And for that matter, FS1/Fox and ESPN/Disney.
Posted this last week on the NU board, but repost a more concise version here.
If ND decides that it's in their best interest to join a conference (the scuttlebutt is that they are leaning towards staying independent for as long as they can make it work), it'll be the B1G and the conference may very well stop there.
No other school would bring in the additional revenue to keep the slice of the pie for each school as big as it would be with just the addition of the Domers - not Clemson, not FSU (not that the B1G presidents and chancellors would be inclined to accept those 2 schools).
The wildcard here would be Oregon with the financial backing of Uncle Phil.
Word is that Knight is determined to get Oregon into the B1G, and failing that, the SEC (and failing that, he'll probably turn to the ACC).
Conference expansion is all about the $$ and Nike could offer the B1G a 9 or even 10 figure sponsorship deal.
In addition, PSU, dOSU, USC, UM, MSU and Iowa are all Nike schools.
Nike can always also sweeten the pot to those schools (while USC is annoyed with the Ducks for coming into their backyard and snaring recruits, they seem to have no problem taking Nike $$).
So if Uncle Phil is willing to pony up, the B1G could stop at 18 for maximum payouts to each member school.
But 17/18 schools is kinda an unwieldy number with the LA schools (and possibly Oregon) being relegated to a far away outpost.
To offset this, going to a 24 school conference made up of 4 divisions (which would keep intact most of the important regional rivalries and help mitigate a good part of the travel issues for the non-revenue sports) may be the answer.
In this scenario, each school would play the 5 teams within its own division, 6 teams from another division (on a rotating basis) and a protected rivalry (which need at least a rotation of protected rivals) game - making up the 12 game season schedule.
There would be no OOC games.
Here is a possible breakdown of schools/divisions.
Atlantic
Maryland
Penn State
North Carolina
Notre Dame
Rutgers?
Duke or UVA?
Midwest
Ohio State
Michigan
Michigan State
Indiana
Purdue
Rutgers?
Heartland
Northwestern
Illinois
Wisconsin
Iowa
Minnesota
Nebraska
Pacific
USC
UCLA
Oregon
Washington
Stanford?
Cal or Colorado?
Geographically, makes the most sense to stick the ND in the Midwest division, but one of the prime reasons the Domers have resisted joining the B1G is because they do not want to be seen as a midwestern school, plus the majority of their fan base resides along the NE/Atlantic corridor.
Can then just stick Penn State in the Midwest division, but that would make the division too top heavy and likewise, the bulk of the fan base lives in the NE/Atlantic corridor (plus, this would finally quiet the fans who wished PSU had joined the ACC instead of the B1G, or maybe not).
If the B1G invites only one of UVA/Duke, then the make up of the Atlantic is fairly cut and dry, but if they decide to add both, it becomes a bit oroblematic.
Think at the end of the day, the result would be to move Rutgers to the Midwest despite it being a geography anomaly, since this would make the schools in the Midwest happy by giving them more exposure in the NYC market (ND would not like that the subway Domers wouldn't get an annual, easy trip to see the fighting Irish play, but ND can't get everything they want, plus State College and College Park are manageable trips and ND gets to continue playing ACC schools that are academic peers).
For the Pacific, the B1G probably takes 1 Bay area school (every school in the B1G has from 1% to 5% of it alums living in area w/ the exception of Northwestern which is greater than 5%).
Plus, the B1G would want a vehicle (by the way of having home games) to schmooze the tech companies execs (like Apple) who will be players when it comes to streaming rights.
The last slot out west will likely be between Cal (does UCLA have enough juice to bring Cal into the fold) or would the B1G want a presence in a different market, Colorado?
An alternative would to take both Cal and Colorado, put the Buffs in the Heartland with their old rivals, the Huskers and move Illinois to the Midwest, and Rutgers to the Atlantic.
But this would mean leaving either UVA or Duke on the outside looking in.
Whichever way it ends up, this would give the B1G a national footprint across the northern part of the country, which would include many of the largest population centers while keeping the most desirable (from a national viewership standpoint) regional rivalries intact.
In addition, by adding more teams in the Pacific or Mountain timezone, have more options/variety for having a late start Friday night game (can't have USC and UCLA host every late game on Fridays).
The sanctity of reserving Friday evenings for high school football has been done away with for some time now.
The B1G (and I'm sure, the SEC as well) can make Friday night like Monday or Thursday night football as the NFL has done.
But it would be a 2 game slate with the early game starting at 6:30 or 7 pm Eastern time and the late game at 9:30 pm.
