Who would the basketball schools like to add to the Big East when the conference splits? This is assuming that Notre Dame goes with the football schools and that the basketball schools will want 12 members for an Atlantic-Lakeside line-up to cut travel costs.

My projection is:

ATLANTIC
- Providence
- Fairfield (Catholic and someone needs to finish last)
- St. John's
- Seton Hall
- Villanova
- Georgetown

LAKESIDE
- Marquette
- DePaul
- St. Louis
- Detroit (Catholic and someone needs to finish last)
- Xavier
- Dayton

Not included are:
- Fordham and Manhattan (New York duplication)
- St. Joseph's and LaSalle (Philadelphia duplication)
- Duquesne and St. Bonaventure (not competitive or convenient)

What this alignment does is give the Big East a school in each of the main Northeast media markets except Boston and Baltimore. Providence is close to Boston and Georgetown is close to Baltimore, though. It also provides teams in the major Midwestern media markets.

Obviously if Notre Dame decides not to go with the football teams, the Fighting Irish would replace Detroit in the line-up. And you can substitute the Indianapolis market for the Detroit market. Xavier and Dayton pretty much have to be a package deal to switch leagues.

This line-up would be optimal for the Big East by cutting travel costs and creating two convenient divisions. This league would still be among the Top 10 in the NCAA. It would help the Atlantic 10 by taking away its three Midwestern outposts and dropping it to 11 schools.

Fairfield is the only "head scratcher" but the league will need a presence in Connecticut and a travel partner for Providence. Fairfield is a Catholic school and has been to the NCAA Tournament before. It can only improve in the Big East, a big step up from the MAAC.

This line-up, using the All-Catholic concept, brings together 12 like-minded institutions who see basketball as their primary sport. Villanova, Georgetown, and Dayton do play NCAA I-AA football, but it doesn't drive their agendas. Both sides of the league will win.

Only problem I see is Dayton over Duquesne, Duquesne continues that league's Pittsburgh presence and is likely much easier to get to than Dayton, OH.

This is a non-starter. Georgetown and Villanova would have no interest in this.

I doubt they want either a)a large league or b)an all catholic league.

Georgetown
Villanova
Seton Hall
St Johns
Providence
Charlotte
Massachusetts
Notre Dame
DePaul
Marquette

Scratch DePaul and Marquette if Dame isn't in the mix. Add, I don't know, Richmond, or maybe duplicate the philly/DC markets perhaps.

A 12-team league MIGHT be needed because of the non-revenue sports travel. Unless everyone is comfortable doing divisions of five schools each in a league of 10 schools. In that case, it's possible that if Notre Dame stays with the seven basketball schools, then only Xavier and Dayton would be added. You really have to feel for St. Louis in that situation. They would be stuck way to the west of an East Coast based A-10 or would have to swallow their pride and try to join the Missouri Valley or Horizon League.

As for not wanting an All-Catholic league, why wouldn't they want an All-Catholic league? The problem with the Big East is too many different types of schools with conflicting agendas. Making the future basketball Big East an All-Catholic league is the best remedy to that problem. Everyone will share a similar goal and mission. Why add two/four state schools to a mix of eight Catholic schools? That only leads to more potential trouble down the road. It's better for a conference if every school is on the same page.

As for Duquesne over Dayton ... Xavier and Dayton are a package deal. If you want Xavier, you have to take Dayton. And, honestly, Dayton is very close to Cincinnati. That's a great travel deal for non-revenue sports. Play both teams in one weekend. It's easier on student-athletes to travel to Cincinnati to play Dayton and Xavier in the same weekend than it would be for them to travel to Cincinnati against Xavier and then drive FIVE HOURS to Pittsburgh to play Duquesne. It's bad for the student-athletes most of all.

A Pittsburgh presence? Pitt owns the Pittsburgh market, followed by Penn State. Duquesne is barely a blip on the radar most of the time. The Dukes haven't exactly been setting the A-10 on fire in most sports either. Is it really worth the hoops schools adding Duquesne for a "Pittsburgh market" that will still belong overwhelmingly to Pitt when they can take the Xavier and Dayton combo that enjoys much more visibility in Cincinnati? The basketball schools would be much better off in the long run with those two schools.

