The article is ostensibly about Southern Miss and their recent decline, and is written by a 2005 USM alum, but the majority of the article is about the history and future of C-USA. Likely nothing anyone here doesn't already know, but I thought some might like to read it.

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/southe...nt-losers/

Great article. Rice, USM, and UTEP should be the power houses in Conf USA since been around the longest and potential top 25 program. If this happens, the Conf will be just fine. However, none of the schools have been successful in this fashion.

(06-23-2015 02:24 PM)NicevilleWRC Wrote:  The article is ostensibly about Southern Miss and their recent decline, and is written by a 2005 USM alum, but the majority of the article is about the history and future of C-USA. Likely nothing anyone here doesn't already know, but I thought some might like to read it.

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/southe...nt-losers/

A good article that offers a good perspective. Why is it that when a G5 school falls, it feels like it is twice as hard to get back up? Tulsa and Tulane have also fallen on very hard times and it seems like there is no recovery in sight for them either. Honestly, I don't miss them, right now they would add no value to CUSA whatsoever.

It seems like in the G5 there is MWC, and then there is the rest of the pack. AAC and CUSA may be slightly ahead of the others, but it looks like if any team from any G5 conference is able to rank into the top 25, they automatically pull their conference forward(due to their likelihood of getting the access bowl). I'd say the G5 field is wide open and I would like Rice to step up and lead the pack. Beating UT coupled with a good season(conference championship) would be a great start.

If USM had been a major player, their plunge would have been front-page news all over the sports world. Frankly, I've never seen a program fall that far that quickly. That was a stunning and precipitous decline.

According to the article, UTEP has never finished a season ranked. If that is true (and it may well be), that is rather astonishing. Good to know that we have a perennial albatross in the conference.

Times are hard for the non-P5, and they look as if they are going to get harder. Logically, if we were to move up (which is just a pipe dream at this point), we would go to the Big 12. However, the Texas schools in that conference are definitely not our friends, so the MWC is simultaneously a more realistic and more welcoming environment for us. I still have hope that we can work towards that end and pull it off. We just do not belong in CUSA, and that is because we should be competing against schools that have at least a modicum of academic respectability at the undergraduate level.

(MWC member San Diego State is arguably a better school than every institution in CUSA save for Rice. And yet, SDSU is pretty far down the pecking order in California. That's how bad it is for us in CUSA.)

(06-23-2015 11:28 PM)owl95 Wrote:  A good article that offers a good perspective. Why is it that when a G5 school falls, it feels like it is twice as hard to get back up? Tulsa and Tulane have also fallen on very hard times and it seems like there is no recovery in sight for them either. Honestly, I don't miss them, right now they would add no value to CUSA whatsoever.

It seems like in the G5 there is MWC, and then there is the rest of the pack. AAC and CUSA may be slightly ahead of the others, but it looks like if any team from any G5 conference is able to rank into the top 25, they automatically pull their conference forward(due to their likelihood of getting the access bowl). I'd say the G5 field is wide open and I would like Rice to step up and lead the pack. Beating UT coupled with a good season(conference championship) would be a great start.

It'll be interesting to see what happens with the AAC. Their first year was pretty good. UCF beat Baylor in their bowl game. Let's not talk about the CUSA champ in the Liberty Bowl. Memphis surprised me last year. I don't think a good AAC is good for us right now - they are the only G5 conference I root against. Some of that is bad blood from the CUSA raid, some is annoyance at their fans and their weird superiority/inferiority complex (I called them the Hyacinth Bucket conference in a thread on the CUSA board) but some of it is rational self-interest. CUSA needs to avoid getting permanently pegged as a step below AAC/MWC.

(06-23-2015 11:51 PM)Wiessman Wrote:  If USM had been a major player, their plunge would have been front-page news all over the sports world. Frankly, I've never seen a program fall that far that quickly. That was a stunning and precipitous decline.

According to the article, UTEP has never finished a season ranked. If that is true (and it may well be), that is rather astonishing. Good to know that we have a perennial albatross in the conference.

Times are hard for the non-P5, and they look as if they are going to get harder. Logically, if we were to move up (which is just a pipe dream at this point), we would go to the Big 12. However, the Texas schools in that conference are definitely not our friends, so the MWC is simultaneously a more realistic and more welcoming environment for us. I still have hope that we can work towards that end and pull it off. We just do not belong in CUSA, and that is because we should be competing against schools that have at least a modicum of academic respectability at the undergraduate level.

