(01-22-2014 02:09 PM)Kittonhead Wrote:  Cincinnati has got to go in the same division as Temple and UConn to maintain the "Northeastern" rivals Aresco was talking about on the Beach Front Properties video. If you don't keep Cincinnati, Temple, UConn in the same division its a very big blow for those schools.

With UCF and USF the question I think is do you put them in the same division or do you have them in separate divisions? That I think is a difficult question to answer because if they are in different divisions there will need to be a crossover game.

I believe that since the West will be on paper a weaker division with Tulane, SMU and Tulsa it probably makes the most sense for competitive balance to send UCF to the West to add a strong team to that division and keep UC, UConn and USF together in the East. Then give every school one permanent crossover game.

Cincinnati/Memphis
Temple/Houston
UConn/SMU
Navy/Tulane
East Carolina/Tulsa
USF/UCF

That should keep most everyone happy.

UC is not in the northeast.

(01-22-2014 02:18 PM)SteveUCF19 Wrote:  

(01-22-2014 02:09 PM)Kittonhead Wrote:  Cincinnati has got to go in the same division as Temple and UConn to maintain the "Northeastern" rivals Aresco was talking about on the Beach Front Properties video. If you don't keep Cincinnati, Temple, UConn in the same division its a very big blow for those schools.

With UCF and USF the question I think is do you put them in the same division or do you have them in separate divisions? That I think is a difficult question to answer because if they are in different divisions there will need to be a crossover game.

I believe that since the West will be on paper a weaker division with Tulane, SMU and Tulsa it probably makes the most sense for competitive balance to send UCF to the West to add a strong team to that division and keep UC, UConn and USF together in the East. Then give every school one permanent crossover game.

Cincinnati/Memphis
Temple/Houston
UConn/SMU
Navy/Tulane
East Carolina/Tulsa
USF/UCF

That should keep most everyone happy.

UC is not in the northeast.

But they identify with Northeastern schools, especially since joining the Big East. I think most Cincinnati fans have said they want to be with UCONN and Temple. Most UCONN fans feel the same way.

(01-22-2014 02:23 PM)HuskyU Wrote:  

(01-22-2014 02:18 PM)SteveUCF19 Wrote:  

(01-22-2014 02:09 PM)Kittonhead Wrote:  Cincinnati has got to go in the same division as Temple and UConn to maintain the "Northeastern" rivals Aresco was talking about on the Beach Front Properties video. If you don't keep Cincinnati, Temple, UConn in the same division its a very big blow for those schools.

With UCF and USF the question I think is do you put them in the same division or do you have them in separate divisions? That I think is a difficult question to answer because if they are in different divisions there will need to be a crossover game.

I believe that since the West will be on paper a weaker division with Tulane, SMU and Tulsa it probably makes the most sense for competitive balance to send UCF to the West to add a strong team to that division and keep UC, UConn and USF together in the East. Then give every school one permanent crossover game.

Cincinnati/Memphis
Temple/Houston
UConn/SMU
Navy/Tulane
East Carolina/Tulsa
USF/UCF

That should keep most everyone happy.

UC is not in the northeast.

But they identify with Northeastern schools, especially since joining the Big East. I think most Cincinnati fans have said they want to be with UCONN and Temple. Most UCONN fans feel the same way.

They'll identify themselves with northeastern schools until the B12 calls. Then they'll say "what's a UConn?"

(01-22-2014 02:23 PM)HuskyU Wrote:  

(01-22-2014 02:18 PM)SteveUCF19 Wrote:  

(01-22-2014 02:09 PM)Kittonhead Wrote:  Cincinnati has got to go in the same division as Temple and UConn to maintain the "Northeastern" rivals Aresco was talking about on the Beach Front Properties video. If you don't keep Cincinnati, Temple, UConn in the same division its a very big blow for those schools.

With UCF and USF the question I think is do you put them in the same division or do you have them in separate divisions? That I think is a difficult question to answer because if they are in different divisions there will need to be a crossover game.

I believe that since the West will be on paper a weaker division with Tulane, SMU and Tulsa it probably makes the most sense for competitive balance to send UCF to the West to add a strong team to that division and keep UC, UConn and USF together in the East. Then give every school one permanent crossover game.

Cincinnati/Memphis
Temple/Houston
UConn/SMU
Navy/Tulane
East Carolina/Tulsa
USF/UCF

That should keep most everyone happy.