As for Georgetown and Villanova having no interest, they won't have a choice. If the football schools split in 2010, what are Georgetown and Villanova going to do? Go independent? Nope. They will do whatever it takes to survive and ensure that they have a viable conference home with top-notch basketball. The bills have to be paid. This 16-team Big East is just a temporary holding cell for a few years in order to ensure that both sides are recognized by the NCAA when they split. It's just not being said out in public.

I think Dayton would be a great pick. It is a decent size market (low 50's) with crossover appeal in the Cincinnati and Columbus markets. It always has great basketball attendance that I would venture to says rivals any of the BB only schools in the BE. A good number of students are also coming from the Northeast so I think this is a good move all around.

brista21 Wrote:Only problem I see is Dayton over Duquesne, Duquesne continues that league's Pittsburgh presence and is likely much easier to get to than Dayton, OH.

Dayton has an international airport, and draws 100% of the Dayton market. Duquesne pulls maybe 10% of the Pittsburgh market (probably much, much less). Dayton is a top 100 program of all time (was rated in the high 70's, when they probably should have been closer to 40), is in the top 25 for attendance every year, and hosts the NCAA play-in game every year.

Duquesne and Dayton aren't even comparable, anybody who would take the Dukes over the Flyers needs to lay off the crack.

Krocker Krapp Wrote:It's better for a conference if every school is on the same page....

As for Georgetown and Villanova having no interest, they won't have a choice. If the football schools split in 2010, what are Georgetown and Villanova going to do? Go independent? Nope. They will do whatever it takes to survive and ensure that they have a viable conference home with top-notch basketball. The bills have to be paid.

Clearly, every school in the above list is not on the same page. Some play football, some do not. Some play lacrosse, some do not. Some can afford to send their tennis and soccer teams halfway across the country, and some frankly cannot.

Georgetown and Villanova do not share much at all with these schools. How many tickets will Georgetown sell in MCI Center for Duquesne?

The bills have to be paid, but not in that scenario.

I think what many people misunderstood in this thread is the need of the bb schools to expand. They have no need. It's the fb schools that need to expand. If the split occurs, the bb schools are just fine fine sitting pat. An 8-team conference in bb is great if it has good schools. The remaining bb schools would have an excellent league.

Temple

Wilkie01 Wrote:Temple

The fb schools might consider Temple, but not the bb schools. Philly belongs to Nova. The Be long ago had to choose among Nova, St. Joe's, and Temple. They said they didn't want more than 1 team in a market.

Fairfield? No way. The Stags have no fan base and the market is small. You have to consider what arrangement will maximize revenue for the 7-8 schools. It may be an 8, 9, 10 or 12 team conference. I would guess the expansion list will include, in no order:

1. UMass
2. Charlotte
3. SLU
4. X
5. Dayton
6. Creighton
7. Holy Cross

Being all Catholic conference has plays and minuses. I am sure it will weigh heavily on the minds of the Presidents. You also have to see how the non-revenue sports line up. Holy Cross has close ties to many of the schools and has indicated a willingness to move up. In other words, they have been lobbying the other schools already. Academics will play a major part in any expansion decision. Finally, there are hard feelings between some of the schools on the list, e.g, Dayton and MU, so that could have an effect.

I think if ND stays, the group adds 1 school for scheduling purposes and that is it. Financially, it probably doesn't make that much sense to add more. Its cheap and easy to travel between Milwaukee or Chicago and the east coast. The one school will probably be one that is considered the most successful program (by the President's definition) in 2009. But, I think it will be one of the 7 identified above.

Why does Dayton and Marquette have issues with each other? They've played each other on the court recently, so I wouldn't think it was the Great Midwest breakup?!?

mlbUC Wrote:Why does Dayton and Marquette have issues with each other? They've played each other on the court recently, so I wouldn't think it was the Great Midwest breakup?!?

