(05-22-2020 01:09 AM)ClairtonPanther Wrote:  I know that this would result in a loss of TV revenue, but perhaps worth the risk. I think Pitt should go back to independent, and use a league (like ND does) for bowl tie-ins. I miss the traditional schedule Pitt had with BC, Temple, Rutgers, Navy, WVU, Syracuse and so on. There's zero traditional rivals on our schedule. I'd rather play Navy on a yearly basis than Duke, I'd rather play Rutgers on a yearly basis than North Carolina. This is nothing personal against the likes of Virginia and Georgia Tech, but these games just don't get me excited for Saturdays. Maybe I'm wrong with this opinion. But conference realignment and the chase of money really destroyed what was left of northeastern football. Big East was a valiant effort to create a northeastern league, but wasn't meant to be. But being in a southern based league with no rivals isn't the fit I was expecting it to be. Virginia Tech is the closest thing we have to a yearly rival, and it doesn't come close to the hatred we had with WVU and likely never will. We may hate a Miami, but we're not close to being Miami's top rival either. Florida, FSU and ND are much more rivals for Miami than Pitt is. Call this buyer's remorse, I don't know. But if I'm Pitt admin, I'm closely looking to what UConn and BYU are doing.

Gimme this sample schedule:

Army
Virginia Tech
Temple
Maryland
Boston College
Rutgers
Navy
BYU
Notre Dame
Syracuse
UConn
WVU

And I'm sure many Pitt fans will disagree, and that's ok. My opinion doesn't represent that of all Pitt fans nor those that run Pitt athletics.

I'd say not only is your opinion rare, but I personally know of no other Pitt fans that would agree with it. I know of no one pinning to play Rutgers over UNC. Navy, yes, they (not Army) were a traditional opponent and those game were always enjoyable.

While many Pitt fans miss Big East basketball, they are very happy with the ACC basketball and view it as the next best hoops conference alternative, and it includes six very familiar faces. On the other hand, ACC football, and the rest of the ACC's sports, is viewed as a major upgrade and I don't know anyone that would trade it for any other conference schedule, including any prior Big East ones, and 1980s independence schedules aren't coming back (nor is independence at all tenable if Pitt wants to maintain any semblance of major collegiate athletics). For sure, the quality of road trips has immensely improved over anything Pitt has ever had including during independence. If you aren't excited to play UVA, I suggest catching a game in Charlottesville because that is an awesome area for a weekend getaway. What is coming back is WVU on the football schedule (already there in hoops), with the possibility it will return long term.

The ACC really is the best fit for Pitt out of all the P5 for many reasons, but foremost institutional fit and its primary eastern (even if southeastern) posture. Pitt isn't going anywhere.

(05-22-2020 08:32 PM)The Cutter of Bish Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 02:48 PM)Jackson1011 Wrote:  Pitt, Penn st and West Virginia should play each other in every sport/every year. The idea that all three are in different leagues is beyond insane

I’ll see this trio and raise you a Syracuse. Seriously underrated rivalries there between the Orange and PSU and Pitt. At the very least, Cuse and BC found each other again, and Pitt has them around, but, yeah, there’s some gaping holes.

All of the northeastern schools are at fault for what no longer exists between its “core,” but, that’s precisely the problem. Different kinds of schools, different outlooks on athletics, and different motivations. There was never a core. It was like you needed PSU, but it didn’t help not having Army and Navy around, either. You had much of the schools banded there in the Big East, and it didn’t work. Notre Dame prancing around. PSU sucked because they wanted 2-1’s, blah-blah-blah, but even without them, BE schools were awful to each other. What was done to Temple was one thing; how BC played the move to ACC another, then all of these great rivalry games dying for what?

I will say that the Big Ten took the wrong eastern schools, especially if Pitt and Cuse did apply to the conference. Potential and reach be darned, Rutgers and UMD football have no place in the Big Ten, and they will never “keep” PSU truly satisfied, and you could have had the northeast by the neck reviving those rivalries.

I agree with a lot of what you said. Thing for me is like BC, Syracuse was a great game on our traditional schedule. It's a game that has had importance, but like Virginia Tech, it really never really transpired into a hated rival.

