(04-16-2017 04:42 PM)Sactowndog Wrote:  The games played by the UC System aren't appreciated by the Cal State schools and UCSD and Davis will never be invited to the MWC as long as SDSU, SJSU and Fresno State are in the league.

Well first of all, this is your made up fantasy. But even if so, that's three votes out of 11 or 12 (not sure how Hawaii factors in). Not enough to stop anything.

(04-16-2017 05:00 PM)Sactowndog Wrote:  The wildcard in the Deck is the current move by some in the Republican Party to split California into east and west. If such a move is ever to happen it will happen in the next two years.

In other words, it will never happen.

No more than DC is going to be allowed to become a state. And why not? Easy: because neither party can afford to let the other get a guaranteed two senators (Dems for the DC state, Repubs for the California Ag State).

(04-16-2017 05:54 PM)jrj84105 Wrote:  This isn't an ideal conference. It's a political compromise.
- CA schools demand round robin play.
- NW schools want the old PAC8 and demand SoCal access-stretched to the limit now.
- SW schools demand SoCal access.
- UT also would want SoCal access and likely to bring a state school (TTU).
- University presidents want big research schools.

Rice would be a great partner, but nobody is demanding them. Rice is also very good research school for its size, but UCSD is an elite research institution (UCSD is #14 globally). UCSD (but not Rice) allows everybody their requisite SoCal access which is a top priority for every voting block. Texas is such an elite athletic department, that they can pull dead weight in UCSD and he o a degree UNM.

Rice actually isn't highly ranked in total research. That's because it has no medical. Medical is where the big funding dollars are.

Anyway, couple counter points:
- don't think any Calif schools, or Oregon and Washington, are clamoring to make sure everyone in the PAC 8 plays OSU and WSU. But Oregon and Washington themselves are behemoths, that would be able to demand playing the four California schools yearly
- Not sure if the Arizona's have much more pull than OSU and WSU
- Utah and Colorado definitely don't have clout to demand anything
- San Diego I feel like is a very distinct region from LA ... and so I don't think playing in SD is truly the same thing as playing at USC/UCLA, for "SoCal access". Also not sure where the top football talent comes from in Calif. Is strictly in the LA overall area? I think the Bay area has some talent. Don't know about SD or the other parts of Calif.

(04-16-2017 08:15 PM)jrj84105 Wrote:  With SDSU looking to public funding for a stadium and UCSD looking for a conference, I think the answer is for the two schools to jointly occupy a publicly funded stadium. UCSD goes FCS and is invited by the BigSky in 2020 to replace UND.

Sounds like a reasonable idea, if UCSD had any interest in football. So probably means it can never happen.

(04-16-2017 10:15 PM)nzmorange Wrote:  Do you really think that the university of Minnesota is a better overall school than Vanderbilt and several Ivy's?

Minnesota is better than Vanderbilt and the lower Ivy's, when it comes to research. So are Wisconsin and Washington, for that matter.

(04-16-2017 10:15 PM)nzmorange Wrote:  My point is that the top 5 schools in the PAC are fantastic. The bottom 7 aren't.

In what sense??

Oregon, Oregon St, and Washington St are really the only PAC schools that aren't in the "outstanding" or "elite" tiers of university research. And Oregon's is because the state maintains a separate university for medical school and health science research (located in Portland ... and no, it's not Portland St). If that were lumped in with Eugene, as it should be, then Oregon is probably right with Arizona and Utah.

(04-17-2017 08:39 AM)nzmorange Wrote:  By what meaningful metric is SDSU materially worse than OSU as is?

Research and academic reputation, would be my guesses.