(05-19-2014 07:08 AM)runamuck Wrote:  

(05-19-2014 06:02 AM)GoApps70 Wrote:  

(05-19-2014 05:22 AM)swampbear Wrote:  Going independent is almost a death wish......they need a home...

Yeah, agree. Think they are wanting SBC football membership more than they would even say in public. Going independent might very well be the death kneel of UMass football in FBS. Especially if for more than a year or two.

being an independent has worked out ok for byu and notre dame. I'm not sure what the advantage would be for umass to be in a g5 conference whereby most of their games would be against schools their fans have no interest in. as an independent they could put together a nice schedule for football. home and homes against big name teams like utsa was able to get would be better for their program.

Problem with that is that UMass isn't Notre Dame or BYU. Notre Dame was paid extra money by the breakdown even for not being in a conference for years, guess they still do. If they want a quality team, to be sure they maintained 15,000, they would either have to pay a lot for them or consider a 2-1, which they couldn't do often because they would not have the set conference teams to automatically come in. Ask NMSU how expensive one year of independent play was last year. Their boards have the answer.

A pot-sweetener like the 4 OOC MBB games from UMASS has been mentioned to help SB conference RPI. Would they/could they/would it be more attractive if, they also added a scheduling alliance in WBB or baseball or Men's soccer or anything as well? Just wondering if that could be part of a football only membership deal, and would it be much help? I haven't heard anything other than MBB mentioned, but I know RPI or quality OOC games have to be important in those other sports as well.

(05-19-2014 08:18 AM)boroeagle2 Wrote:  A pot-sweetener like the 4 OOC MBB games from UMASS has been mentioned to help SB conference RPI. Would they/could they/would it be more attractive if, they also added a scheduling alliance in WBB or baseball or Men's soccer or anything as well?

None of the other sports carry much weight in terms of media valuation ... 70:25:5 FB:BBall:EverythingElse could well be a bit generous to "everything else".

And supposing the third most important sport in the Sunbelt is baseball (though a ways back of FB and BBall), there is no shortage of northern schools willing to travel south in the first month of the season before the northern schools can start hosting games at home, so it wouldn't seem to be an issue in any event.

(05-19-2014 06:02 AM)GoApps70 Wrote:  

(05-19-2014 05:22 AM)swampbear Wrote:  Going independent is almost a death wish......they need a home...

Yeah, agree. Think they are wanting SBC football membership more than they would even say in public. Going independent might very well be the death kneel of UMass football in FBS. Especially if for more than a year or two.

If even Notre Dame found that they needed a scheduling alliance to get a reasonable schedule in the second half of the season, UMass would definitely need one.

If UMass could get a collection of late season scheduling agreements with Go5 conferences on a home and away basis adding up to four games, that gives them 2/2 home/away. Enough 2-1's to fill three games a season would bring it up to 3/4 home and away. A P5 buy game away and an New England FCS buy game home would bring it up to 4/5. Either another P5 buy game to raise the revenue to sweeten the pot to get a pair of offsetting home and away or another set of 2-1's would bring it up to 5/7.

If they could get Army to agree to a standing November series and five games out of scheduling alliances with Go5 conference, that would start them at 3/3. They could go for 6/6 if they could land enough 2/1's to bring that up to 4/5, an FCS buy game to bring that to 5/5, and an additional pair of early season home and away to bring it up to 6/6, but that would mean going without the revenue from the P5 buy game and they would still likely have to sweeten the pot at times to assure the pair of early season home and away contracts.

The main sweetener they can use other than money are OOC BBall games with schools in conferences below the status of A10 BBall, but there is a ceiling on how much they could do that, likely the four games they presently commit under the MAC FB-only contract. So that would likely have to be focused on landing freedom to schedule late season home games.

The only thing that makes their position easier than NMSU and Idaho is their location and their cheap rental deal with Gillette ... there are schools that like the idea of playing in the Northeast Corridor and in large metro areas.

But if even Notre Dame needed an agreement that gave it the freedom to schedule at least four games in the second half of the season, its seems hard to imagine that UMass could survive without something similar on the Go5 level.

Doubt much emphasis is being put onto minor sports if they have even talked about them.