(10-19-2016 06:25 PM)Rick Gerlach Wrote:  

(10-19-2016 04:58 PM)Orange County Owl Wrote:  

(10-18-2016 06:51 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  While I'm scattershooting, one other thought. Suppose we got together with everybody who got jilted by the XII and put together our own league? Rice, UH, Cincy, BYU, Air Force, Colo St, Tulane, UConn, UCF, Boise, toss in Army and Navy, maybe Memphis and Tulsa. That's a way to showcase everybody for the next round. Worst case, it's a more attractive league than the XII without Texas, OU, Okie State, and Kansas basketball.

There has been a lot of talk about a "best of the rest" type league. Unfortunately, there is absolutely no way we would be in that mix right now.

Think about it this way ... a league of this type would theoretically involve the top half of each of the MWC and AAC (and possibly BYU). We can't even get an invite to either league individually, let alone the top half of either one.

Having the worst team in the country (admittedly for a one year data point) doesn't exactly help either.

We need three years and substantial investment in a coaching staff (and continued infrastructure upgrades).

(And in fairness, I know that you were talking more about those who were Big 12 "finalists", so I'm kind of mixing concepts here.)

At the risk of coming off as Negative Ned here, we have a REALLY long way to go.

Agree with your comment on the 'best of the rest' league.

I'm about to split hairs on one point. We clearly have been very bad this year and right now are one of the worst teams in Division 1, non-FCS football. No one is arguing 'good' for a winless team at this point in the season, merely levels of bad.

I still think it's premature to label us as the 'worst' team in the country. From recent efforts, it's clear that the team has not given up on the season, and we're two plays from having 2 wins now, admittedly against two teams that are probably just as bad as we are. I also acknowledge that beating PVAM will not get us out of the conversation for potential 'worst'.

But I still hold out hope for the players pulling out 3 or even 4 wins. Your designation may be correct, but right now, I'd say "one of the worst". A 1-11 record would remove all doubt. I don't think that's where we end up, based on our more recent efforts.

Yeah, it's splitting hairs, and being 'one of the worst' is not really any better, but let's not claim the dubious championship yet.

Just wondering if anyone posting here is from one of Jerry Berndt's teams and can give some perspective on worst vs. SWC versus worst vs. CUSA3.14159.

(10-20-2016 09:31 AM)GoodOwl Wrote:  

(10-19-2016 06:25 PM)Rick Gerlach Wrote:  

(10-19-2016 04:58 PM)Orange County Owl Wrote:  

(10-18-2016 06:51 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  While I'm scattershooting, one other thought. Suppose we got together with everybody who got jilted by the XII and put together our own league? Rice, UH, Cincy, BYU, Air Force, Colo St, Tulane, UConn, UCF, Boise, toss in Army and Navy, maybe Memphis and Tulsa. That's a way to showcase everybody for the next round. Worst case, it's a more attractive league than the XII without Texas, OU, Okie State, and Kansas basketball.

There has been a lot of talk about a "best of the rest" type league. Unfortunately, there is absolutely no way we would be in that mix right now.

Think about it this way ... a league of this type would theoretically involve the top half of each of the MWC and AAC (and possibly BYU). We can't even get an invite to either league individually, let alone the top half of either one.

Having the worst team in the country (admittedly for a one year data point) doesn't exactly help either.

We need three years and substantial investment in a coaching staff (and continued infrastructure upgrades).

(And in fairness, I know that you were talking more about those who were Big 12 "finalists", so I'm kind of mixing concepts here.)

At the risk of coming off as Negative Ned here, we have a REALLY long way to go.

Agree with your comment on the 'best of the rest' league.

I'm about to split hairs on one point. We clearly have been very bad this year and right now are one of the worst teams in Division 1, non-FCS football. No one is arguing 'good' for a winless team at this point in the season, merely levels of bad.

I still think it's premature to label us as the 'worst' team in the country. From recent efforts, it's clear that the team has not given up on the season, and we're two plays from having 2 wins now, admittedly against two teams that are probably just as bad as we are. I also acknowledge that beating PVAM will not get us out of the conversation for potential 'worst'.

But I still hold out hope for the players pulling out 3 or even 4 wins. Your designation may be correct, but right now, I'd say "one of the worst". A 1-11 record would remove all doubt. I don't think that's where we end up, based on our more recent efforts.

Yeah, it's splitting hairs, and being 'one of the worst' is not really any better, but let's not claim the dubious championship yet.

Just wondering if anyone posting here is from one of Jerry Berndt's teams and can give some perspective on worst vs. SWC versus worst vs. CUSA3.14159.

I think you may have intended to post this in the "Ain't it Awful" thread, where Wiess and TexOwl2 had already been discussing the worst Rice Owl team ever. OC and I were talking about this year.

(10-20-2016 08:35 AM)westsidewolf1989 Wrote:  

(10-19-2016 11:36 PM)Bogg Wrote:  

(10-19-2016 11:14 PM)Orange County Owl Wrote:  

(10-19-2016 10:52 PM)Bogg Wrote:  ... Rice is probably at the top of the list the next time the American or Mountain West add members, and either would be a good fit.