(05-22-2020 10:09 PM)CrazyPaco Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 01:09 AM)ClairtonPanther Wrote:  I know that this would result in a loss of TV revenue, but perhaps worth the risk. I think Pitt should go back to independent, and use a league (like ND does) for bowl tie-ins. I miss the traditional schedule Pitt had with BC, Temple, Rutgers, Navy, WVU, Syracuse and so on. There's zero traditional rivals on our schedule. I'd rather play Navy on a yearly basis than Duke, I'd rather play Rutgers on a yearly basis than North Carolina. This is nothing personal against the likes of Virginia and Georgia Tech, but these games just don't get me excited for Saturdays. Maybe I'm wrong with this opinion. But conference realignment and the chase of money really destroyed what was left of northeastern football. Big East was a valiant effort to create a northeastern league, but wasn't meant to be. But being in a southern based league with no rivals isn't the fit I was expecting it to be. Virginia Tech is the closest thing we have to a yearly rival, and it doesn't come close to the hatred we had with WVU and likely never will. We may hate a Miami, but we're not close to being Miami's top rival either. Florida, FSU and ND are much more rivals for Miami than Pitt is. Call this buyer's remorse, I don't know. But if I'm Pitt admin, I'm closely looking to what UConn and BYU are doing.

Gimme this sample schedule:

Army
Virginia Tech
Temple
Maryland
Boston College
Rutgers
Navy
BYU
Notre Dame
Syracuse
UConn
WVU

And I'm sure many Pitt fans will disagree, and that's ok. My opinion doesn't represent that of all Pitt fans nor those that run Pitt athletics.

I'd say not only is your opinion rare, but I personally know of no other Pitt fans that would agree with it. I know of no one pinning to play Rutgers over UNC.

While many Pitt fans miss Big East basketball, they are very happy with the ACC basketball and view it as the next best hoops conference alternative, and it includes many familiar faces. On the other hand, ACC football, and the rest of the ACC's sports, is viewed as a major upgrade and I don't know anyone that would trade it for any other conference schedule, including the prior Big East one, and 1980s independence schedules aren't coming back (nor is independence at all tenable). For sure, the quality of road trips has immensely improved over anything Pitt has ever had including during independence. What is coming back is WVU on the football schedule (already there in hoops), with the possibility it will return long term.

The ACC really is the best fit for Pitt out of all the P5 for many reasons, but foremost institutional fit and its primary eastern (even if southeastern) posture. Pitt isn't going anywhere.

Yea, that's why I labeled this an extreme take. There's just something about having regional rivalries, and for many reasons listed in this thread they're just not coming back. Florida has: FSU, Miami, Tennessee, Georgia as big regional games; Alabama has: Auburn, LSU, Ole Miss as big regional games; Michigan has OSU, Mich St, PSU as big regional games... we have nada. And quite frankly, not having big regional rivalries as a steady dose of our schedule is hurting Pitt as well as the Pittsburgh & even PA economy.

I hope WVU remains a permanent game on our schedule. That'll be the closest thing to having a regional rival on our schedule.

(05-22-2020 06:15 PM)TerryD Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 04:58 PM)Wahoowa84 Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 06:34 AM)Fighting Muskie Wrote:  The lack of a strong, Eastern all sports conference really kills Pitt. Imagine if it had been economically viable for Penn St to anchor such a league:

Penn St
Pitt
Syracuse
BC
UConn
Rutgers
Temple
Maryland
WVU
VT
Miami

Unfortunately, circumstances and internal politics within the Big East prevented that from ever being a reality and rather than be a cohesive, united region the football programs in that part of the country got Balkanized.

To add insult to injury, when the ACC entered into its relationship with ND, Pitt lost that ever important annual game.

Pitt’s biggest draws are Penn St, ND, and WVU. Now they rarely play any of them. Annual games with Syracuse and Miami hardly make up for why was lost. Those were 4th or 5th rate rivalries at best.

It’s too bad that back in 2005, when the ACC was gutting the Big East of its football programs they didn’t have the foresight to expand past 12 to create a Northern and Southern division that could have kept some of those programs together

VT, as well as Maryland and Miami, would likely prefer partnerships with ACC schools...versus the Eastern all sports conference proposed above.

Without multiple anchor schools that consistently strive for national recognition, there was no way to create a stable Eastern Conference. It would have taken a partnership of Penn State and Notre Dame to create a viable Eastern Conference. Schools like Pitt, WVU, Syracuse and BC would have been the middle class that kept the conference together. Universities like Rutgers, Temple, UConn, Army and Navy would be good geographic members.

(05-22-2020 05:59 PM)bill dazzle Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 03:17 PM)esayem Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 03:03 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 03:00 PM)bill dazzle Wrote:  I have said many times that West Virginia would fit extremely well in the SEC. The rabid fan base, no pro sports, good in both football and basketball, etc. It just makes sense.

(Please don't take me to task for posting this, JRsec.)

Yes, WV has those things, but there is also a cultural disconnect between WV and the SEC. WV is that part of Virginia that seceded from the state rather than join the confederacy. That was a momentous step, as the area we call WV today had been a part of Virginia for 256 years.

