(03-22-2022 03:13 PM)Saint3333 Wrote:  Surprised the AAC didn't charge incoming members 1/3rd of the entrance fee as they'll receive 1/3rd of the media rights of legacy members. Poor deal-makers.

Apparently its 2.5 million to join the Private Club that is the AAC. All that to potentially join the 7th or 8th best conference in Football.

(03-22-2022 05:40 PM)HerdZoned Wrote:  

(03-22-2022 03:29 PM)ECUGrad07 Wrote:  If the AAC could swap UTSA, FAU, & Charlotte for Marshall, App, & Louisiana (or USM), I'd love that as an ECU fan.

No thanks esp when you lose Memphis and a few others.

Charlotte is horrible at every sport besides men's soccer... They are a mediocre FIU is all
UAB took shutting down the program to actually become somewhat decent. CUSA should have kicked them out the min they no longer had football.
UNT has never put it all together, 6 winning seasons since they moved up
FAU only wins come when The Lane Train was there
UTSA may be the brightest bulb in the box, but how long will Traylor be there
Rice, well since 1980 (42 years) Rice has count them 10 winning seasons in football and 11 winning seasons in basketball

Everyone besides Charlotte and Temple are over 600 miles from ECU.

I agree 100% with this! The SBC is really positioned with likeminded institutions within a relatively geographical footprint. It’s pretty damn awesome!

The breakdown on the schools listed is pretty accurate also. I agree UTSA has the highest ceiling but how many Bowl games have they won? (Really that shouldn’t matter with their young history)

If anything, ECU is a SBC program…not the other way around.

No, of course we don't need them to be successful.

But we are forever tied to them and with would be AWESOME to play them every year closest to 11-14. Their football is NOT that bad. They beat our ass last year and their baseball is solid. I dont give a Frenchmans **** about several delusional fans. The ones I met and hung out with when they came to Huntington were awesome and truly appreciated Huntington and Marshall. They are not a classless bunch. They are proud of their program just like we are of ours.

(03-22-2022 08:08 PM)THUNDERStruck73 Wrote:  No, of course we don't need them to be successful.

But we are forever tied to them and with would be AWESOME to play them every year closest to 11-14. Their football is NOT that bad. They beat our ass last year and their baseball is solid. I dont give a Frenchmans **** about several delusional fans. The ones I met and hung out with when they came to Huntington were awesome and truly appreciated Huntington and Marshall. They are not a classless bunch. They are proud of their program just like we are of ours.

I ran across a good bit of ECU fans during the weekend of the ‘12 NOLA Bowl. Super cool people…definitely fit the SBC culture.

(03-22-2022 06:49 PM)THUNDERStruck73 Wrote:  If Im ECU and if I had solid reasons to believe that Memphis and SMU are going bye bye... oh, and with them, Navy probably says "Peace out.", and if I had reason to believe that the media deal is going to shrink considerably, then I pounce at the chance to play:

ODU
JMU
Marshall
App
Coastal
GaSo
GaState

And an opportunity to play ULL and USM relatively often in a growing conference that is quickly gaining credibility as is evidenced by the media deal. No brainer to me, but I'm not an ECU fan (or administrator).

We definitely aren't ECU fans. I don't/can't understand some of their fans's thinking. I understand the financial aspect of the situation. The thinking beyond that...not at all. Other than some cloudy AAC roo-rah. Logically, you'd think the SBC BEast would be a really attractive G5 division for them. The #1 reason should be the unbeatable travel for them. #2 Its filled with realistic regional rivalry potential and you already have Marshall/App. You play two West schools a year to see the other side. ECU's pride and joy is with football and baseball. On par lol. They aren't winning anything in basketball, can't tell me it's basketball. Seems like the bigger picture thinking would be a no brainer administration decision. It's a bit mind boggling.

(03-22-2022 08:08 PM)THUNDERStruck73 Wrote:  No, of course we don't need them to be successful.

But we are forever tied to them and with would be AWESOME to play them every year closest to 11-14. Their football is NOT that bad. They beat our ass last year and their baseball is solid. I dont give a Frenchmans **** about several delusional fans. The ones I met and hung out with when they came to Huntington were awesome and truly appreciated Huntington and Marshall. They are not a classless bunch. They are proud of their program just like we are of ours.

Again the majority of their fan base see every program in the SB below them, including Marshall and for that I don't care if we ever play them or not.

I think ECU fans have a similar mindset to what USM fans had up until the past few years. I get it, they were on the cusp of being in a big time league, have a lot of big wins over current A5 schools, and have a lot of fan support.

The main difference is ECU got a lifeline out of CUSA so they have remained closer to the top conference wise while USM had to deal with CUSA's downfall. Pirate fans are now about to experience that for themselves with AAC 2.0.

