(05-22-2019 08:00 AM)Nerdlinger Wrote:  

(05-22-2019 05:19 AM)XLance Wrote:  When the idea of Syracuse, Boston College, and Miami was first floated as an expansion possibility, there was a competing school of thought that suggested Virginia Tech, West Virginia and Pittsburgh. These ideas were talked about on several, then independent message boards ad infinitum.
Eventually the "Notre Dame" bait that Swofford's consultants recommended won out. But a school, or group of schools was able to engineer the Hokies entry and Syracuse's ouster when the Irish refused to commit (it also cost Marye Anne Fox her job as NC State Chancellor when it was learned that she was Notre Dame's mole in the process).

Imagine if the "other" side had won out in 2003.
Not only would the ACC include West Virginia, Virginia Tech and Pitt (12) but could/would have picked up South Carolina and Miami for 14.

South Carolina is not leaving and would not have left the SEC for the ACC.

South Carolina was ready to make the move back to the ACC in 2010-11.
Eric Hyman had numerous talks to iron out logistics with the ACC in during that time frame. As with many things in realignment, the timing didn't work, and then came the formation of the SECN and it was no longer economically desirable for SC.

(05-22-2019 11:07 AM)XLance Wrote:  

(05-22-2019 08:00 AM)Nerdlinger Wrote:  

(05-22-2019 05:19 AM)XLance Wrote:  When the idea of Syracuse, Boston College, and Miami was first floated as an expansion possibility, there was a competing school of thought that suggested Virginia Tech, West Virginia and Pittsburgh. These ideas were talked about on several, then independent message boards ad infinitum.
Eventually the "Notre Dame" bait that Swofford's consultants recommended won out. But a school, or group of schools was able to engineer the Hokies entry and Syracuse's ouster when the Irish refused to commit (it also cost Marye Anne Fox her job as NC State Chancellor when it was learned that she was Notre Dame's mole in the process).

Imagine if the "other" side had won out in 2003.
Not only would the ACC include West Virginia, Virginia Tech and Pitt (12) but could/would have picked up South Carolina and Miami for 14.

South Carolina is not leaving and would not have left the SEC for the ACC.

South Carolina was ready to make the move back to the ACC in 2010-11.
Eric Hyman had numerous talks to iron out logistics with the ACC in during that time frame. As with many things in realignment, the timing didn't work, and then came the formation of the SECN and it was no longer economically desirable for SC.

Wait, you're trying to tell us that U of SC was willing to take a huge cut in conference payout to come back to the league they left voluntarily?

From a 2011 Forbes article [re: 2009-10 fiscal year AD profits]:

Quote:I also don't think you'll be surprised to hear that the average revenue in the ACC ($21m) is less than half that of the SEC ($50m) and only slightly better than half that of the Big Ten ($41m).

One thing to note, however, is that revenue in the ACC should spike in 2011 under a new television contract with ESPN. The ACC currently averages $66.9 million per year under a contract that ran through the 2010 season. Under the new ESPN contract, the ACC will average $155 million. To put this in perspective, although a huge increase for the ACC, it still falls short of the $205 million the SEC averages per year from its television contracts with CBS and ESPN.

I don't know what makes you think SC wanted to rejoin the ACC, but the financial gap was already too big by 2010.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/sportsmoney...1210c58ca2

There is absolutely no way that South Carolina was, is, or will leave the SEC for the ACC. It's the only advantage they have over Clemson and anyone even seriously considering a move like that would be ran out of Columbia tarred and feathered on a rail.

(05-21-2019 10:36 AM)IWokeUpLikeThis Wrote:  

(05-21-2019 08:34 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(05-21-2019 06:55 AM)Hokie Mark Wrote:  Sometimes it works out best when things DON'T go according to plan (e.g. Louisville replacing Maryland also).

Thoughts?

Louisville replacing Maryland was a huge downgrade for the ACC. Massive. Every conference in the country would rather have Maryland than Louisville.

If you polled the 14 ACC Presidents, Maryland would win that vote 14-0 IMO. Presidents care more about location and academics than athletics.

That vote may go toward Maryland if you poll University Presidents, but 100 out of 100 Clemson fans would rather have UofL. Heck, we'd rather have UofL than half the founding members. (Ok that's an exaggeration. 95 out of 100.) The University of Idaho is a "Flagship University" and look how much more important and well known they are than Boise State. The Flagship U is the one that leads. Not the namesake. Navy is the true flagship of the state of Maryland.

(05-21-2019 06:55 AM)Hokie Mark Wrote:  A Clemson fan who goes by MSTiger02 [IIRC] on this site wrote a guest article for ACCFootballRx in which he contends that the ACC's original plan was to add Miami, BC and Syracuse (not VT). He goes on to assert that if that had happened, VT would most likely be in the SEC today (instead of Missouri).

What if everything had gone according to plan?

Sometimes it works out best when things DON'T go according to plan (e.g. Louisville replacing Maryland also).

Thoughts?

Another interesting thought is to assume all the teams land in the same conference but in a different order. Cuse is in the Coastal from the start. PITT and VT are 13 and 14. VT probably still ends up in the Coastal because of UVA putting PITT in the Atlantic. UofL becomes the new #14 and still takes UM's Spot. Which means Pitt and VT are crossovers and Cuse and Pitt play opposite division schedules.

Who would have won all those ACC Championships in the years VT carried the league?

(05-22-2019 10:51 AM)NJ2MDTerp Wrote:  The 1990 ACC expansion should've included Miami. That would've given the ACC a pretty solid 10 school conference along the southeast coast from Maryland to Florida and most likely would've preempted further expansion in 2003.

This, this, and more this! Imagine Constantin Popa vs Eric Montross!! The ACC dropped the ball there. Miami made way more sense than FSU as far as the school profile was concerned. It really would have been the kill shot to the Big East football conference too.