The state might be mostly MAGA country, but it is also at heart a Northern state, not a southern one. And southerners can still smell that.

That’s a very simplified version. Like modern day West Virginians are some group of high morality freedom fighters? Lol. I’ll remind you WVU was in the SoCon for like half a century.

What the hell is a “northern state” anymore besides geography? Hell, the most racist people I’ve met in my life are from Ohio. What does the confederacy have to do with anything?

Regardless of all this. Nobody should feel bad for Pitt. They made their bed in the early 80’s. Penn State moved on, and without them any northeastern conference has a giant hole in it.

From the U.S. National Geodetic Survey, a federal entity with which I have no familiarity (found on Wikipedia).

"West Virginia is a state located in the Appalachian region of the Southern United States, though it is also considered to be a part of the Mid-Atlantic Southeast Region."

I don't consider West Virginia part of the "North" at all but I'm a hillbilly from Tennessee whose Anglo-Celtic ancestors settled in Appalachia, so what do I know. I love bluegrass, whiskey and the highland warpipes-fueled sound of the Dropkick Murphys — just like most of the fine folks in West Virginia enjoy (the first two things and not the third, mind you).

I grew up 25 miles north of Morgantown and 35 miles southeast of Pittsburgh.

You are in the upper reaches of Appalachia there, but metro Pittsburgh is the heart of Western Pennsylvania and the center of gravity there.

Morgantown, Wheeling, etc....(northern West Virginia) are oriented more towards Pittsburgh and the North.

They tune in to Pittsburgh television stations there.

Southern West Virginia (Charleston, Beckley, etc...) is obviously more "Southern" in orientation. It is more like Kentucky.

(This Irish-American Western Pennsylvania coal country boy also likes whiskey, bluegrass and Dropkick Murphys).

I trust this board's posters take note that Terry and I enjoy Dropkick Murphys. I sincerely hope there is at least one other poster among us who is a woman of about 45 (and who looks 35) who also enjoys Celtic music and who lives near Nashville and likes Vanderbilt sports, art deco architecture, craft beer, film noir and sleight-of-hand magic. I can provide my phone number if so.

Pitt has all the trappings of a Big Ten East school. I wish the Big Ten would have taken them instead of Rutgers. I find it appalling that how little can interest the Scarlet Knights attract. If Penn St, Ohio St, and Michigan were all coming to Heinz Field to play Pitt you wouldn’t be seeing a bunch of empty yellow chairs.

(05-22-2020 10:44 PM)Fighting Muskie Wrote:  Pitt has all the trappings of a Big Ten East school. I wish the Big Ten would have taken them instead of Rutgers. I find it appalling that how little can interest the Scarlet Knights attract. If Penn St, Ohio St, and Michigan were all coming to Heinz Field to play Pitt you wouldn’t be seeing a bunch of empty yellow chairs.

I tend to think that those three would've become instant rivals, at least on the Pitt side. It's far easier to hate the OSU's, UM's and PSU's of the world than the UNC's, UV's, and Dukes... at least from a football perspective. However, B10 didn't want Pitt. I guess life goes on.

(05-22-2020 08:32 PM)The Cutter of Bish Wrote:  I will say that the Big Ten took the wrong eastern schools, especially if Pitt and Cuse did apply to the conference. Potential and reach be darned, Rutgers and UMD football have no place in the Big Ten, and they will never “keep” PSU truly satisfied, and you could have had the northeast by the neck reviving those rivalries.

Those three schools are on the wrong side of the Appalachian Mountains to dominate the eastern markets. Perhaps all three deserve to be together in the Big Ten.

(05-22-2020 09:02 PM)Transic_nyc Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 08:32 PM)The Cutter of Bish Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 02:48 PM)Jackson1011 Wrote:  Pitt, Penn st and West Virginia should play each other in every sport/every year. The idea that all three are in different leagues is beyond insane

I’ll see this trio and raise you a Syracuse. Seriously underrated rivalries there between the Orange and PSU and Pitt. At the very least, Cuse and BC found each other again, and Pitt has them around, but, yeah, there’s some gaping holes.

All of the northeastern schools are at fault for what no longer exists between its “core,” but, that’s precisely the problem. Different kinds of schools, different outlooks on athletics, and different motivations. There was never a core. It was like you needed PSU, but it didn’t help not having Army and Navy around, either. You had much of the schools banded there in the Big East, and it didn’t work. Notre Dame prancing around. PSU sucked because they wanted 2-1’s, blah-blah-blah, but even without them, BE schools were awful to each other. What was done to Temple was one thing; how BC played the move to ACC another, then all of these great rivalry games dying for what?