Meanwhile, the SBC is growing and getting better every year and continues to make good additions to the league. Let's see where things stand with the ECU faithful in 5-10 years. Some ECU fans already know the SBC would be a better fit. I doubt many USM or Marshall fans expected to be happy about a move to the SBC 5 or so years ago.

(03-22-2022 03:29 PM)ECUGrad07 Wrote:  I'm happy enough with the new AAC.

I don't love the additions of UTSA and Charlotte, but I'm OK with everyone else. I love the additions of UNT & UAB, though.

I wouldn't want to be in the SBC for mostly money reasons. However, I would love to play Marshall, App (now that the FCS days are long behind them), Southern Miss, and Louisiana (because I live in Lafayette).

ECU has no history whatsoever with schools like Texas State, Arkansas State, ULM, Coastal, Georgia Southern, Georgia State (we have played 1 time, right?), South Alabama, Troy, etc. Nothing against any of them - fine institutions all.

While the AAC seems disjointed and scattered, ECU has at least been in a conference with everyone joining the AAC at one point or another. So there is familiarity.

If the AAC could swap UTSA, FAU, & Charlotte for Marshall, App, & Louisiana (or USM), I'd love that as an ECU fan.

ECU was a full non-football member of the CAA along with JMU from 1981 to 2001 and with ODU from 1991-2001. Recent football history with JMU from the beat down in 2017 and then the way Mike Houston left, recent history with ODU in a few matchups and several more matchups in the near future. Hard to imagine rivalries wouldn't rekindle and grow with your etceteras if in a conference together.

Not that there's any chance of that in the immediate future, but from a mid-atlantic perspective ECU and the SBC East teams are one of the more interesting possibilities to think about for the next time things start moving. We'll see what happens between now and then. In the meantime though I am glad we're with these 13 instead of with ECU and then a bunch we don't care about just like I'm sure you're glad you're getting the AAC 8 media money.

To be clear, I am ECSTATIC to be in the Belt AS IS. In fact, we are installing new turf this spring WITH the SBC logo (byelawz).

If we had ESPN's blessing and it added to the TV deal (which it would), you grab ECU and LaTech (Not getting UAB barring a collapse of the AAC). Swallow your friggin pride Cajuns...it is a fantastic BUSINESS decision to bring them in. Call it a day and reap the benefits and laugh all the way to the bank.

(03-22-2022 10:06 PM)THUNDERStruck73 Wrote:  To be clear, I am ECSTATIC to be in the Belt AS IS. In fact, we are installing new turf this spring WITH the SBC logo (byelawz).

If we had ESPN's blessing and it added to the TV deal (which it would), you grab ECU and LaTech (Not getting UAB barring a collapse of the AAC). Swallow your friggin pride Cajuns...it is a fantastic BUSINESS decision to bring them in. Call it a day and reap the benefits and laugh all the way to the bank.

Pass on La. Tech. If we have to have a C-USA 4.0 school, make it WKU.

Otherwise, #16 should be a current AAC schools like USF or UTSA.

(03-22-2022 09:01 PM)JTApps1 Wrote:  I think ECU fans have a similar mindset to what USM fans had up until the past few years. I get it, they were on the cusp of being in a big time league, have a lot of big wins over current A5 schools, and have a lot of fan support.

The main difference is ECU got a lifeline out of CUSA so they have remained closer to the top conference wise while USM had to deal with CUSA's downfall. Pirate fans are now about to experience that for themselves with AAC 2.0.

Meanwhile, the SBC is growing and getting better every year and continues to make good additions to the league. Let's see where things stand with the ECU faithful in 5-10 years. Some ECU fans already know the SBC would be a better fit. I doubt many USM or Marshall fans expected to be happy about a move to the SBC 5 or so years ago.

This is spot on.

I think the Sun Belt is the wave of the future in the G5. C-USA isn't dead yet, and they'll have some 10- and 11-win teams here and there, but it is gonna struggle. The MAC is just the little engine that could. MW isn't going away. But the AAC has its work cut out. Five years from now, I think ECU fans will start to see the SUNlight (see what I did there?) that their old ways of being in basically various versions of C-USA aren't in their best interests.

Yet they'll be stuck there d/t long TV contracts and pricey buyouts.

(03-22-2022 08:08 PM)THUNDERStruck73 Wrote:  No, of course we don't need them to be successful.

But we are forever tied to them and with would be AWESOME to play them every year closest to 11-14. Their football is NOT that bad. They beat our ass last year and their baseball is solid. I dont give a Frenchmans **** about several delusional fans. The ones I met and hung out with when they came to Huntington were awesome and truly appreciated Huntington and Marshall. They are not a classless bunch. They are proud of their program just like we are of ours.