UC is not in the northeast.

But they identify with Northeastern schools, especially since joining the Big East. I think most Cincinnati fans have said they want to be with UCONN and Temple. Most UCONN fans feel the same way.

My uncle who lives in Cincinnati describes the area as the Westernmost providence of the Northeast.



I think it more has to do with UC being an urban school that was basketball first for decades that binds it to Temple and UConn over the other options.

Tulsa, Tulane, Memphis, SMU, Houston that is definitely the South. East Carolina can fit in both an Eastern or Southern Conference. The same with UCF or USF. Navy is another school based on its student profile I feel belongs squarely in the Northeast Camp

(01-22-2014 02:33 PM)SteveUCF19 Wrote:  

(01-22-2014 02:23 PM)HuskyU Wrote:  

(01-22-2014 02:18 PM)SteveUCF19 Wrote:  

(01-22-2014 02:09 PM)Kittonhead Wrote:  Cincinnati has got to go in the same division as Temple and UConn to maintain the "Northeastern" rivals Aresco was talking about on the Beach Front Properties video. If you don't keep Cincinnati, Temple, UConn in the same division its a very big blow for those schools.

With UCF and USF the question I think is do you put them in the same division or do you have them in separate divisions? That I think is a difficult question to answer because if they are in different divisions there will need to be a crossover game.

I believe that since the West will be on paper a weaker division with Tulane, SMU and Tulsa it probably makes the most sense for competitive balance to send UCF to the West to add a strong team to that division and keep UC, UConn and USF together in the East. Then give every school one permanent crossover game.

Cincinnati/Memphis
Temple/Houston
UConn/SMU
Navy/Tulane
East Carolina/Tulsa
USF/UCF

That should keep most everyone happy.

UC is not in the northeast.

But they identify with Northeastern schools, especially since joining the Big East. I think most Cincinnati fans have said they want to be with UCONN and Temple. Most UCONN fans feel the same way.

They'll identify themselves with northeastern schools until the B12 calls. Then they'll say "what's a UConn?"

As logical as what a Cincinnati move to the B12 sounds now, its mostly predicated on WVU staying in the conference and Cincinnati continuing to perform on the football field.

If Memphis football for example takes off in the AAC and can match what UC is doing in football they may look their direction instead.

(01-22-2014 02:05 PM)b0ndsj0ns Wrote:  If ECU is not in a division with UCF and USF then I personally won't like it, which means nothing but it's just my opinion.

With them both in the other division you will play one of them home or away way more often than not.

(01-22-2014 02:15 PM)Kittonhead Wrote:  

(01-22-2014 02:05 PM)b0ndsj0ns Wrote:  If ECU is not in a division with UCF and USF then I personally won't like it, which means nothing but it's just my opinion.

I have a hard time seeing UCF/USF in the same division.

Both divisions are going to want a Florida school to help with recruiting. I also think at least 1 should be grouped in with the West schools to balance out having 3 small private schools.

If you split them up, then the possibility of a UCF/USF championship exists as well as a better chance of both schools thriving at the same time which if you are Aresco that is what you want to see happen.

With both teams is the same division you will still play a florida team each year. The trips will also be just as frequent (with the odd year every 6 if i am doing my math right) of not playing a Florida team in the other division.

It can be worked out where northern schools play a Florida school often enough, and in some years they will play both.

(01-22-2014 02:02 PM)SteveUCF19 Wrote:  

(01-22-2014 01:09 PM)CyberBull Wrote:  

(01-21-2014 09:05 PM)Carolina_Low_Country Wrote:  There has been several discussions on whether Cincinnati should be in the East or West division of the AAC if the AAC decides to divide up the conference between East and West in 2015. On first glance at a map most people would say that Cincinnati should go to the west. However once you brake down the data it shows that Cincinnati is closer to Eastern schools and that South Florida makes more since for the west division.

Below is an image of a spreadsheet of how far away schools are from each other with the first being air millage and the one in parentheses being from the ground. The second spreadsheet is a list of the closes schools to that school to the furthest away.




By analyzing the data on average South Florida is 714.2 air miles from Eastern division schools and 766.6 miles from Western division schools. While Cincinnati is 562.6 miles from Eastern Schools and 700.2 miles from Western schools. This shows that Cincinnati is much closer to the eastern schools than the western schools, while South Florida is only 52.4 miles further away on average from western schools than eastern schools. This including a the huge outlier of UCF which is only 79 air miles from South Florida. Meaning it would be more convenient for Cincinnati to be in the East and South Florida in the west. If you have to remember flying to New Orleans from Tampa is a lot closer than flying to Storrs or Phily because the plain can go right over the Gulf of Mexico.

