https://nypost.com/2025/01/11/sports/pit...onference/

I hope this doesn’t happen. Just give us Syracuse, Notre Dame and Boston College back!

I also hope this doesn't happen. We don't know who will be left from the ACC after they get picked apart, but if four go, I suspect it will be UNC, Duke, Virginia, and Florida St who leave. An ACC without UNC, Duke and Virginia loses almost all of it's basketball appeal. Plus at that point it turns into a total Frankenstein conference.

Also northeast teams that leave for southern based basketball conferences have had catastrophic results. BC, Syracuse and Temple are three obvious examples, but I would also put UConn in that boat. UConn people blame Ollie for the falloff, but when he had a BE recruited roster in the AAC he coached them to the NCAA championship beating coaches Phil Martelli, Jay Wright, Tom Izzo, Billy Donovan, Fred Hoiberg, and John Calipari along the way, while being the underdog in every game except against Martelli. His coaching was okay then. They say the same thing, that Boeheim and Fran Dunphy had lost their fastball, but all I know is they consistently won, until they left for southern based leagues. Syracuse and Boeheim were eating the ACC for lunch in their first season, with a BE recruited roster, starting out something like 20-0. And of course UConn's fortunes turned around big time once they returned back home.

Minus UNC, Duke and Virginia, the only ACC teams I'd have interest in are Syracuse, for it's BE history, and Louisville because i think they have quality athletic programs. BC is too far in the rear view mirror for me to care anymore. Pitt's betrayal is still too offensive to overlook, so no interest there. And ND I'd be open to because they'd uplift a lot of other sports besides mens basketball. It's nothing against the other schools, but there's no history and minimal cohesion to make it a good fit. Plus I've seen enough to know I don't want to play down south and get a steady dose of Southern home cooking when it comes to the officiating, like the Northeast ACC teams always do.

So I'd like to maintain the status quo, but I guess that's unlikely since the only thing guaranteed in college sports is idiotic change.

(01-12-2025 10:56 PM)Traderwill Wrote:  I also hope this doesn't happen. We don't know who will be left from the ACC after they get picked apart, but if four go, I suspect it will be UNC, Duke, Virginia, and Florida St who leave. An ACC without UNC, Duke and Virginia loses almost all of it's basketball appeal. Plus at that point it turns into a total Frankenstein conference.

Also northeast teams that leave for southern based basketball conferences have had catastrophic results. BC, Syracuse and Temple are three obvious examples, but I would also put UConn in that boat. UConn people blame Ollie for the falloff, but when he had a BE recruited roster in the AAC he coached them to the NCAA championship beating coaches Phil Martelli, Jay Wright, Tom Izzo, Billy Donovan, Fred Hoiberg, and John Calipari along the way, while being the underdog in every game except against Martelli. His coaching was okay then. They say the same thing, that Boeheim and Fran Dunphy had lost their fastball, but all I know is they consistently won, until they left for southern based leagues. Syracuse and Boeheim were eating the ACC for lunch in their first season, with a BE recruited roster, starting out something like 20-0. And of course UConn's fortunes turned around big time once they returned back home.

Minus UNC, Duke and Virginia, the only ACC teams I'd have interest in are Syracuse, for it's BE history, and Louisville because i think they have quality athletic programs. BC is too far in the rear view mirror for me to care anymore. Pitt's betrayal is still too offensive to overlook, so no interest there. And ND I'd be open to because they'd uplift a lot of other sports besides mens basketball. It's nothing against the other schools, but there's no history and minimal cohesion to make it a good fit. Plus I've seen enough to know I don't want to play down south and get a steady dose of Southern home cooking when it comes to the officiating, like the Northeast ACC teams always do.

So I'd like to maintain the status quo, but I guess that's unlikely since the only thing guaranteed in college sports is idiotic change.

Think this post is really accurate. The one thing I would say about Ollie though, is he seemed to really start to struggle as a coach once his divorce began. I know family was a big aspect of his life, so idk if it messed with his head or what. But he just seemed to try so much less. For example, Makai Ashton-Langford was a highly rated, local recruit Ollie had signed that decommitted before ever playing a game for us. Why? Nobody knows exactly, but he lived in MA and Ollie didn't even bother to go see him play once his senior year of high school. Even if it wasn't the reason, a lot of us thought it looked bad, especially for a guy who preached family values the way Ollie did.

I do think the travel associated with the AAC hindered our performance, which goes hand in hand with what you're saying. It's something I've been paying attention to now that conferences are spanning 3-4 timezones. The school that is traveling is always at a huge disadvantage, and I think it's going to lead to some skewed results. If NBA teams have caught on to how travel impacts their players, it's going to impact younger college kids as well.