I have to agree. I've had the same experience with ECU fans when we've played them. The Marshall vs ECU matchup is always a game I look forward to.

(03-22-2022 07:37 PM)HerdZoned Wrote:  

(03-22-2022 06:49 PM)THUNDERStruck73 Wrote:  If Im ECU and if I had solid reasons to believe that Memphis and SMU are going bye bye... oh, and with them, Navy probably says "Peace out.", and if I had reason to believe that the media deal is going to shrink considerably, then I pounce at the chance to play:

ODU
JMU
Marshall
App
Coastal
GaSo
GaState

And an opportunity to play ULL and USM relatively often in a growing conference that is quickly gaining credibility as is evidenced by the media deal. No brainer to me, but I'm not an ECU fan (or administrator).

DO NOT NEED THE AWFULNESS OF ECU.

Like Charlotte the only good thing ECU has is baseball. They are a 1 trick pony. They can stay with Temple.

And ECU07 post just proved my point about what I said. The majority of the fan base would not accept being in the Sun Belt even if it meant 4-5 crowds 35-40K for them every year or two.

They still believe their worth is more than they command. To me they are just like WVU to Marshall, don't need them to be a standout or successful.

Huh? You've had a bone to pick with ECU for years, which is fine don't really care about that, but like we don't need Sun Belt schools to have games that draw that much. We were also in a league with you guys for a decade, I went to I believe every Marshall-ECU game in Greenville, and yes you brought more fans than anyone else in the league did but it was max 2k you ever brought and most of the time much fewer fans. App would certainly bring a lot of fans to Greenville, they've proven that in the games we've played at home, but if we really wanted that so badly we could offer to play App home and home OOC every year and even the most ardent ECU hating App fans know they'd agree to that in a second and cancel whatever games needed to make it happen.

Of course we'd sign a home and home with ECU, good fan support and very winnable game.

Also, why are there posters talking about the distance of the AAC like that's some new development for ECU? ECU hasn't been in a football conference that was "regional" since the 70's, in fact the newest version of the AAC is actually the most regional it's ever been for ECU in the post independent days. I guess I get it as ODU or App fans you guys were always in extremely regional leagues so the idea of being that spread out seems awful, but ECU's been doing it since 1997 and has long since baked that in as the cost of doing business.

You likely don't mind traveling if the conference opponent is Cincy or Houston, but now it's FAU and North Texas...

(03-23-2022 10:12 AM)Saint3333 Wrote:  You likely don't mind traveling if the conference opponent is Cincy or Houston, but now it's FAU and North Texas...

Maybe they enjoy playing in empty stadiums. They are back in CUSA again. It's like divorcing Betsy and marrying Suzie. Then Suzie leaves so they ask Betsy to move back in but only under the condition that they can call her Suzie.

ECU has played three football games against SBC opponents in the last 10 years. ECU lost every time (to App, Georgia State, and Louisiana).

Just pointing that out.

(03-23-2022 11:16 AM)GreenBison Wrote:  

(03-23-2022 10:12 AM)Saint3333 Wrote:  You likely don't mind traveling if the conference opponent is Cincy or Houston, but now it's FAU and North Texas...

Maybe they enjoy playing in empty stadiums. They are back in CUSA again. It's like divorcing Betsy and marrying Suzie. Then Suzie leaves so they ask Betsy to move back in but only under the condition that they can call her Suzie.

Of course we are "back in C-USA again." Heck we honestly never left it in the first place. Joining the AAC just got us essentially back into C-USA 1.0 and now the AAC is making its always inevitable shift into looking like C-USA 2.0, and then eventually the B12 will morph into the new C-USA 1.0 and we'll hope to catch the lifeboat onto that and not get stuck when the AAC looks like C-USA 3.0.

(03-23-2022 11:29 AM)b0ndsj0ns Wrote:  

(03-23-2022 11:16 AM)GreenBison Wrote:  

(03-23-2022 10:12 AM)Saint3333 Wrote:  You likely don't mind traveling if the conference opponent is Cincy or Houston, but now it's FAU and North Texas...

Maybe they enjoy playing in empty stadiums. They are back in CUSA again. It's like divorcing Betsy and marrying Suzie. Then Suzie leaves so they ask Betsy to move back in but only under the condition that they can call her Suzie.

Of course we are "back in C-USA again." Heck we honestly never left it in the first place. Joining the AAC just got us essentially back into C-USA 1.0 and now the AAC is making its always inevitable shift into looking like C-USA 2.0, and then eventually the B12 will morph into the new C-USA 1.0 and we'll hope to catch the lifeboat onto that and not get stuck when the AAC looks like C-USA 3.0.

There won't be a lifeboat for you this time. Not to the Big 12 at least. Unless 75% of that conference leaves, you're too far down in the pecking order.