I will say that the Big Ten took the wrong eastern schools, especially if Pitt and Cuse did apply to the conference. Potential and reach be darned, Rutgers and UMD football have no place in the Big Ten, and they will never “keep” PSU truly satisfied, and you could have had the northeast by the neck reviving those rivalries.

"Little" Rutgers didn't put a gun to the heads of the Big Ten and told them to take us. The core schools preferred similar institutions over old northeastern rivalries. They could have had Pitt, Syracuse and Boston College any time before 2005. Heck, they could have taken Missouri and Kansas as well but passed on all of them. Why? Because the academics running the institutions have their particular standards. It's just that it worked out for us the last time.

But, of course, the sports snobs and geography snobs will never accept us, so what's the damn difference!

Academics? Last USN&WR rankings Syracuse and Pitt ranked ahead of Rutgers.

I can't help it if Rutgers has the stupidest name for a state university in the country. If they just called it the University of New Jersey or New Jersey University more people would respect them and more people would want to go there.

(05-22-2020 01:09 AM)ClairtonPanther Wrote:  I know that this would result in a loss of TV revenue, but perhaps worth the risk. I think Pitt should go back to independent, and use a league (like ND does) for bowl tie-ins. I miss the traditional schedule Pitt had with BC, Temple, Rutgers, Navy, WVU, Syracuse and so on. There's zero traditional rivals on our schedule. I'd rather play Navy on a yearly basis than Duke, I'd rather play Rutgers on a yearly basis than North Carolina. This is nothing personal against the likes of Virginia and Georgia Tech, but these games just don't get me excited for Saturdays. Maybe I'm wrong with this opinion. But conference realignment and the chase of money really destroyed what was left of northeastern football. Big East was a valiant effort to create a northeastern league, but wasn't meant to be. But being in a southern based league with no rivals isn't the fit I was expecting it to be. Virginia Tech is the closest thing we have to a yearly rival, and it doesn't come close to the hatred we had with WVU and likely never will. We may hate a Miami, but we're not close to being Miami's top rival either. Florida, FSU and ND are much more rivals for Miami than Pitt is. Call this buyer's remorse, I don't know. But if I'm Pitt admin, I'm closely looking to what UConn and BYU are doing.

Gimme this sample schedule:

Army
Virginia Tech
Temple
Maryland
Boston College
Rutgers
Navy
BYU
Notre Dame
Syracuse
UConn
WVU

And I'm sure many Pitt fans will disagree, and that's ok. My opinion doesn't represent that of all Pitt fans nor those that run Pitt athletics.

I liked the rivalry you guys were building with Cincy too. No love lost between those cities pro teams so it was a no brainer the colleges would naturally also feel that animosity.

I think the ACC needs to go a Big East/ACC division split.

Pitt, UofL, Cuse, BC, VT, Miami, FSU (yes, I know FSU wasn't in the BE but they weren't OG ACC)

Duke, NC ST, UNC, Wake, Clemson, GT, UVA

Both are full of long time rivalries with the exception of UofL but they have history with more teams in that division.

I would love a redo on a northeastern FB league.

(05-23-2020 05:19 AM)schmolik Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 09:02 PM)Transic_nyc Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 08:32 PM)The Cutter of Bish Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 02:48 PM)Jackson1011 Wrote:  Pitt, Penn st and West Virginia should play each other in every sport/every year. The idea that all three are in different leagues is beyond insane

I’ll see this trio and raise you a Syracuse. Seriously underrated rivalries there between the Orange and PSU and Pitt. At the very least, Cuse and BC found each other again, and Pitt has them around, but, yeah, there’s some gaping holes.

All of the northeastern schools are at fault for what no longer exists between its “core,” but, that’s precisely the problem. Different kinds of schools, different outlooks on athletics, and different motivations. There was never a core. It was like you needed PSU, but it didn’t help not having Army and Navy around, either. You had much of the schools banded there in the Big East, and it didn’t work. Notre Dame prancing around. PSU sucked because they wanted 2-1’s, blah-blah-blah, but even without them, BE schools were awful to each other. What was done to Temple was one thing; how BC played the move to ACC another, then all of these great rivalry games dying for what?

I will say that the Big Ten took the wrong eastern schools, especially if Pitt and Cuse did apply to the conference. Potential and reach be darned, Rutgers and UMD football have no place in the Big Ten, and they will never “keep” PSU truly satisfied, and you could have had the northeast by the neck reviving those rivalries.

"Little" Rutgers didn't put a gun to the heads of the Big Ten and told them to take us. The core schools preferred similar institutions over old northeastern rivalries. They could have had Pitt, Syracuse and Boston College any time before 2005. Heck, they could have taken Missouri and Kansas as well but passed on all of them. Why? Because the academics running the institutions have their particular standards. It's just that it worked out for us the last time.

