(03-17-2013 04:40 PM)mathenis89 Wrote: (03-17-2013 01:16 PM)WKUApollo Wrote: If I were a bettin' man, and thankfully I'm not, I'd waiger that should Tulsa leave, Arkansas State gets a CUSA invite. That would keep schools in the divisions they want to be in plus Arkansas State is only the second FBS in Arkansas so there's tremendous potential market to tap into. Should they decide to add 3 teams, I think it'll be ASU, GSU, and UL to keep things balanced in divisional play. WKU brings nothing to CUSA except ancient history basketball success. No market, no historical success in FBS football. Tiny football stadium. Add in our "directional" name and that's enough. Anyone who doesn't think there's been lots of maneuvering and backstage discussions going on among a variety of schools doesn't have a clue.
... Do you even read conference realignment discussions, beat writers, or analysts?
And the accuracy rate so far has been pretty poor.
Nebraska doesn't have enough TV sets to get in the Big 10. TCU can't get in Big XII because of Texas, BYU will get the invite instead. Florida State to the SEC to offset adding UTEP.
My belief upon great study (and talking to a few people who know the score) is this.
If CUSA loses Tulsa and only Tulsa, especially if it is prior to July 1, Arkansas State will be the front-runner. WKU messes up the divisions unless they go to 16 and UL will face opposition from Tech and Rice. Arkansas State is the easy pick.
The problem is this manure is all temporary.
I don't think Navy is as firmly convinced that the A12 works for them and they are a risk to drop out.
Too many people too connected insist that Big 10 is going to 16. Conventional wisdom says they want two from ACC and are waiting for ACC v. Maryland to wrap up. The Big 10 was willing to pay $20 million to get Maryland (allow that to sink in, all we've heard for years is exit fees and entry fees and here is a league paying that sort of money for program that hasn't been top 10 in football since 1976 and ranked twice the last decade, hasn't made the Sweet 16 since 2003). What would the B1G pay for a Georiga Tech, Florida State, North Carolina or Virginia? What would they pay for a Texas, Oklahoma or even a Missouri?
If the B1G takes two teams, odds are the teams come from some combination of ACC, Big XII, or even SEC. That means more movement. Those losing teams will add and unless the ones picked up happen to be BYU or Army those pick ups impact other leagues and on down the merry line.
There are only three outcomes for the Southern region.
1. We keep a three tier system with an upper league, a perceived middle league and a bottom league with the footprints all overlapping. Status quo.
2. We have two perceived upper tier leagues one more eastern/southeastern and one south/southwest with little to no footprint overlap and one lower/entry level league with a wide footprint.
3. One perceived upper tier league that crosses the region and two lower/entry level leagues that respect geography better.
Maintaining status quo is likely near impossible given the dearth of money to put on the table to maintain three wide footprint leagues especially if two TV valuable members are raided out. If Two A12 are raided out the question becomes split or stay together. If the choice is split we get option 2. If they choose to stick together then a depeleted CUSA likely splits roughly east/west into two new leagues.
I think most of the jockeying right now isn't likely to achieve much simply because the nature of the game is changing.
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Time to change the sun belt tournament format - From the bird's nest
