(05-31-2017 10:09 AM)DavidSt Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 09:59 AM)Sultan of Euphonistan Wrote:  Why would the MAC have to realign if the goal is to make things more of a bus league? The MAC is already a bus league almost exclusively.

Northern Illinois, Ball State and Buffalo are more outliers because the schools are mainly in Ohio and Michigan. Those three have to travel the furthest without much support from other schools from their state.

Create more travel partners.

Northern Illinois and Illinois State
Ball State and Indiana State
Buffalo and Stony Brook

I could see Eastern Michigan move down because of the lack of fan support.

You realize on a good day, at 3 AM, that's a 7 hour drive, rigth?

(05-31-2017 11:31 AM)megadrone Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 10:09 AM)DavidSt Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 09:59 AM)Sultan of Euphonistan Wrote:  Why would the MAC have to realign if the goal is to make things more of a bus league? The MAC is already a bus league almost exclusively.

Northern Illinois, Ball State and Buffalo are more outliers because the schools are mainly in Ohio and Michigan. Those three have to travel the furthest without much support from other schools from their state.

Create more travel partners.

Northern Illinois and Illinois State
Ball State and Indiana State
Buffalo and Stony Brook

I could see Eastern Michigan move down because of the lack of fan support.

You realize on a good day, at 3 AM, that's a 7 hour drive, rigth?

Albany is not ready for FBS, but Stony Brook does have the drive and advantage to go D1.
If the MAC wants to keep Eastern Michigan? Should they call up former founder Wayne State to be a travel partner?

Well if its availability that is the issue, the one thing to figure out is if this is going to be a temporary issue. If it's not then this really impacts schools with football teams than those with no football. Flying commercial for football is possible but they would require months and months of planning to schedule a flight or 2 to carry the whole team or in 2 groups.
Flying commercial for the other sports isn't as bad since with proper planning you can get seats for 15 - 25 players depending on the sport.

If buses is the way they want to go then yes...there could be some realignment coming soon especially as the TV revenues are dropping or not going to increase.

By the way, I remember busing around in college for track meets and the longest one we had was 14 hours and we didn't get a bus but a van instead. Ahhh...good memories.

(05-31-2017 11:31 AM)NoDak Wrote:  The issue seems to be consigning a plane for three days for a football charter.

Ìf a plane wasn't held the whole three days, there would be a lot more interest by airlines.

Worse case: take a red-eye one way charter on Thursday night, release it, and take a red-eye one way charter back on Saturday night. Or at least find a school near you that has opposite travel plans, and charter together so the plane isn't idle for most of the time. An Uber type charter reservation system can reduce costs here.

Would be very unusual for the charter company to have the aircraft arrive at the destination on Friday afternoon and hold it there until late Saturday / early am on Sunday.

One of AState's trips out west we were delayed like three hours departing because our charter had mechanical issues flying in to pick up the team for the return trip home.

FWIW. The CFP has been concerned enough about the availability of charters that they have already contracted with charter companies to provide travel for the championship teams. The short turnaround was too big of a risk.

NCAA has been having issues since at least 2015 for the basketball tournament but then again you are moving 68 teams over four days (and at peak 32 teams a day).
http://www.ncaa.com/news/ncaa/article/20...mpionships

(05-31-2017 10:15 AM)Attackcoog Wrote:  While this affects costs--it's really more about availability. Sounds like the charters just aren't going to be as available. A flight from Houston to Florida is just a few hours. A bus ride requires 17-20 hours---likely requiring a layover with hotel and meal costs. Player time, loss of class time, loss of practice time, and competitive on the field issues are all concerns when athletes have 2 days of grueling bus travel each way for long distant games. Those trips won't help recruiting once the word begins to filter down to current HS players.

I agree with your point on availability. As others have noted, scarcity creates price increases but also fuels innovation. And long bus trips are not the answer.

This was an interesting article.

(05-31-2017 10:09 AM)DavidSt Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 09:59 AM)Sultan of Euphonistan Wrote:  Why would the MAC have to realign if the goal is to make things more of a bus league? The MAC is already a bus league almost exclusively.