(MWC member San Diego State is arguably a better school than every institution in CUSA save for Rice. And yet, SDSU is pretty far down the pecking order in California. That's how bad it is for us in CUSA.)

Although some here disagree, I think we need to be ready if a spot in the MWC opens up. Ideally it would be with another Texas school or two.

(06-24-2015 08:07 AM)JustAnotherAustinOwl Wrote:  

(06-23-2015 11:28 PM)owl95 Wrote:  A good article that offers a good perspective. Why is it that when a G5 school falls, it feels like it is twice as hard to get back up? Tulsa and Tulane have also fallen on very hard times and it seems like there is no recovery in sight for them either. Honestly, I don't miss them, right now they would add no value to CUSA whatsoever.

It seems like in the G5 there is MWC, and then there is the rest of the pack. AAC and CUSA may be slightly ahead of the others, but it looks like if any team from any G5 conference is able to rank into the top 25, they automatically pull their conference forward(due to their likelihood of getting the access bowl). I'd say the G5 field is wide open and I would like Rice to step up and lead the pack. Beating UT coupled with a good season(conference championship) would be a great start.

It'll be interesting to see what happens with the AAC. Their first year was pretty good. UCF beat Baylor in their bowl game. Let's not talk about the CUSA champ in the Liberty Bowl. Memphis surprised me last year. I don't think a good AAC is good for us right now - they are the only G5 conference I root against. Some of that is bad blood from the CUSA raid, some is annoyance at their fans and their weird superiority/inferiority complex (I called them the Hyacinth Bucket conference in a thread on the CUSA board) but some of it is rational self-interest. CUSA needs to avoid getting permanently pegged as a step below AAC/MWC.

I agree with you completely. I also root against the AAC for many of the same reasons you state above. Not much we can do about surpassing MWC right now, but money-wise, the AAC is not really any better off than CUSA. I loved that CUSA did better this bowl season than AAC and that CUSA knocked out the AAC baseball teams in the tournament. We need to do it again next year.

What if, over the next 5 years, CUSA's young programs in the big markets begin to fulfill their potential, as the article mentioned? What if they begin to tap into all those fans and they dramatically raise the profile of the conference? Given the geography, would the MWC still be a better option? I certainly don't think so.

(06-24-2015 08:07 AM)JustAnotherAustinOwl Wrote:  It'll be interesting to see what happens with the AAC. Their first year was pretty good. UCF beat Baylor in their bowl game. Let's not talk about the CUSA champ in the Liberty Bowl. Memphis surprised me last year. I don't think a good AAC is good for us right now - they are the only G5 conference I root against. Some of that is bad blood from the CUSA raid, some is annoyance at their fans and their weird superiority/inferiority complex (I called them the Hyacinth Bucket conference in a thread on the CUSA board) but some of it is rational self-interest. CUSA needs to avoid getting permanently pegged as a step below AAC/MWC.

I think you are describing the final year of the Big East - 2013. The first year of the AAC (2014) was unimpressive. East Carolina made some Access Bowl noise and then faded. C-USA (who had just lost Tulsa, Tulane, and East Carolina but added Western Kentucky, UTSA, and Old Dominion) snuck past the AAC in a photo finish for the second place football dollars distributions, behind the MWC. SMU, Tulsa, Connecticut and Tulane all were frequent mentions on Bottom 10 lists.

(06-24-2015 12:37 PM)Afflicted Wrote:  What if, over the next 5 years, CUSA's young programs in the big markets begin to fulfill their potential, as the article mentioned? What if they begin to tap into all those fans and they dramatically raise the profile of the conference? Given the geography, would the MWC still be a better option? I certainly don't think so.

Bird in hand beats three in the bush. And I think the MWC has some inherent benefits with state flagships, Air Force, etc.

Having said that, if 5 years from now CUSA is clearly the best performing G5, then absolutely I'll reassess.

There's no way that CUSA will catch the MWC without further realignment. The MWC has better schools overall, less competitive markets (no $EC taint), and a few fairly strong programs in the major sports (BSU, Fresno State, and Nevada in football; San Diego State, Nevada, and New Mexico in basketball).

If we unite on something like this, I think we can get it done; if we remain divided, or if we listen to those who seek to keep us divided, the status quo will certainly prevail. This is part of the reason why being an advocate for real change in any realm is so challenging and not for the faint of heart.

