Quote:-- Xavier will be a slam dunk to join the BE....as for #10....I could see St Joe, Umass, St Louis, Rhode Island, George Washington...if I were betting I would say Xavier and St Joe so the league would be made up of all Catholic schools

As I said, UD and XU are supposedly inseparable. Dayton is also a catholic school, so I think they would get the nod over St. Joseph's. Travel partners and Xavier pushing for Dayton would probably be enough to get them the nod over St. Joe's.

I could see GW, St. Louis, Xavier, and Dayton all being let in to make it 12 teams. Is UMass a catholic institution? If so, maybe even make a 14 team league with 2 divisions, all catholic schools (adding all the above mentioned teams plus Dayton).

Quote:Is UMass a catholic institution?

No...Umass is a state school...unfortuatly....it is also one of the few state schools around the country that does not play D1 football



Jackson

Jackson1011 Wrote:No...Umass is a state school...unfortuatly....it is also one of the few state schools around the country that does not play D1 football

Another thing that Dayton has going for it is that it is in Georgetown's D1-AA football league (Pioneer League), so it already has a relationship there. The Pioneer League is made up of schools who were playing D1-A basketball and D3 football (they decided they couldn't play D3 football, so they created the Pioneer League, which has the same rules as D3 but plays up in D1-AA).

mlbUC Wrote:

Quote:Big East
DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, Seton Hall, St. Johns, Temple, Villanova... and maybe... I dunno, Xavier or St. Joe or UMass, whoever. I would rather see two major players come out of the split than one major player and three other slightly beefed up mid-majors by spreading the basketball only schools over multiple leagues (which would never happen anyways).

From what I have heard Xavier and Dayton are a package deal. They have a pretty long history of playing in the same conference and both schools want to stay in the same conference (plus, being only 50 miles apart, they are great travel partners).

Dayton and Xavier never played in the same conference together until they both joined the A-10 in the Mid 90's.

Xavier was part of the Horizon league (then known as the Mid- Collegiant Conference) and was an historic Mid-Major. They dropped football in 1974 to dump all their resources into basketball. And over the last 30 years with a couple of arena upgrades along the way they've developed into a national power.

Dayton was one of the best basketball programs of the 50's and 60's. I believe they were in the Great Midwest conference which included UC before the migration to the A-10. They've always had a very large following in Dayton as a traditional high major program. Played UCLA in the Final Four.

Kit-Cat; you are totally mistaken.

UD and XU were both in the MidWESTERN Collegiate Conference before UD left for the Great Midwest. Wright State joined in the last year or two and UD looked to get out of the MCC, which they did when they left for the Great Midwest. After the Great Midwest broke up, XU had gotten into the A-10, and helped get UD in with them once again. UD Arena was basically the home of the MCC tournament until they left to go to the Great Midwest.

Their all-time record against Xavier is 78-59 (137 total games!). Their series dates all the way back to 1919. UD and Xavier are both part of the "Mythical Miami Valley Conference" that included Miami (OH) and Cincinnati. UD has played Xavier more times than anybody else, and Xavier has played UD more times than anybody else.

Do you still want to lecture me on this? UD and XU are very close schools who realized in the past that not being together was not in their best interests, and have made an agreement not to leave the other school behind again (after UD left them behind to go to the Great Midwest). If you don't believe me just go talk to any Xavier or UD fan who have any kind of knowledge of the other school and they can pretty much tell you that they are a package deal.

And one other thing, what does it take to be a national power if XU can be considered one? Don't get me wrong, they have been a great program in the last 5-10 years, but they have only one sweet 16, which was last year when they made the elite 8. They have lost their head coach to a bigger "name" school for the past 15 years. Sure doesn't sound like a national power to me, more like a stepping stone program that is in the upper level of the mid-majors.