But, of course, the sports snobs and geography snobs will never accept us, so what's the damn difference!

Academics? Last USN&WR rankings Syracuse and Pitt ranked ahead of Rutgers.

I can't help it if Rutgers has the stupidest name for a state university in the country. If they just called it the University of New Jersey or New Jersey University more people would respect them and more people would want to go there.

Academics, institutional fit, etc didn't have a whole lot to do with it. The Big Ten needed to get their cable network carried on the east coast for the massive carriage fees it would unlock and the state universities of Maryland and New Jersey combined with Penn State got them everything between DC and NYC/Long Island. It's really not that complicated.

(05-22-2020 02:57 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 02:50 PM)bullet Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 10:29 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 09:10 AM)JRsec Wrote:  IMO the Big 10 and SEC and Big 12 need to be more honest about their mistakes as well instead of playing happy families.

I think we all - except radical ACCers from the Carolina Core - agree that the reason the ACC needs a GOR is that (a) it makes considerably less than its competitors, the SEC and B1G, and (b) it is a three-sectioned hydra with grafted-on southern (read Florida) and northeastern wings that have no cultural ties with the Carolina-VA core and thus are amenable to bolting for more money. Who knows, maybe the ACCN is even right now closing that money gap and hence the problem, but probably not.

As for the SEC, the only real mistake I've seen, and it is a mild one, is Missouri. Missouri just doesn't fit as well as we thought it might. They aren't a terrible fit, but they aren't a particularly good one. I'd personally be happy if the B1G or Big 12 took them off SEC hands. That said, if getting Mizzou was the price for getting TAMU, then it was well worth paying, as TAMU has been a Grand Slam, the best post-2009 expansion acquisition that any conference has made.

WVU would have been a better fit. And might have been the team added today. But 9 years ago, markets for conference networks were the prime requirement.

I agree that WV would be a better fit for the SEC than Missouri. But, let's face it, WV has a reputation. A sofa-burning reputation. Missouri smells better.

But that thing about markets - while WV is itself ensconced in Appalachia, its graduates generally leave for two places, Pittsburgh and the Virginia side of Washington DC. You go to Northern Virginia and you will be surprised at how many WV t-shirts you see out and about. There is a market for WV eyeballs in both of those areas.

Not entirely true. Lots of their students come from the suburbs of NYC, Philly, DC and Baltimore. Thats where they move to when they graduate. Lots of WVU fans all up and down the I-95 corridor.

I fully support Pittsburgh going independent.

(05-22-2020 11:42 PM)NJ2MDTerp Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 08:32 PM)The Cutter of Bish Wrote:  I will say that the Big Ten took the wrong eastern schools, especially if Pitt and Cuse did apply to the conference. Potential and reach be darned, Rutgers and UMD football have no place in the Big Ten, and they will never “keep” PSU truly satisfied, and you could have had the northeast by the neck reviving those rivalries.

Those three schools are on the wrong side of the Appalachian Mountains to dominate the eastern markets. Perhaps all three deserve to be together in the Big Ten.

I don’t think it’s location but more pedigree and tradition? UMD used to run around with southern schools. Yeah, they have a thing with WVU, but, again, WVU was also “southern” at one time. They don’t run deep with the rest of the northeast unless you want to count what series they’ve had with Navy and Penn State.

Rutgers definitely centered in on the region, but until the 80’s, were playing a schedule more reminiscent of today’s Patriot League or CAAF, with some familiar names in there, too. I would say that people aren’t being truly fair to Rutgers because they don’t run deep at other known D1 northeastern schools, like Cuse, BC, or even Temple, but Rutgers has carried so many other issues with it that it has made for a tough chew.

Both fit the institutional profile of Big Ten schools, but the athletic value to the northeast and linkage to PSU is overstated at best or simply untrue. Probably the kind of spew from college administrators who refuse to actually tackle their real sentiments or expose the politics. Like any between PSU and Pitt, or the political challenge of having new members from “claimed” states, like we hear with Ohio with OSU and Cincy or Iowa with UI and ISU.

(05-22-2020 05:21 PM)JRsec Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 05:10 PM)Wahoowa84 Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 04:57 PM)JRsec Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 04:54 PM)XLance Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 02:57 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  I agree that WV would be a better fit for the SEC than Missouri. But, let's face it, WV has a reputation. A sofa-burning reputation. Missouri smells better.

But that thing about markets - while WV is itself ensconced in Appalachia, its graduates generally leave for two places, Pittsburgh and the Virginia side of Washington DC. You go to Northern Virginia and you will be surprised at how many WV t-shirts you see out and about. There is a market for WV eyeballs in both of those areas.