(06-24-2015 12:46 PM)ESE84 Wrote:  

(06-24-2015 08:07 AM)JustAnotherAustinOwl Wrote:  It'll be interesting to see what happens with the AAC. Their first year was pretty good. UCF beat Baylor in their bowl game. Let's not talk about the CUSA champ in the Liberty Bowl. Memphis surprised me last year. I don't think a good AAC is good for us right now - they are the only G5 conference I root against. Some of that is bad blood from the CUSA raid, some is annoyance at their fans and their weird superiority/inferiority complex (I called them the Hyacinth Bucket conference in a thread on the CUSA board) but some of it is rational self-interest. CUSA needs to avoid getting permanently pegged as a step below AAC/MWC.

I think you are describing the final year of the Big East - 2013. The first year of the AAC (2014) was unimpressive. East Carolina made some Access Bowl noise and then faded. C-USA (who had just lost Tulsa, Tulane, and East Carolina but added Western Kentucky, UTSA, and Old Dominion) snuck past the AAC in a photo finish for the second place football dollars distributions, behind the MWC. SMU, Tulsa, Connecticut and Tulane all were frequent mentions on Bottom 10 lists.

I think you're correct. It looked a lot more like the AAC than the old Big East that year, membership-wise.

(06-24-2015 12:46 PM)ESE84 Wrote:  C-USA (who had just lost Tulsa, Tulane, and East Carolina but added Western Kentucky, UTSA, and Old Dominion) snuck past the AAC in a photo finish for the second place football dollars distributions, behind the MWC. SMU, Tulsa, Connecticut and Tulane all were frequent mentions on Bottom 10 lists.

But thanks to CUSA enlarging to 14 teams, CUSA received less $$ per team than AAC. And significantly less $$ in TV revenue and NCAA basketball distributions.

(06-24-2015 04:44 PM)WIowl Wrote:  

(06-24-2015 12:46 PM)ESE84 Wrote:  C-USA (who had just lost Tulsa, Tulane, and East Carolina but added Western Kentucky, UTSA, and Old Dominion) snuck past the AAC in a photo finish for the second place football dollars distributions, behind the MWC. SMU, Tulsa, Connecticut and Tulane all were frequent mentions on Bottom 10 lists.

But thanks to CUSA enlarging to 14 teams, CUSA received less $$ per team than AAC. And significantly less $$ in TV revenue and NCAA basketball distributions.

SMU, Tulsa, and Tulane are serious drags in the AAC. I hope that continues. As for TV revenues, is that a remnant of the old Big East? As for NCAA units, I hope that Rice will soon be in a position to help earn those for the conference.

Edit: Rice being strong in football, basketball, and baseball over the next few years would certainly make a difference to CUSA. It's exciting to think that with this AD, this actually could happen.

(06-24-2015 05:27 PM)owl95 Wrote:  

(06-24-2015 04:44 PM)WIowl Wrote:  

(06-24-2015 12:46 PM)ESE84 Wrote:  C-USA (who had just lost Tulsa, Tulane, and East Carolina but added Western Kentucky, UTSA, and Old Dominion) snuck past the AAC in a photo finish for the second place football dollars distributions, behind the MWC. SMU, Tulsa, Connecticut and Tulane all were frequent mentions on Bottom 10 lists.

But thanks to CUSA enlarging to 14 teams, CUSA received less $$ per team than AAC. And significantly less $$ in TV revenue and NCAA basketball distributions.

SMU, Tulsa, and Tulane are serious drags in the AAC. I hope that continues. As for TV revenues, is that a remnant of the old Big East? As for NCAA units, I hope that Rice will soon be in a position to help earn those for the conference.

Edit: Rice being strong in football, basketball, and baseball over the next few years would certainly make a difference to CUSA. It's exciting to think that with this AD, this actually could happen.

SMU and Tulsa are drags? SMU was top 25 in basketball last year, made the NCAAs, and is expected to be even better this year; Tulsa won the CUSA tourney in its last year in the conference and was very good this year. They both expect to be better in football, they fired both coaches when they both started performing poorly and are paying top dollar.

AAC games are on ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, and the other ESPN outlets; CUSA games are on CBSSports, FX1, Fox regional, with much smaller audiences. Their contract is better in terms of exposure AND revenue.

The CUSA contract is up for bid and you think TV executives are going to pay more for Middle Tenn, F[I/A]U, UTSA than Memphis, Cincinnati, UCONN, UCF?