We definitely hope so (and thanks).

We do appear to making progress to at least getting our MBB on track, which - while obviously not a primary driver - should be helpful.

But, to your main point ... we HAVE to get out of CUSA.

I posted this elsewhere, but UConn has an active AAU application crawling through the process, and in the event of Army hopping on board I could see UConn trying to make an "I'll stump for you if you'll stump for me" handshake agreement with Rice (if Rice was amenable). I'll be honest, I love that division with Tulsa/Tulane/SMU/Navy for Rice. Houston and Memphis would be there, but it's probably the the best possible fit for Rice overall.

I do as well (re: the AAC West being good for Rice) but not really sure how Rice would get in, even with a UH departure somewhere. The three private schools already bring up the rear in football, although Tulsa and SMU basketball are good. Not sure Rice adds a whole lot athletically...we're basically Tulane although usually slightly better in most sports.

Call it a backhanded compliment, but there just isn't much else out there anymore. The schools that might be the best athletically (in football at least) tend to be schools in small markets with poor academics - think Marshall, MTSU, WKU, and SMU. Northern Illinois isn't too far of a drive from Chicago, but they don't bring Chicago, and similar can be said of FIU in Miami. The MAC schools seem content. With Rice you at least get great academics and plenty of money for investment, plus a stadium already in place and a major media/recruiting market. They should be on the short list the next time the American or MW need a member.

Bogg - I hope you become Commissioner of AAC or MTW very soon! Thanks for the support and sharing your thoughts.

(10-20-2016 08:57 PM)Owl1912 Wrote:  Bogg - I hope you become Commissioner of AAC or MTW very soon! Thanks for the support and sharing your thoughts.

Or, commissioner of my new P6 AAU conference with Texas, Iowa State, Kansas, Rice, Tulane, and Buffalo. We need to get UConn in to the AAU so they can join up and be a travel partner for Buffalo.

(10-20-2016 06:12 PM)Bogg Wrote:  Call it a backhanded compliment, but there just isn't much else out there anymore. The schools that might be the best athletically (in football at least) tend to be schools in small markets with poor academics - think Marshall, MTSU, WKU, and SMU. Northern Illinois isn't too far of a drive from Chicago, but they don't bring Chicago, and similar can be said of FIU in Miami. The MAC schools seem content. With Rice you at least get great academics and plenty of money for investment, plus a stadium already in place and a major media/recruiting market. They should be on the short list the next time the American or MW need a member.

From the Rice perspective, I think a major concern is that neither the AAC or MWC will "need" a member anytime soon.

Obviously the lack of Big 12 expansion is the first step of this.

Even in the event of either conference losing a program or two - the new system allowing a CCG with only 10 games makes not backfilling programs a real option.

We shall see (and thanks for the reasonable discussion) ...

(10-21-2016 12:13 PM)Orange County Owl Wrote:  

(10-20-2016 06:12 PM)Bogg Wrote:  Call it a backhanded compliment, but there just isn't much else out there anymore. The schools that might be the best athletically (in football at least) tend to be schools in small markets with poor academics - think Marshall, MTSU, WKU, and SMU. Northern Illinois isn't too far of a drive from Chicago, but they don't bring Chicago, and similar can be said of FIU in Miami. The MAC schools seem content. With Rice you at least get great academics and plenty of money for investment, plus a stadium already in place and a major media/recruiting market. They should be on the short list the next time the American or MW need a member.

From the Rice perspective, I think a major concern is that neither the AAC or MWC will "need" a member anytime soon.

Obviously the lack of Big 12 expansion is the first step of this.

Even in the event of either conference losing a program or two - the new system allowing a CCG with only 10 games makes not backfilling programs a real option.

We shall see (and thanks for the reasonable discussion) ...

That's definitely a legitimate possibility, and a BYU/Houston Big 12 expansion was probably Rice's best shot at moving up in the near term. Things do look set to be pretty quiet over the next couple of years unless the Twitter rumors of UT/OU looking to negotiate an early exit from the Big 12 turn out to be true. The one thing I will say is that the American's TV deal is up in a couple years (2019 I think, I'm not sure) and there's some speculation that they could try hard to get Army on board to improve their next media rights deal. If that happens (and there aren't any indications yet that it will) I don't see the league sitting at 13 football members. That, or the American getting a significantly richer TV deal than the MW and trying to peel away Air Force or CSU, could trigger some movement along the top of the G5.

Substitutes "Rice" for "SMU" and Herman hits the nail on the head...

http://www.sbnation.com/college-football...mu-rivalry

(10-21-2016 03:56 PM)mbrindley Wrote:  Substitutes "Rice" for "SMU" and Herman hits the nail on the head...

http://www.sbnation.com/college-football...mu-rivalry

"Texas’ other famous team outside the Power 5 is SMU."

...sigh...

I dislike $MUt almost as much as Cougar High, but I hope they humiliate CH.