Kentucky burns couches too. It's a cultural thing.

Well both states have a large % of their retirement investments tied up in Barcolounger.

Interesting how the SEC powers-that-be sacrificed cultural fit (WVU) for academic snobbery (Mizzou) in the last expansion. BIG leaders would be proud of that decision.

And that would be wrong. Missouri had 6 million and West Virginia just over 1. Market footprint recommendation from ESPN says, Missouri! Very much like market footprint recommendation from FOX says, Rutgers!

When the Eers first applied to the SEC in '91 they lacked the required sports to fit the SEC and were considered an outlier as was Virginia Tech who also expressed interest at that time. The SEC's first choice was always going to be Virginia Tech in that market because of the population and academics. West Virginia likes to think they were in competition with Missouri. They weren't. Mizzou only got in because Boren insisted upon Oklahoma State otherwise the SEC's big additions might well have been Oklahoma and Texas A&M.

But your quip about academic snobbery is not too far off base as there is a concerted effort in the SEC to improve on that count. We finally all received R1 Carnegie status, something that was not true in either '92 or 2012. The last set of additions included two AAU schools.

West Virginia is a fine school hampered in the same way as the two Mississippi schools in that all three are tasked with bringing up the standard of living for the state's population as a priority as opposed to enhancing research for national matters. WVU does a fine job in that regard. But it goes unrecognized because Carnegie doesn't have a recognition for actually serving the needs of your state, meaning the people who fund you.

Apparently a failed mission if, as so many posters always claim, WVU's graduates all rush off to Pittsburgh and northern Virginia.

The proof is in the pudding. Despite the university's decades of effort to pull up West Virginia by its bootstraps, it remains an impoverished, backward state. Mississippi, too. And before anyone jumps on my assessment, I have a history in both states.

(05-23-2020 08:50 AM)The Cutter of Bish Wrote:  Both fit the institutional profile of Big Ten schools, but the athletic value to the northeast and linkage to PSU is overstated at best or simply untrue.

Thing is, though, since adding Rutgers and MD, B1G revenues have gone through the roof. So they certainly haven't hurt the B1G in any discernible way.

(05-23-2020 09:22 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(05-23-2020 08:50 AM)The Cutter of Bish Wrote:  Both fit the institutional profile of Big Ten schools, but the athletic value to the northeast and linkage to PSU is overstated at best or simply untrue.

Thing is, though, since adding Rutgers and MD, B1G revenues have gone through the roof. So they certainly haven't hurt the B1G in any discernible way.

It has helped to create an interesting dichotomy however. If you examine revenues in the Big 10 it is clear that the top 5 schools do exceedingly well in ratings, attendance, and revenue. It is equally clear that the bottom 5 schools drag all averages way down. What is thinning in the Big 10 is the middle. So while they are very healthy and certainly in no immediate danger of losing status it is clearly but slowly becoming a conference of have and have nots by SEC and Big 10 standards, certainly not when compared to the PAC and ACC.

I feel like WVU runs into some of the same issues. WVU AD has done a good job of scheduling regional opponents in the non-conference. They schedule multiple good/regional P5 games a year. It makes for a hard schedule, but I think their fans enjoy it. Here are their bigger/regional non-con games by year:

2020:
FSU
Maryland

2021:
Maryland
VT

2022:
Pitt
VT

2023:
Pitt
Penn State

2024:
Penn State
Pitt

2025:
Pitt

2026:
Alabama
ECU

2027:
Alabama

(05-23-2020 09:55 AM)MAcFroggy Wrote:  I feel like WVU runs into some of the same issues. WVU AD has done a good job of scheduling regional opponents in the non-conference. They schedule multiple good/regional P5 games a year. It makes for a hard schedule, but I think their fans enjoy it. Here are their bigger/regional non-con games by year:

2020:
FSU
Maryland

2021:
Maryland
VT

2022:
Pitt
VT

2023:
Pitt
Penn State

2024:
Penn State
Pitt

2025:
Pitt

2026:
Alabama
ECU

2027:
Alabama

Wow! That is a phenomenal, fan-friendly OOC schedule by WVU. They only have 3 games per year to schedule...and they actually have H&H rivalries with Pitt, PSU, UMD and VT. Kudos to the AD.

Games against FSU and Alabama could be risky. Other than UT-Austin and OU, I thought B12 schools were cautious with high profile opponents.

It also means 11 P5 games per year...very challenging.

The WVU AD understood the implications of joining the B12. WVU may have joined a Texahoma conference, but WVU recognizes its roots.