Speaking of all of this....

http://espn.go.com/blog/big12/post/_/id/...ck-in-news

(06-24-2015 03:19 PM)JustAnotherAustinOwl Wrote:  

(06-24-2015 12:46 PM)ESE84 Wrote:  

(06-24-2015 08:07 AM)JustAnotherAustinOwl Wrote:  It'll be interesting to see what happens with the AAC. Their first year was pretty good. UCF beat Baylor in their bowl game. Let's not talk about the CUSA champ in the Liberty Bowl. Memphis surprised me last year. I don't think a good AAC is good for us right now - they are the only G5 conference I root against. Some of that is bad blood from the CUSA raid, some is annoyance at their fans and their weird superiority/inferiority complex (I called them the Hyacinth Bucket conference in a thread on the CUSA board) but some of it is rational self-interest. CUSA needs to avoid getting permanently pegged as a step below AAC/MWC.

I think you are describing the final year of the Big East - 2013. The first year of the AAC (2014) was unimpressive. East Carolina made some Access Bowl noise and then faded. C-USA (who had just lost Tulsa, Tulane, and East Carolina but added Western Kentucky, UTSA, and Old Dominion) snuck past the AAC in a photo finish for the second place football dollars distributions, behind the MWC. SMU, Tulsa, Connecticut and Tulane all were frequent mentions on Bottom 10 lists.

I think you're correct. It looked a lot more like the AAC than the old Big East that year, membership-wise.

No, it was the AAC's first year. The name change happened in summer of 2013.

11 Schools which announced they were moving to the Big East but never played in the league under that name:
UCF
Houston
SMU
Memphis
Tulane
ECU
Tulsa
Navy
TCU
Boise State
San Diego State

0 schools announced they would join the AAC after it took on its current name.

We are doing just fine cheers

(06-24-2015 09:17 PM)WIowl Wrote:  

(06-24-2015 05:27 PM)owl95 Wrote:  

(06-24-2015 04:44 PM)WIowl Wrote:  

(06-24-2015 12:46 PM)ESE84 Wrote:  C-USA (who had just lost Tulsa, Tulane, and East Carolina but added Western Kentucky, UTSA, and Old Dominion) snuck past the AAC in a photo finish for the second place football dollars distributions, behind the MWC. SMU, Tulsa, Connecticut and Tulane all were frequent mentions on Bottom 10 lists.

But thanks to CUSA enlarging to 14 teams, CUSA received less $$ per team than AAC. And significantly less $$ in TV revenue and NCAA basketball distributions.

SMU, Tulsa, and Tulane are serious drags in the AAC. I hope that continues. As for TV revenues, is that a remnant of the old Big East? As for NCAA units, I hope that Rice will soon be in a position to help earn those for the conference.

Edit: Rice being strong in football, basketball, and baseball over the next few years would certainly make a difference to CUSA. It's exciting to think that with this AD, this actually could happen.

SMU and Tulsa are drags? SMU was top 25 in basketball last year, made the NCAAs, and is expected to be even better this year; Tulsa won the CUSA tourney in its last year in the conference and was very good this year. They both expect to be better in football, they fired both coaches when they both started performing poorly and are paying top dollar.

AAC games are on ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, and the other ESPN outlets; CUSA games are on CBSSports, FX1, Fox regional, with much smaller audiences. Their contract is better in terms of exposure AND revenue.

The CUSA contract is up for bid and you think TV executives are going to pay more for Middle Tenn, F[I/A]U, UTSA than Memphis, Cincinnati, UCONN, UCF?

SMU expected to be better when they hired June Jones. They have always had money...that's historical, it's Dallas, and that is never going to change. The bottom line is AAC needs to be better in football. Their basketball success is secondary to their financial future, since the TV contracts are really based on football performance and fan-draw. Part of the ESPN deal is with CBSSports, you think AAC games won't get downgraded to CBSSPorts if they don't perform in football?

As for the Big 12 expansion...sure, but that won't solve the fundamental problem. The current 4 team playoff system cannot hold when there are 5 conferences. This past year it was the Big 12 left out. What happens next year? Some P5 conference champ is gonna get left out again, and people are still going to be mad. Will it be the PAC-12 champ? B1G? Big 12 again? The only champ in for sure every year is probably the SEC champ. What happens if they want to pick two SEC teams and leave 2 conference champs out in the cold?

The only 2 ways to go are either they will expand the playoff, or there might soon only be a P4.