(05-06-2013 12:39 PM)dbackjon Wrote: Where does Hawaii Basketball go? They are in the Big West now.
Northeastern Flagship schools would be left out - Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, as well as a good chunk of New York (Albany/Stony Brook/Binghampton).
The CAA has good basketball heritage, and with schools like Delaware, (and famous alumni like the Current VP, and a possible all Blue Hen presidental race in 2016 (Biden-Christie), it would be hard to leave them out.
And while they are not very good, leaving out the HBCU's would be tough.
Ivy League?
It gets tough to winnow DI down artificially and with the political ramifications of who gets left out.
I think the best way to winnow out DI is to raise the commitment levels to be DI.
Unfortunately, members of following conferences would not make the jump to "new D1:"
Football conferences:
C-USA
MAC
Sun Belt
WAC
FCS conferences:
Big South
MEAC
Northeast Conference
OVC
Patriot League
Southern Conference
SWAC
Non-football affiliated conferences:
American East
Atlantic Sun
Big West
Great West
The Summit League
Simply put, these conferences are what the rest of D1 is trying to break off from. The vast majority of the teams are too small or too poor. The flagship institutions in the states that are left out are in that category. There just are not enough people to milk profits out of those areas (and the low population states of the Mid-West). That may sound harsh, but it is just the nature of the conference realignment game. At some point, you have to draw a line.
Hawaii basketball would likely stay with the WCC. The CAA is questionable; it loses a lot of its strength without George Mason. I guess it would be
possible to add them, but they'd have to be an amalgamation of current CAA members and selected schools from the other NE conferences.
The Ivy League is a harder question. I don't think they really have D1 strength, but they have D1 level prestige and influence. Unlike other schools, they have the money, they just don't want to focus on athletics. Obviously the football will not be D1 level, but a few of the basketball schools are close. But unfortunately, this move is about cutting the chaff from D1, and the Ivy League schools are usually near the bottom (24th last year).
At best, I think you could have 8 basketball only conferences, 6 with 12 teams, the Ivy League with 8, and the CAA-hybrid with 16 (so 96 teams, equal with football conferences).
So:
Ivy League: Current members
CAA+: Current members + Albany/Siena/Stony Brook + Maine + New Hampshire + Vermont + Boston U?
Either way, past this point you are starting to add teams that will not be competitive and will not add value.