(05-22-2020 10:23 PM)bill dazzle Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 06:15 PM)TerryD Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 04:58 PM)Wahoowa84 Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 06:34 AM)Fighting Muskie Wrote:  The lack of a strong, Eastern all sports conference really kills Pitt. Imagine if it had been economically viable for Penn St to anchor such a league:

Penn St
Pitt
Syracuse
BC
UConn
Rutgers
Temple
Maryland
WVU
VT
Miami

Unfortunately, circumstances and internal politics within the Big East prevented that from ever being a reality and rather than be a cohesive, united region the football programs in that part of the country got Balkanized.

To add insult to injury, when the ACC entered into its relationship with ND, Pitt lost that ever important annual game.

Pitt’s biggest draws are Penn St, ND, and WVU. Now they rarely play any of them. Annual games with Syracuse and Miami hardly make up for why was lost. Those were 4th or 5th rate rivalries at best.

It’s too bad that back in 2005, when the ACC was gutting the Big East of its football programs they didn’t have the foresight to expand past 12 to create a Northern and Southern division that could have kept some of those programs together

VT, as well as Maryland and Miami, would likely prefer partnerships with ACC schools...versus the Eastern all sports conference proposed above.

Without multiple anchor schools that consistently strive for national recognition, there was no way to create a stable Eastern Conference. It would have taken a partnership of Penn State and Notre Dame to create a viable Eastern Conference. Schools like Pitt, WVU, Syracuse and BC would have been the middle class that kept the conference together. Universities like Rutgers, Temple, UConn, Army and Navy would be good geographic members.

(05-22-2020 05:59 PM)bill dazzle Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 03:17 PM)esayem Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 03:03 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  Yes, WV has those things, but there is also a cultural disconnect between WV and the SEC. WV is that part of Virginia that seceded from the state rather than join the confederacy. That was a momentous step, as the area we call WV today had been a part of Virginia for 256 years.

The state might be mostly MAGA country, but it is also at heart a Northern state, not a southern one. And southerners can still smell that.

That’s a very simplified version. Like modern day West Virginians are some group of high morality freedom fighters? Lol. I’ll remind you WVU was in the SoCon for like half a century.

What the hell is a “northern state” anymore besides geography? Hell, the most racist people I’ve met in my life are from Ohio. What does the confederacy have to do with anything?

Regardless of all this. Nobody should feel bad for Pitt. They made their bed in the early 80’s. Penn State moved on, and without them any northeastern conference has a giant hole in it.

From the U.S. National Geodetic Survey, a federal entity with which I have no familiarity (found on Wikipedia).

"West Virginia is a state located in the Appalachian region of the Southern United States, though it is also considered to be a part of the Mid-Atlantic Southeast Region."

I don't consider West Virginia part of the "North" at all but I'm a hillbilly from Tennessee whose Anglo-Celtic ancestors settled in Appalachia, so what do I know. I love bluegrass, whiskey and the highland warpipes-fueled sound of the Dropkick Murphys — just like most of the fine folks in West Virginia enjoy (the first two things and not the third, mind you).

I grew up 25 miles north of Morgantown and 35 miles southeast of Pittsburgh.

You are in the upper reaches of Appalachia there, but metro Pittsburgh is the heart of Western Pennsylvania and the center of gravity there.

Morgantown, Wheeling, etc....(northern West Virginia) are oriented more towards Pittsburgh and the North.

They tune in to Pittsburgh television stations there.

Southern West Virginia (Charleston, Beckley, etc...) is obviously more "Southern" in orientation. It is more like Kentucky.

(This Irish-American Western Pennsylvania coal country boy also likes whiskey, bluegrass and Dropkick Murphys).

I trust this board's posters take note that Terry and I enjoy Dropkick Murphys. I sincerely hope there is at least one other poster among us who is a woman of about 45 (and who looks 35) who also enjoys Celtic music and who lives near Nashville and likes Vanderbilt sports, art deco architecture, craft beer, film noir and sleight-of-hand magic. I can provide my phone number if so.

Hey there, big boy.