Also to prove that South Florida should be in the west I took the order of who was closer and furthest from Cincinnati and South Florida and gave each school a weighted number. So for South Florida UCF got an 11 since they are the closes then Tulane got a 10 East Carolina got a nine, Memphis got a 8 and so on and so on. I then label each school as an E or W depending on what division they would be in with the east being (UCF, ECarolina, Navy, Temple, UCONN) and the west being (Tulane, Memphis, Houston, SMU, Tulsa) and with both Cincinnati and South Florida not receiving any points since they are the schools being analyzed. After being done the list for each school looked like this:

South Florida
11-E
10-W
9-E
8-W
6-W
5-E
4-W
3-E
2-W
1-E

Cincinnati
11-W
10-E
9-E
8-E
7-W
6-E
5-W
4-E
2-W
1-W

When added up South Florida had a total of 29 East and 30 West and Cincinnati had a total of 38 East and 26 West. Once again showing that South Florida on average is closer to western schools than Cincinnati.

So this is how the divisions for the AAC should look:

East
Connecticut
Temple
Cincinnati
Navy
East Carolina
UCF

West
South Florida
Tulane
Memphis
SMU
Houston
Tulsa

with a crossover game every year between
South Florida - UCF
Memphis - Cincinnati
SMU - Navy (Have a rivalry trophy with each other)
Tulane - East Carolina
Houston - Connecticut
Tulsa - Temple

*** Sorry for any typos not the best writer.

I appreciate the, effortbut the 90 miles between Tampa and Orlando should not decide who goes out west.

Navy would be the ideal candidate b/c they are football only and they are more of a 'national' program anyways. Neither USF or UCF heavily recruit TexOma very much so it's not exactly fair that either school would be forced to establish 'new' rivals that don't really make sense geographically or culturally.

How would UCF fans respond if UCF was shipped out west?

Its not based on 90 miles. Its based on geography. USF is further west than UCF. With that said, I wouldn't care if UCF was in the west. We already have history playing all the schools out west from our CUSA days.

I understand that but the difference is so slight even geography-wise that it's seems like a forced metric to delineate AAC divisions. In terms of history playing schools out west USF has played Houston, Memphis and Tulane in the past all sports in the past but I wouldn't call them natural rivals. However, ECU and USF was developing a nice rivalry where fans from both schools traveled in good numbers. That won't happen if USF was placed in the Western division...ditto for UCF.

(01-22-2014 01:43 PM)CitrusUCF Wrote:  Hey, let's ignore E/W and go N/S for the heck of it.

South:
SMU
Houston
Tulane
Tulsa
UCF
USF

North:
Memphis
Cincy
ECU
Navy
Temple
UConn

I honestly think that works better, even if Memphis is geographically closer to Tulsa and Tulane than the others.

+1

This makes the most sense and what most folks assume will be the natural division lineups. Navy is the wildcard and it makes sense due their national following and football only membership where they don't have to fly their women's cross country across several time zones and vice versa.

(01-22-2014 01:09 PM)CyberBull Wrote:  

(01-21-2014 09:05 PM)Carolina_Low_Country Wrote:  There has been several discussions on whether Cincinnati should be in the East or West division of the AAC if the AAC decides to divide up the conference between East and West in 2015. On first glance at a map most people would say that Cincinnati should go to the west. However once you brake down the data it shows that Cincinnati is closer to Eastern schools and that South Florida makes more since for the west division.

Below is an image of a spreadsheet of how far away schools are from each other with the first being air millage and the one in parentheses being from the ground. The second spreadsheet is a list of the closes schools to that school to the furthest away.




By analyzing the data on average South Florida is 714.2 air miles from Eastern division schools and 766.6 miles from Western division schools. While Cincinnati is 562.6 miles from Eastern Schools and 700.2 miles from Western schools. This shows that Cincinnati is much closer to the eastern schools than the western schools, while South Florida is only 52.4 miles further away on average from western schools than eastern schools. This including a the huge outlier of UCF which is only 79 air miles from South Florida. Meaning it would be more convenient for Cincinnati to be in the East and South Florida in the west. If you have to remember flying to New Orleans from Tampa is a lot closer than flying to Storrs or Phily because the plain can go right over the Gulf of Mexico.

