(02-15-2018 02:24 PM)jdgaucho Wrote:  

(02-15-2018 12:26 PM)GiveEmTheAxe Wrote:  

(02-14-2018 01:54 AM)jdgaucho Wrote:  UCSD isn't the problem. It's Bakersfield. I know I'm not the only one disgusted with how this went down

I can see a certain appeal to how the Big West is shaping up. UCSD gives them a fourth AAU member UC campus. If UCR can ever get its **** together the Big West will have half the AAU members in the state of CA (the others being the four Pac-12 schools plus Caltech.) And in Fullerton, Northridge, and Long Beach they have the three highest-enrollment CSU campuses. Cal Poly SLO doesn't fit in with its high-enrollment siblings, but it probably has the best reputation for college town living. They all seem to bring something to the table, either prestige or size or a cool college vibe.

And then there's Bakersfield.

At least if Sacramento State had been the expansion choice it would have fit in with the high-enrollment CSUs. They have the fourth-largest student body if you don't count the FBS-playing MWC schools. They're three times as big as CSU Bakersfield! But I guess Sacramento State has its reasons for staying in the Big Sky.

Here's the problem - no additional representation outside CA. No motivation to invest in basketball or other sports. No differentiation. There's still the bus league stigma. you miss out by staying in a bubble. Academics? Boise bought their brief membership in 2012 and theirs don't compare.

Politics was the reason Bakersfield got in. Not their NIT run in 2017, not their academics. They used UCSD's desperation against them. They were shunned for over a decade, nothing else has made them appealing. It's a victory for Bakersfield only, they bring nothing useful to the table and get all the travel savings benefits.

The Big West of 1990 with UNLV, NMSU and Utah State was the perfect setup. Still primarily CA based, but a presence in multiple states. And capable of producing at-large bids.

The Big West of 2020 is anything but ideal. 10 of 11 members in one state means there is no growth, no regional exposure outside said state. It's sad, really.

Las Vegas, Las Cruces and Logan have a combined population of fewer than a million people. The area from La Jolla to Santa Barbara has roughly 20 million people. I don't see why the CA bubble has to be seen as a bad thing. It's a huge freaking bubble. CA's population is similar to that of Georgia, the Carolinas, Virginia, and Maryland combined. A league almost entirely in that footprint doesn't seem odd to me. Why wouldn't it make sense on the opposite coast? Differentiation in the form of being spread out between conferences and divisions of the NCAA hasn't helped the CA public schools capture anyone's interest inside the bubble or outside of it. Maybe it makes sense to get a patrician (UC) vs plebeian (CSU) league going. It's not like anything else has worked.

Edit: Upon closer inspection it appears that the Las Vegas area is bigger than I thought. But those three areas of the country would still account for about 2 million people compared to SoCal's 20 million.