(05-22-2020 10:20 PM)ClairtonPanther Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 10:09 PM)CrazyPaco Wrote:  

(05-22-2020 01:09 AM)ClairtonPanther Wrote:  I know that this would result in a loss of TV revenue, but perhaps worth the risk. I think Pitt should go back to independent, and use a league (like ND does) for bowl tie-ins. I miss the traditional schedule Pitt had with BC, Temple, Rutgers, Navy, WVU, Syracuse and so on. There's zero traditional rivals on our schedule. I'd rather play Navy on a yearly basis than Duke, I'd rather play Rutgers on a yearly basis than North Carolina. This is nothing personal against the likes of Virginia and Georgia Tech, but these games just don't get me excited for Saturdays. Maybe I'm wrong with this opinion. But conference realignment and the chase of money really destroyed what was left of northeastern football. Big East was a valiant effort to create a northeastern league, but wasn't meant to be. But being in a southern based league with no rivals isn't the fit I was expecting it to be. Virginia Tech is the closest thing we have to a yearly rival, and it doesn't come close to the hatred we had with WVU and likely never will. We may hate a Miami, but we're not close to being Miami's top rival either. Florida, FSU and ND are much more rivals for Miami than Pitt is. Call this buyer's remorse, I don't know. But if I'm Pitt admin, I'm closely looking to what UConn and BYU are doing.

Gimme this sample schedule:

Army
Virginia Tech
Temple
Maryland
Boston College
Rutgers
Navy
BYU
Notre Dame
Syracuse
UConn
WVU

And I'm sure many Pitt fans will disagree, and that's ok. My opinion doesn't represent that of all Pitt fans nor those that run Pitt athletics.

I'd say not only is your opinion rare, but I personally know of no other Pitt fans that would agree with it. I know of no one pinning to play Rutgers over UNC.

While many Pitt fans miss Big East basketball, they are very happy with the ACC basketball and view it as the next best hoops conference alternative, and it includes many familiar faces. On the other hand, ACC football, and the rest of the ACC's sports, is viewed as a major upgrade and I don't know anyone that would trade it for any other conference schedule, including the prior Big East one, and 1980s independence schedules aren't coming back (nor is independence at all tenable). For sure, the quality of road trips has immensely improved over anything Pitt has ever had including during independence. What is coming back is WVU on the football schedule (already there in hoops), with the possibility it will return long term.

The ACC really is the best fit for Pitt out of all the P5 for many reasons, but foremost institutional fit and its primary eastern (even if southeastern) posture. Pitt isn't going anywhere.

Yea, that's why I labeled this an extreme take. There's just something about having regional rivalries, and for many reasons listed in this thread they're just not coming back. Florida has: FSU, Miami, Tennessee, Georgia as big regional games; Alabama has: Auburn, LSU, Ole Miss as big regional games; Michigan has OSU, Mich St, PSU as big regional games... we have nada. And quite frankly, not having big regional rivalries as a steady dose of our schedule is hurting Pitt as well as the Pittsburgh & even PA economy.

I hope WVU remains a permanent game on our schedule. That'll be the closest thing to having a regional rival on our schedule.

Closest thing? You make it sound like Pitt and WVU isn't a real rivalry. It always has been. Pitt has three historic rivals that move that meter for Pitt fans and still play D1 football: PSU, WVU, and ND, and Pitt will regularly be playing two of those regularly, not including annual games against Syracuse, Miami, and Virginia Tech. That is little different than the original Big East schedule except for Temple and Rutgers which no one misses, and BC, which Pitt plays once every six years.

Pitt doesn't have big regional games because it has been mediocre, at best, for 30 years. If Pitt can sustain any success or relevance, it will have big regional games in the ACC the same as when it had big regional games as a regular national contender as an independent.

Here are Pitt's 8 most played historical football opponents through the 2020 schedule (so 4 of the 8 most played are in the ACC, WVU is scheduled from 2022-2025, and Duke will climb into Pitt's top 8 in 5 years):

West Virginia 104 (Pitt is WVU's most played opponent by 44 games)
Penn State 100 (Pitt is PSU's most played opponent by 29 games)
Syracuse 76 (Pitt is SU's most played opponent by 5 games)
Notre Dame 72 (Pitt is ND's 5th most played opponent after Navy, USC, MSU, and Purdue; next closest is Army with 51)
Miami (FL) 40 (Pitt is UM's 3rd most played opponent after FSU and UF)
Navy 40 (Pitt is tied with Duke and UVA as Navy's 6th most played opponent)
Washington & Jefferson 33 (now Division III)
Boston College 31 (Pitt is BC's 8th most played opponent)

On the basketball side, it looks like this:
WVU 188 (Pitt is WVU's most-played opponent)
Penn State 148 (Pitt is PSU's most-played opponent)
Carnegie Tech/Mellon 124 (now Division III)
Syracuse 120 (Pitt is SU's 3rd most played opponent after Colgate and Cornell)
Duquesne 87 (Pitt is Duquesne's third most played opponent, only one game behind WVU)
Westminster 81 (now Division III, Pitt is Westminster's 9th most played opponent)
Georgetown 77 (Pitt is GU's 6th most played opponent)
Notre Dame 66 (Pitt is ND's 7th most played opponent)