT and Oklahoma as equal partners, something that they aren't interested in doing.

Other than that every option presented means less money per team in the PAC and that isn't going to happen. The Big 10 has a similar situation. Do you think that Ohio State and Michigan are going to say "Sure, cut our share of conference revenues by $5 million a year, we just want to be fair to those schools that don't have a major conference to be part of." That idea isn't going to fly. The Big 10 did want to get to 12. By doing so they added the revenue from a conference championship game. They also got a school in kNU that sells out every seat for every game including most of their road games. They also get eyes on every TV in about 5 states and do well in the ratings nationally every time they are on. Adding Nebraska didn't cost them any money and in fact probably added revenue to each of the other schools. Not many other options out there can do that.

Without the PAC and the Big 10 on board nothing is going to get pushed through.

 

[boulder77]

I tend to agree with Mtn on this. I don't think the Pac-12 will expand to 16 voluntarily. They tried. And, it failed. The question now is, should everyone else go to 16 in order to bust the NCAA, does the Pac need to follow suit or can it stay at 12 and still participate? If it were required that all of the new superconferences go to 16, then Larry Scott will really have to earn his dough. Do you make another attempt to break up the Big XII-ish by poaching UT, OU, and two others, or do you solidify the western section of the US by adding Boise, SDSU, UNLV, and North Dakota State (make no mistake, they will **** you up)?

Obviously, I would prefer (as I assume most of us would) to stay at 12. More because I don't see enough logical candidates for expansion (each one that has some value, also has some baggage as well) rather than a protectionist position of just not wanting to expand. The Big XII-ish seems to have stabilized itself once again, so I'm wondering if UT and OU would even consider moving to the Pac now.

 

[MtnBuff]

The big assumption in all this has been the idea of going to 4 superconferences of 16 teams each. There is some logic to the number because it allows you, if you are a playoff supporter to say that you have four coference championship games followed by two semi-finals (bowl games?) and a championship game.

This ignores the huge financial benefit of having 4-5 major bowl games and the arguments made by the losers of the conference championship games.

A more logical (and much more lucrative) plan is to have 5 major conferences of 12-14 teams each. If you have you four major bowl games you have the five conference champs plus three wildcard slots. These can be used by conference championship losers or even a team that was in the same division as the top ranked team or was higher ranked but got knocked out by an upset (like Okie State last year.) It also allows a window for a team outside the major conferences if you have to deal with anti-trust issues or the like.

It also means that you have one additional conference champ and two additional division champs, titles that are welcomed by ADs who are out soliciting funds from donors ("Support the XXX conference south division champions as we push to reach the next level.")

If you stay with five conferences you have the PAC, the Big 10, the SEC, the Big XII, and a conference made up of ACC and Big East leftovers. Each gets a conference championship game to sell and a somewhat regional identity.

 

[Darth Snow]

Though it came down to the wire, Boise State football did choose to leave the Mountain West for the greenerPinstripe Bowl-ier pastures of the Big East. Tough decisions like these often get dragged out not because of a stubborn inability to weigh options rationally, but, rather, because emotion is such a powerful thing.

​

10:30 am, Friday: Boise State opens its Outlook and gets a meeting reminder. Subject: "WITHDRAW FROM MW." After spending a panicky ten minutes thinking "MW" stands for "murder weapon" and wondering who was the last person to see Dave Christensen alive, Boise breathes a sigh of relief and starts looking for the paperwork it needs to leave the Mountain West.
11:15 am, Friday: File cabinets all appear to be cemented shut and filled with sand. Boise now recalls this change to the office document retention policy under Dan Hawkins. "Recruits want to see your traps, not your subject-verb agreement," Hawkins would say. Then he'd swallow a staple remover.

http://www.everydayshouldbesaturday.com/2012/7/2/3132340/boise-state-a-timeline-of-emotion?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+edsbs%2Frss2+%28EDSBS%29

 

[Unleash Hell]

Competetion isn't that much better in the Big East from the MWC, but I think this is bad for Boise with the traveling. This will wear on them over time.