Dayton owes MU a game. It won't play the game for a variety of reasons and it has a caused a huge disagreement between the athletic departments. It has gotten to the point the MU has stated that, but for the game it is owed, it will not play Dayton again. Of course, it will probably blow over in a few years. However, when you are hoping to join a conference, it does not help if one of the teams involved in the decision making process is ticked off at you.

Ok, after talking with some UD fans, I have been told that Marquette pushed UD off their schedule to play Arizona instead. How can UD be that bad guy here? They had set their schedule, MU dropped the game, and wants UD to just up and change the rest of their future schedule to accommodate Marquette?

Not exactly correct. I believe MU helped Dayton out in the past. MU had national tv lined up for the Arizona game. So, MU asked Dayton to move the game to help them out. Dayton said no, even though both schools had other open dates available. It started as a he said, she said fight that ended with Crean going on local radio and stating three things: 1) he expects Dayton to play the game owed on the contract; 2) that the series would not be renewed when the contract ended; and 3) the MU would never play Dayton again as long as he was coach. Maybe there is some bad blood between Crean and Gregory, but as of today, I believe the animosity has spread throughout the athlectic departments.

Very interesting... that is too bad. If Marquette were to keep Dayton out of their conference after a split, then they would likely keep out Xavier as well (from my understanding Xavier and Dayton have a pact that neither will leave to another conference without the other). So in the end, I would guess that Dayton would be let in against Marquette's wishes. UD has Depaul on their schedule still, so they do have a positive vote there. UD is in the pioneer league with Georgetown for football, so that would probably help them. I think UD would be fine, personally...

If Notre Dame stays with the Catholic schools, it's hard for non-revenue sports to have a conference where 5 schools are on the East Coast and 3 schools are in the Midwest. They would have to add at least two ... with the Xavier and Dayton combo being the runaway favorite. They won't get Xavier without Dayton. That would give them 5 schools in the East and 5 schools in the Midwest. The league could work divisional play for sports like volleyball, soccer, baseball, and softball with just 5 schools on each side to cut travel costs.

The basketball will be incredible and they won't have to go all the way to St. Louis or add a "lightweight" like Fairfield.

As for some other recent thoughts, university Presidents are easily able to get over things like the alleged Dayton vs. Marquette feud. Should the AD or Coach disagree with the President, they can start sending out resumes. If the Big East decides to go to 10 schools only, I really feel sorry for St. Louis. They would almost have to leave the A-10, which means swallowing their pride and asking to join the Missouri Valley Conference or Horizon League. I've read some very strong fan opinions against doing that on one of their boards in the past.

Couple of things. Dayton left X once. I don't see why they would not do it again. Schools do what's in their best interest. As for MU and Dayton's tiff, at MU, the President really listens to the AD and coach. If Dayton was a Jesuit school, then I could see the Presidents working it out. X is Jesuit, so they may act to broker a deal.

BTW, adding Dayton and X probably won't reduce travel costs than much for the midwest schools. Flights to the east coast are dirt cheap from Milwaukee and Chicago. Dayton and Cinn. are 5-7 hours by car. Flights are more expensive than to NY or DC. St. Louis is actually cheaper and closer. Again, what is the use of adding schools if it costs you money. Will Dayton and X add enough to a tv contract to offset the additional pieces of the pie? I don't know. As for conference size, 6 team conferences in non-revenue sports are allowed. I don't see it as a negative. It allows schools to play non-con games that are close to home to reduce costs. They key is fielding enough sports to form a conference. The 8 are going to have to do a little tinkering for that to happen.

One last thing, Dayton and GT don't play football in the same league. GT is not in the Pioneer.

When did GT leave the Pioneer League? They were one of the teams like Dayton forced to move to it from D3 football.

Also, Dayton left XU to join the Great Midwest, and after they were booted begged XU to get them into the Atlantic 10. Both schools at that point made a pact that said they would not leave each other, from what I've been told (by people at both schools).