Northern Illinois, Ball State and Buffalo are more outliers because the schools are mainly in Ohio and Michigan. Those three have to travel the furthest without much support from other schools from their state.

Create more travel partners.

Northern Illinois and Illinois State
Ball State and Indiana State
Buffalo and Stony Brook

I could see Eastern Michigan move down because of the lack of fan support.

The only problem with that, is that Buffalo is closer to Western Michigan than to Stony Brook.

(05-31-2017 11:27 AM)DavidSt Wrote:  That could mean some splits that could create new conferences with D2 call ups to fill in spots. The politics of the money issues that politics can't block schools like Nebraska-Omaha, Minn.-Duluth, Mankato State to drop football, nor any blockage from P5 schools from not allowing schools like Metro State in Denver from adding the sport. That is why some conference leaders are saying that basketball and all sports could be split in two levels at D1. This could bring up some schools grandfather in for all sports at D1 who already have a sport or 2. Maybe they could classified schools that were D1 at one time to be D1 like West Texas A&M, MIT, Case Western Reserves, Wayne State and so forth. West Texas A&M, Angelo State, Colorado State-Pueblo and UTPB could be helpful to schools like Texas Tech, UTEP, New Mexico, New Mexico State, Colorado, Air Force, Colorado State, Denver and so forth to have bus trips for all the different sports. Those D1 schools in New Mexico and west Texas are out there in the boonies.

Not another thread turning into a D2 call-up. More schools mean a smaller piece of the pie. Omaha is already facing cuts in athletics after just two years because they are not getting the revenues they thought they would get.

http://www.omaha.com/news/education/uno-...b7d02.html

(05-31-2017 12:55 PM)AZcats Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 11:27 AM)DavidSt Wrote:  That could mean some splits that could create new conferences with D2 call ups to fill in spots. The politics of the money issues that politics can't block schools like Nebraska-Omaha, Minn.-Duluth, Mankato State to drop football, nor any blockage from P5 schools from not allowing schools like Metro State in Denver from adding the sport. That is why some conference leaders are saying that basketball and all sports could be split in two levels at D1. This could bring up some schools grandfather in for all sports at D1 who already have a sport or 2. Maybe they could classified schools that were D1 at one time to be D1 like West Texas A&M, MIT, Case Western Reserves, Wayne State and so forth. West Texas A&M, Angelo State, Colorado State-Pueblo and UTPB could be helpful to schools like Texas Tech, UTEP, New Mexico, New Mexico State, Colorado, Air Force, Colorado State, Denver and so forth to have bus trips for all the different sports. Those D1 schools in New Mexico and west Texas are out there in the boonies.

Not another thread turning into a D2 call-up. More schools mean a smaller piece of the pie. Omaha is already facing cuts in athletics after just two years because they are not getting the revenues they thought they would get.

http://www.omaha.com/news/education/uno-...b7d02.html

Summit should lose IUPUI, IUPUFW and Western Illinois, and center more on bringing in schools in the region like Northern Colorado, Montana, Montana State, Northern Iowa, Minn.-Duluth, UMKC and Mankato State. Maybe a Fort Hays State? They could save money that way. For Omaha to save the sports? I think splitting the conferences up into more bus worthy at D1 level. The issue is that you don't have a bus friendly travel for the north central plains to work without bringing up some D2 schools in key places to save money.

(05-31-2017 11:34 AM)DavidSt Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 11:31 AM)megadrone Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 10:09 AM)DavidSt Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 09:59 AM)Sultan of Euphonistan Wrote:  Why would the MAC have to realign if the goal is to make things more of a bus league? The MAC is already a bus league almost exclusively.

Northern Illinois, Ball State and Buffalo are more outliers because the schools are mainly in Ohio and Michigan. Those three have to travel the furthest without much support from other schools from their state.

Create more travel partners.

Northern Illinois and Illinois State
Ball State and Indiana State
Buffalo and Stony Brook

I could see Eastern Michigan move down because of the lack of fan support.

