Is now the time to invite both for full membership?

I'm pretty sure the invitation to Notre Dame has already been sent and remains unopened at the bottom of a pile of mail. A potential invitation to Cincinnati depends on if the Irish ever send back their RSVP.

Personally, I would rather stay at 15 schools should the stars ever align and the Irish join for football. Of course, this would only work if the division requirement gets voted out one day. If that never happens, and membership in all of the other P5 conferences stays steady, then sure, Cincinnati for 16 would be great.

Before this season, I would have put the chances of Notre Dame ever joining for football at maybe 0.01%. Now that they have had a little taste of what it is like to pay attention to conference standings during a season and participate in a conference championship game, I'd put the chances at 0.5%. However, even at those greatly increased odds, I think there is a 0% chance it would happen within the next couple of years. I don't see any potential changes until after the dust has settled on a few P5 television contract negotiations, as well as getting closer to the end of the current CFP contract.

We can keep holding out hope that the Irish will join full time one day. However, my more realistic hope, is that existing conference teams can continue to improve, win more out-of-conference games, climb in the rankings, and ensure that the conference championship game is a matchup of two highly ranked teams each year, and then, maybe, we can get a better deal in the next round of the CFP than our current Orange Bowl embarrassment. Oh, I'll also be hoping for some instability in the Big 12 and PAC-12, as well as some disappointing television contract offers for them both. :)

(01-04-2021 01:32 AM)7thHeaven Wrote:  Is now the time to invite both for full membership?

So it can go 0-7 in bowls?

Notre Dame has an open invitation. Nothing else happens otherwise.

Perhaps it is time for the Big XII to invite BYU and Cincinnati for full membership?

Obviously everything starts with ND....but I'd rather have WVU over Cincy.

(01-04-2021 11:24 AM)YouPeople Wrote:  Obviously everything starts with ND....but I'd rather have WVU over Cincy.

VT is scheduled to play at WVU next Fall. Let's see how that goes, then I'll let you know if I prefer WVU over Cincinnati or not!

(01-04-2021 11:24 AM)YouPeople Wrote:  Obviously everything starts with ND....but I'd rather have WVU over Cincy.

VT is scheduled to play at WVU next Fall. Let's see how that goes, then I'll let you know if I prefer WVU over Cincinnati or not!

(01-04-2021 01:38 PM)Hokie Mark Wrote:  

(01-04-2021 11:24 AM)YouPeople Wrote:  Obviously everything starts with ND....but I'd rather have WVU over Cincy.

VT is scheduled to play at WVU next Fall. Let's see how that goes, then I'll let you know if I prefer WVU over Cincinnati or not!

Past interactions and one visit to Morgantown is all I need to know that Cincy is the easy call here. I doubt the pandemic has made West Virginia LESS volatile than they were.