Also to prove that South Florida should be in the west I took the order of who was closer and furthest from Cincinnati and South Florida and gave each school a weighted number. So for South Florida UCF got an 11 since they are the closes then Tulane got a 10 East Carolina got a nine, Memphis got a 8 and so on and so on. I then label each school as an E or W depending on what division they would be in with the east being (UCF, ECarolina, Navy, Temple, UCONN) and the west being (Tulane, Memphis, Houston, SMU, Tulsa) and with both Cincinnati and South Florida not receiving any points since they are the schools being analyzed. After being done the list for each school looked like this:

South Florida
11-E
10-W
9-E
8-W
6-W
5-E
4-W
3-E
2-W
1-E

Cincinnati
11-W
10-E
9-E
8-E
7-W
6-E
5-W
4-E
2-W
1-W

When added up South Florida had a total of 29 East and 30 West and Cincinnati had a total of 38 East and 26 West. Once again showing that South Florida on average is closer to western schools than Cincinnati.

So this is how the divisions for the AAC should look:

East
Connecticut
Temple
Cincinnati
Navy
East Carolina
UCF

West
South Florida
Tulane
Memphis
SMU
Houston
Tulsa

with a crossover game every year between
South Florida - UCF
Memphis - Cincinnati
SMU - Navy (Have a rivalry trophy with each other)
Tulane - East Carolina
Houston - Connecticut
Tulsa - Temple

*** Sorry for any typos not the best writer.

I appreciate the effort, but the 90 miles between Tampa and Orlando should not decide who goes out west.

Navy would be the ideal candidate b/c they are football only and they are more of a 'national' program anyways. Neither USF or UCF heavily recruit TexOma very much so it's not exactly fair that either school would be forced to establish 'new' rivals that don't really make sense geographically or culturally.

How would UCF fans respond if UCF was shipped out west?

It would be awesome.

Cincinnati thinks itself a 'midwestern' city and OH a midwestern state.

It's all about perspective.

I grew up in middle america (Iowa, Missouri, etc)....I moved to Cincy to go to school there. My perception of Cincy was at the time that it was an "eastern school/city" because I grew up in the midwest. I was surprised to find that people in Cincy think Cincy to be a midwest town. I asked some people at the time "if Ohio is midwest what does that make Iowa, Kansas, etc?". The response was "those places are the west". Of course to that I asked "what does that make Idaho, Nevada, and California then?" Response: "the far west".

So as you can see, there is no right answer and it comes down to perspective.


I think for recruiting purposes in hoops, yes we identify with the north eastern schools because Mick recruits NY, NJ. It appears Tubbs is going to hit south and south east along with local so in football I'm not sure it matters what division we are in.

(01-23-2014 06:19 AM)Bearcats#1 Wrote:  Cincinnati thinks itself a 'midwestern' city and OH a midwestern state.

It's all about perspective.

I grew up in middle america (Iowa, Missouri, etc)....I moved to Cincy to go to school there. My perception of Cincy was at the time that it was an "eastern school/city" because I grew up in the midwest. I was surprised to find that people in Cincy think Cincy to be a midwest town. I asked some people at the time "if Ohio is midwest what does that make Iowa, Kansas, etc?". The response was "those places are the west". Of course to that I asked "what does that make Idaho, Nevada, and California then?" Response: "the far west".

So as you can see, there is no right answer and it comes down to perspective.


I think for recruiting purposes in hoops, yes we identify with the north eastern schools because Mick recruits NY, NJ. It appears Tubbs is going to hit south and south east along with local so in football I'm not sure it matters what division we are in.

I grew up in Cincinnati and always considered it Midwest. I considered Pittsburgh east coast. I viewed western Iowa & Kansas as plains states.

At the risk of sounding arrogant, I think a lot of the push to put UC in the west was always just to balance the strength of the divisions. If we're putting a Florida team in the west, UCF likely accomplishes the same thing, at least in the short term.

It will be interesting to see what divisional plan they ultimately go with.

(01-23-2014 08:16 AM)uccheese Wrote:  At the risk of sounding arrogant, I think a lot of the push to put UC in the west was always just to balance the strength of the divisions. If we're putting a Florida team in the west, UCF likely accomplishes the same thing, at least in the short term.

Its not arrogant. UC is one of the better brands in the conference. I don't think anyone would argue with that.