You realize on a good day, at 3 AM, that's a 7 hour drive, rigth?

Albany is not ready for FBS, but Stony Brook does have the drive and advantage to go D1.
If the MAC wants to keep Eastern Michigan? Should they call up former founder Wayne State to be a travel partner?

That's well and good but it doesn't change the fact that Stony Brook isn't going to help Buffalo with travel because it's further than the majority of the existing MAC.

(05-31-2017 11:27 AM)DavidSt Wrote:  That could mean some splits that could create new conferences with D2 call ups to fill in spots. The politics of the money issues that politics can't block schools like Nebraska-Omaha, Minn.-Duluth, Mankato State to drop football, nor any blockage from P5 schools from not allowing schools like Metro State in Denver from adding the sport. That is why some conference leaders are saying that basketball and all sports could be split in two levels at D1. This could bring up some schools grandfather in for all sports at D1 who already have a sport or 2. Maybe they could classified schools that were D1 at one time to be D1 like West Texas A&M, MIT, Case Western Reserves, Wayne State and so forth. West Texas A&M, Angelo State, Colorado State-Pueblo and UTPB could be helpful to schools like Texas Tech, UTEP, New Mexico, New Mexico State, Colorado, Air Force, Colorado State, Denver and so forth to have bus trips for all the different sports. Those D1 schools in New Mexico and west Texas are out there in the boonies.

(05-31-2017 11:34 AM)DavidSt Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 11:31 AM)megadrone Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 10:09 AM)DavidSt Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 09:59 AM)Sultan of Euphonistan Wrote:  Why would the MAC have to realign if the goal is to make things more of a bus league? The MAC is already a bus league almost exclusively.

Northern Illinois, Ball State and Buffalo are more outliers because the schools are mainly in Ohio and Michigan. Those three have to travel the furthest without much support from other schools from their state.

Create more travel partners.

Northern Illinois and Illinois State
Ball State and Indiana State
Buffalo and Stony Brook

I could see Eastern Michigan move down because of the lack of fan support.

You realize on a good day, at 3 AM, that's a 7 hour drive, rigth?

Albany is not ready for FBS, but Stony Brook does have the drive and advantage to go D1.
If the MAC wants to keep Eastern Michigan? Should they call up former founder Wayne State to be a travel partner?

Travel partner for EMU? Are you completely ignorant of the geography? EMU is already within travel partner distance of at least 2 universities consisting of Toledo and BGSU. Remember that the closest universities are not always one in your own state. EMU does not need MORE travel partners. Travel for a school like EMU and the schools going to EMU already have plenty of choices in the MAC.

The MAC is essentially still built on a travel design that worked back in the 70s when traveling by bus was even more common. The MAC is already well positioned for a situation where geographic compactness is considered a major bonus.

Seems like this might create an opportunity for having an inventory of 50-75 seat turboprops. Several manufacturers are looking at 90 seaters right now.

With 75 seats you can carry normal football traveling party on two aircraft, might get by with two 50 seaters if you cull some of the boosters and such. A 50 can be used effectively for basketball. Put your men's and women's teams on a mirror schedule playing doubleheaders and those become really cost efficient and can probably contract with the legacy carriers to run some of their less profitable routes.

I am sorry, this reminds of the old tv show Coach when Luther swaps the charter plan tickets for train tickets in the episdoe I think I can't, I think I can't

The commercial airline industry model is to take passengers from point A to point B, then repeat as quickly as possible. They rarely go from A to B then back to A again. Taking a single plane out of that loop affects the entire system. Not only do the airlines lose 2-3 days revenue but they have a plane at a location where they probably don't need it.

Commercial airlines also have a monopoly on gates, departure times and arrival times. Most 2nd tier airports are not capable of landing a 100+ passenger plane. It's not going to be easy to start up a charter service. Especially with only 6 games/year.

(05-31-2017 01:56 PM)arkstfan Wrote:  Seems like this might create an opportunity for having an inventory of 50-75 seat turboprops. Several manufacturers are looking at 90 seaters right now.