Posted this last week on the NU board, but repost a more concise version here.
If ND decides that it's in their best interest to join a conference (the scuttlebutt is that they are leaning towards staying independent for as long as they can make it work), it'll be the B1G and the conference may very well stop there.
No other school would bring in the additional revenue to keep the slice of the pie for each school as big as it would be with just the addition of the Domers - not Clemson, not FSU (not that the B1G presidents and chancellors would be inclined to accept those 2 schools).
The wildcard here would be Oregon with the financial backing of Uncle Phil.
Word is that Knight is determined to get Oregon into the B1G, and failing that, the SEC (and failing that, he'll probably turn to the ACC).
Conference expansion is all about the $$ and Nike could offer the B1G a 9 or even 10 figure sponsorship deal.
In addition, PSU, dOSU, USC, UM, MSU and Iowa are all Nike schools.
Nike can always also sweeten the pot to those schools (while USC is annoyed with the Ducks for coming into their backyard and snaring recruits, they seem to have no problem taking Nike $$).
So if Uncle Phil is willing to pony up, the B1G could stop at 18 for maximum payouts to each member school.
But 17/18 schools is kinda an unwieldy number with the LA schools (and possibly Oregon) being relegated to a far away outpost.
To offset this, going to a 24 school conference made up of 4 divisions (which would keep intact most of the important regional rivalries and help mitigate a good part of the travel issues for the non-revenue sports) may be the answer.
In this scenario, each school would play the 5 teams within its own division, 6 teams from another division (on a rotating basis) and a protected rivalry (which need at least a rotation of protected rivals) game - making up the 12 game season schedule.
There would be no OOC games.
Here is a possible breakdown of schools/divisions.
Atlantic
Maryland
Penn State
North Carolina
Notre Dame
Rutgers?
Duke or UVA?
Midwest
Ohio State
Michigan
Michigan State
Indiana
Purdue
Rutgers?
Heartland
Northwestern
Illinois
Wisconsin
Iowa
Minnesota
Nebraska
Pacific
USC
UCLA
Oregon
Washington
Stanford?
Cal or Colorado?
Geographically, makes the most sense to stick the ND in the Midwest division, but one of the prime reasons the Domers have resisted joining the B1G is because they do not want to be seen as a midwestern school, plus the majority of their fan base resides along the NE/Atlantic corridor.
Can then just stick Penn State in the Midwest division, but that would make the division too top heavy and likewise, the bulk of the fan base lives in the NE/Atlantic corridor (plus, this would finally quiet the fans who wished PSU had joined the ACC instead of the B1G, or maybe not).
If the B1G invites only one of UVA/Duke, then the make up of the Atlantic is fairly cut and dry, but if they decide to add both, it becomes a bit oroblematic.
Think at the end of the day, the result would be to move Rutgers to the Midwest despite it being a geography anomaly, since this would make the schools in the Midwest happy by giving them more exposure in the NYC market (ND would not like that the subway Domers wouldn't get an annual, easy trip to see the fighting Irish play, but ND can't get everything they want, plus State College and College Park are manageable trips and ND gets to continue playing ACC schools that are academic peers).
For the Pacific, the B1G probably takes 1 Bay area school (every school in the B1G has from 1% to 5% of it alums living in area w/ the exception of Northwestern which is greater than 5%).
Plus, the B1G would want a vehicle (by the way of having home games) to schmooze the tech companies execs (like Apple) who will be players when it comes to streaming rights.
The last slot out west will likely be between Cal (does UCLA have enough juice to bring Cal into the fold) or would the B1G want a presence in a different market, Colorado?
An alternative would to take both Cal and Colorado, put the Buffs in the Heartland with their old rivals, the Huskers and move Illinois to the Midwest, and Rutgers to the Atlantic.
But this would mean leaving either UVA or Duke on the outside looking in.
Whichever way it ends up, this would give the B1G a national footprint across the northern part of the country, which would include many of the largest population centers while keeping the most desirable (from a national viewership standpoint) regional rivalries intact.
In addition, by adding more teams in the Pacific or Mountain timezone, have more options/variety for having a late start Friday night game (can't have USC and UCLA host every late game on Fridays).
The sanctity of reserving Friday evenings for high school football has been done away with for some time now.
The B1G (and I'm sure, the SEC as well) can make Friday night like Monday or Thursday night football as the NFL has done.
But it would be a 2 game slate with the early game starting at 6:30 or 7 pm Eastern time and the late game at 9:30 pm.
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