Of course, these big leagues will probably benefit from this until people catch on. I think a lot of mediocre teams will upset good teams at home, and they'll just treat it like they would any other win, as Q1A, Q2, etc. So you'll probably see some unworthy teams getting bids due to a "marquee" home win over a team playing 3 timezones away from home.

I think that the biggest things besides travel which have hurt teams moving to southern based conferences have been the impact on recruiting and the loss of natural rivalries which in turn impacted attendance.

Syracuse, for example, used to get a lot of its star players out of NYC. Syracuse is a long way from NYC, but those players abd their families knew they’d be back in town against both St. John’s & Seton Hall. And then the big return would be for the Big East tournament.

There was never the same buzz here in CT for games against AAC opponents and attendance tailed off during those AAC years. I think that this was true for football as well as basketball.

Nonetheless, I think it is inevitable that UConn will eventually find its way to the ACC because of football dollars. Once the ACC’s best football programs leave, they will be looking to back fill and UConn will be a natural addition. It was the big football schools which blocked UConn in favor of Louisville last time. Once those schools are gone, I expect that UConn will be welcomed.

I'm not in favor of this. Joining as is would be too big and I do not like the idea of leaving anyone behind. I am also coming around to the idea that the B1G and SEC aren't going to expand and that the ACC will find a way to stick together and keep Clemson and FSU happy

(01-19-2025 01:01 AM)Bill Marsh Wrote:  I think that the biggest things besides travel which have hurt teams moving to southern based conferences have been the impact on recruiting and the loss of natural rivalries which in turn impacted attendance.

Syracuse, for example, used to get a lot of its star players out of NYC. Syracuse is a long way from NYC, but those players abd their families knew they’d be back in town against both St. John’s & Seton Hall. And then the big return would be for the Big East tournament.

There was never the same buzz here in CT for games against AAC opponents and attendance tailed off during those AAC years. I think that this was true for football as well as basketball.

Nonetheless, I think it is inevitable that UConn will eventually find its way to the ACC because of football dollars. Once the ACC’s best football programs leave, they will be looking to back fill and UConn will be a natural addition. It was the big football schools which blocked UConn in favor of Louisville last time. Once those schools are gone, I expect that UConn will be welcomed.

I think we will end up in the Big XII, Yormark seems to want us and the only hold up was football performance, which is rapidly improving. There is a reason guys like Kurtz brought up UConn again after we won the Fenway Bowl. We would help solidify them as the best basketball league, while potentially providing a killshot to the ACC by taking one of, if not their best possible backfill candidate once their football schools start to leave.

I know the travel would suck, but unlike the AAC, we would be bringing incredibly good teams/major brands up to CT, like Kansas, Iowa State, Arizona, etc.

For now, I'm happy to be in the Big East. It sucks big business is ruining college sports and will likely force a move at some point, though

I didn't realize I hadn't made a detailed post on this thread about why I think this is a terrible idea. So here is a copy paste of the post I just put on the ACC board:

"I saw Pitino saying this a week or so ago and I thought it was stupid then... I still think it's incredibly stupid. I just cannot for the life of me find even one real benefit to a merger.

It would be one thing if this actually would create what is clearly the best basketball league. But it wouldn't even be close to being the best league. The Big XII still is better, top to bottom. The SEC would probably be better each year too (I don't think they'll collectively have seasons like this one every year, but their success this year does show their skill on the hardwood.) At best, you're hoping to be the 3rd best league every year, and you would likely be the 4th best some seasons.

On top of that, a full merger would put 29 teams in the league. You couldn't even play every school every year. What is the point in adding competitive schools if your top brands won't even play each other every year?

So we would have 29 teams. At least we will get a lot of bids, right? Well, according to the most recent bracketology, the league would be tracking to get 9/29 teams in... Not even 1/3 of the league! Still behind the SEC (12/16) and B1G (11/18), and only 2 more than the XII, which would still have a much better % of teams getting bids (7/16.)

I won't even get started on how much it dilutes revenue, as others have already covered that in this thread.

Unless they want to make some sort of tier system, where there are 2 divisions within the conference and teams are relegated based on performance, I can't even see how it would strengthen the resumes of teams come tourney time. And a tiered system would come with a whole host of other drawbacks, that isn't even worth thinking about unless significantly more money is involved (again, it's not.)

Just an incredibly dimwitted idea on so many levels..."