With 75 seats you can carry normal football traveling party on two aircraft, might get by with two 50 seaters if you cull some of the boosters and such. A 50 can be used effectively for basketball. Put your men's and women's teams on a mirror schedule playing doubleheaders and those become really cost efficient and can probably contract with the legacy carriers to run some of their less profitable routes.

How much would that cost. Im wondering if P5's could essentially create their own carriers by leasing 3 or 4 turbo prop aircraft for this purpose.

Seriously, how much does a new private jet cost? $40-50M? $1-2M for annual maintenance and fuel costs?

That's like one member's annual share in the B1G. Buy 3 or 4 of these to share among B1G members - and rent them out to the MAC for Tuesday games and to the AAC/ACC for Thursday games.

Problem solved.

EDIT: MAC is a bus league, so have to get CUSA and Sun Belt on the Tuesday-Wednesday schedule...

(05-31-2017 02:56 PM)YNot Wrote:  Seriously, how much does a new private jet cost? $40-50M? $1-2M for annual maintenance and fuel costs?

That's like one member's annual share in the B1G. Buy 3 or 4 of these to share among B1G members - and rent them out to the MAC for Tuesday games and to the AAC/ACC for Thursday games.

Problem solved.

EDIT: MAC is a bus league, so have to get CUSA and Sun Belt on the Tuesday-Wednesday schedule...

737 starts at $78 million and can run up to $155 million. Then you need a crew and someone to perform certified repairs and upkeep.

(05-31-2017 02:41 PM)Wolfman Wrote:  The commercial airline industry model is to take passengers from point A to point B, then repeat as quickly as possible. They rarely go from A to B then back to A again. Taking a single plane out of that loop affects the entire system. Not only do the airlines lose 2-3 days revenue but they have a plane at a location where they probably don't need it.

Commercial airlines also have a monopoly on gates, departure times and arrival times. Most 2nd tier airports are not capable of landing a 100+ passenger plane. It's not going to be easy to start up a charter service. Especially with only 6 games/year.

Not really what I'm talking about.

More along the lines of the regional carriers who contract with a carrier to provide service under their banner. You don't need gates because the carrier has the gates, unless you are providing a charter flight then you generally contract on a flight by flight basis with an air service provider, usually the little building with small aircraft and private jets lurking around on the other side of the airport.

(05-31-2017 10:35 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 10:15 AM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 10:01 AM)ESE84 Wrote:  

(05-31-2017 09:42 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  Apparently schools are having a harder time finding air charters.
https://www.bloombergquint.com/onweb/201...rs-the-bus

ECU, while still in C-USA, was one of the proponents for the 14-team expansion to create bus trip opportunities in the East (Charlotte and Old Dominion) and West.

The side story here is the AAC has similar travel cost problems to C-USA and the Sunbelt, but that problem is alleviated by the television contract revenues, historic basketball credits, and AAC warchest. It is not a surprise those issues first surface at ECU.

While this affects costs--it's really more about availability. Sounds like the charters just aren't going to be as available. A flight from Houston to Florida is just a few hours. A bus ride requires 17-20 hours---likely requiring a layover with hotel and meal costs. Player time, loss of class time, loss of practice time, and competitive on the field issues are all concerns when athletes have 2 days of grueling bus travel each way for long distant games. Those trips won't help recruiting once the word begins to filter down to current HS players.

Scarcity will impact cost.

Right now to be the best of my knowledge, around 400 to 450 miles is generally about as far as most teams will bus because that's about the limit of convenience. The hassle of loading a team to get to the airport, unloading, boarding, unloading eats up about as much time as just riding a bus the entire way.

Longer than that there won't be a lot of happiness about taking the bus.

One problem is the P5 schools fly everywhere as referenced in the article. Maybe there should be a minimum distance instituted just to make sure teams have a charter available when they truly need it. I know that is one of the perks the big boys like to use, but nobody should be forced into 10+ hour bus trips because some teams don't want to bus for a couple of hours.

On the flip-side, I know App uses some smaller companies that only do charter flights so maybe they can work to pickup the slack of the national carriers? It could be a good opportunity for them.