I always thought the push to put UC in the west is because of geography. Out of the 12 schools they are one of the 6 in the western half. With that said, I think Navy goes west. They have a history of playing SMU, Tulane and Tulsa.

(01-23-2014 09:19 AM)SteveUCF19 Wrote:  

(01-23-2014 08:16 AM)uccheese Wrote:  At the risk of sounding arrogant, I think a lot of the push to put UC in the west was always just to balance the strength of the divisions. If we're putting a Florida team in the west, UCF likely accomplishes the same thing, at least in the short term.

Its not arrogant. UC is one of the better brands in the conference. I don't think anyone would argue with that.

I always thought the push to put UC in the west is because of geography. Out of the 12 schools they are one of the 6 in the western half. With that said, I think Navy goes west. They have a history of playing SMU, Tulane and Tulsa.

i completely disagree, navy wont voluntarily go west just to play those teams and dramatically increase the expenses
especially since half the eastern schools have the bigger brand.. navy/smu has potential for a cross-divisional matchup but that's honestly as far as it goes

and to the UC fan trying not to sound arrogant.. outside of uc the next 2 teams with the highest win percentage over the last 5 years are in the west

(01-23-2014 09:37 AM)pesik Wrote:  

(01-23-2014 09:19 AM)SteveUCF19 Wrote:  

(01-23-2014 08:16 AM)uccheese Wrote:  At the risk of sounding arrogant, I think a lot of the push to put UC in the west was always just to balance the strength of the divisions. If we're putting a Florida team in the west, UCF likely accomplishes the same thing, at least in the short term.

Its not arrogant. UC is one of the better brands in the conference. I don't think anyone would argue with that.

I always thought the push to put UC in the west is because of geography. Out of the 12 schools they are one of the 6 in the western half. With that said, I think Navy goes west. They have a history of playing SMU, Tulane and Tulsa.

i completely disagree, navy wont voluntarily go west just to play those teams and dramatically increase the expenses
especially since half the eastern schools have the bigger brand.. navy/smu has potential for a cross-divisional matchup but that's honestly as far as it goes

and to the UC fan trying not to sound arrogant.. outside of uc the next 2 teams with the highest win percentage over the last 5 years are in the west

I would like UCF to be in the west. I want to be with our old CUSA mates.

I want to be in the same division as USF and ECU. This way we can use Division Titles as a fair comparison. Plus they are great opponents and the only teams that we really have history with.

(01-23-2014 10:30 AM)ArmoredUpKnight Wrote:  I want to be in the same division as USF and ECU. This way we can use Division Titles as a fair comparison. Plus they are great opponents and the only teams that we really have history with.

As an ECU fan, I desire to be in a division with as many of UCF, USF, UConn, Navy, and Cincinnati as possible. An East/West split gives us that with the exception of Cincinnati. A North/South split gives us that save UCF/USF. Either would be fine with me, though I'd prefer East/West.

That said, I personally believe the Red/Blue zipper format is what is best for the league. I've mentioned before that I was aware of such a proposed lineup. It was:

Red: Houston, Temple, Cincinnati, USF, Navy, Tulsa

Blue: SMU, UConn, Memphis, UCF, ECU, Tulane

(01-23-2014 06:19 AM)Bearcats#1 Wrote:  Cincinnati thinks itself a 'midwestern' city and OH a midwestern state.

It's all about perspective.

I grew up in middle america (Iowa, Missouri, etc)....I moved to Cincy to go to school there. My perception of Cincy was at the time that it was an "eastern school/city" because I grew up in the midwest. I was surprised to find that people in Cincy think Cincy to be a midwest town. I asked some people at the time "if Ohio is midwest what does that make Iowa, Kansas, etc?". The response was "those places are the west". Of course to that I asked "what does that make Idaho, Nevada, and California then?" Response: "the far west".

So as you can see, there is no right answer and it comes down to perspective.


I think for recruiting purposes in hoops, yes we identify with the north eastern schools because Mick recruits NY, NJ. It appears Tubbs is going to hit south and south east along with local so in football I'm not sure it matters what division we are in.

Cincinnati is the most Eastern midwest city, the most Northern southern city, the most Midwestern eastern city, and the most Southern northern city in the USA. I lived there over 30 years and now live on the East Coast. There is NO PLACE like Cincy. Very conservative yet maintaining a high desire to be associated with the arts, education and culture of the East Coast. IMHO