The idea of Syracuse getting in over Virginia Tech would never have happened anyway. The much maligned NC schools would have vetoed the **** out of that and we would have ended up a 10 team conference in 2003. Probably still would have been screwed out of a CCG, never to receive the lifeboat tossed to the Big XII a few years ago. What a joke.

(05-22-2019 10:51 AM)NJ2MDTerp Wrote:  The 1990 ACC expansion should've included Miami. That would've given the ACC a pretty solid 10 school conference along the southeast coast from Maryland to Florida and most likely would've preempted further expansion in 2003.

I imagine there still would have eventually been a push to get to 12 for the CCG.

(05-21-2019 07:51 PM)Fighting Muskie Wrote:  The conservative rewrite of this story goes something like this:

2004-2005: the ACC adds BC, Syracuse, and Miami

The Big East still raids C-USA but with just UConn and Pitt being the only pre-1991 football schools it's much more likely that the league splits. Miami and Syracuse slump in the ACC--VT, WVU, L'ville, all surge.

I am not sure the big east splits at that point. For one existing rules would have locked them out of an automatic bid (only five teams together). But two, the existing basketball only schools, especially with UConn as part of the football schools, were just not in a strong enough position at that point to start their own league. The decade between this point and when the split happened, grown, nova, and Marquette (and even st Johns) along with new comers Xavier and Butler were much stronger and in a much better position to branch off

(05-22-2019 08:29 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(05-21-2019 02:42 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  

(05-21-2019 12:27 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(05-21-2019 11:15 AM)Kaplony Wrote:  

(05-21-2019 10:36 AM)IWokeUpLikeThis Wrote:  If you polled the 14 ACC Presidents, Maryland would win that vote 14-0 IMO. Presidents care more about location and academics than athletics.

I wouldn't be so sure of that.

Throughout their history Maryland was an obstructionist element that cost the ACC multiple chances to better itself as a conference in the decades leading up to the last realignment.

Like .... ?

Fought tooth and nail to prevent FSU being issued an invitation, only agreeing when it was a done deal.

There is strong belief that Maryland leaked confidential ACC information to the Big Slow prior to officially being issued an invitation.

They were opposed to the ACC football championship game being played in Charlotte.

1) FSU had zero cultural affiliation with the ACC and still has none. They are a football mercenary hire and have been for 28 years. If you care about the culture of a conference and not money, opposing FSU was a very defensible move.

2) That's hearsay and of course Maryland engaged in behind the scenes machinations with B1G before joining, every body leaving one conference for another does that. Doesn't count because it was part of their process of *leaving*, meaning they weren't ACC 'conference mates' at that point.

3) Very defensible. The ACC has always been too politically NC-centric, and so Maryland, being pretty far from NC, has always been sensitive about all the big events being in NC and wanting to move them around. No more "anti-ACC" than say Florida or LSU not wanting the SEC basketball tournament to be in Lexington each year would be "anti-SEC" if it was.

Maryland was an ACC founder and always a good partner. They did a lot of good, particularly in fighting the tendency for the conference to be too NC-centric. Totally committed to the ACC, until they decided to leave.

I went to Maryland around the turn of the century. They were plotting a move out of the acc back then. They were not totally committed “until they left.” There was a 15 plus year lead up to that move.

(05-22-2019 09:55 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(05-22-2019 09:21 AM)CardinalJim Wrote:  

(05-22-2019 08:38 AM)ken d Wrote:  The premise of the OP was what would have happened if Va Tech hadn't been included in the ACC's 2003 expansion. Would they have been a target for the SEC?

Well, what if it had been the SEC that struck first and took Va Tech off the table, pairing them with Texas A&M? Might the SEC have then gone after NC State as well, to be paired with another B12 school for geographic balance and reach?

Would a wounded ACC have been as attractive to the other Big East schools then?

Unlike most Louisville fans I was never that excited about joining The ACC in any configuration. The present CFP format dictated that schools found a way into a P5 conference so UofL did.

If The CFP would have included every conference, as it should, I would have preferred that Louisville stayed in The Big East. When Pitt and Syracuse left, we had to find a way out.

In my humble opinion, The Big East fit Louisville better with its urban universities.

Again I am appreciative of the life raft that The ACC threw us from the sinking Big East. I just don’t believe it would have been necessary if all things were equal.

This makes sense to me. UofL had a lot more connections with the Big East schools than with ACC schools. There was just a lot more "fit" there, culturally and geographically.

As you say, bottom line is that UofL had to accept an offer from any P5 conference. But the best scenario would have been if the Big East had not been raided and had managed to have maintained its status as a Power/AQ conference in to the CFP era.

The acc is actually more of a geographical fit as most of the teams are within driving distance for a weekend game. But, ironically, one disadvantage is there is an inherit advantage to being the southernmost team in a conference in terms of football (USF was invisibly firjer south but were a startup). But the big east was definitely a more natural home.

(05-22-2019 02:57 PM)esayem Wrote:  

(05-22-2019 10:51 AM)NJ2MDTerp Wrote:  The 1990 ACC expansion should've included Miami. That would've given the ACC a pretty solid 10 school conference along the southeast coast from Maryland to Florida and most likely would've preempted further expansion in 2003.

This, this, and more this! Imagine Constantin Popa vs Eric Montross!! The ACC dropped the ball there. Miami made way more sense than FSU as far as the school profile was concerned. It really would have been the kill shot to the Big East football conference too.

The idea of Syracuse getting in over Virginia Tech would never have happened anyway. The much maligned NC schools would have vetoed the **** out of that and we would have ended up a 10 team conference in 2003. Probably still would have been screwed out of a CCG; never to receive the lifeboat tossed to the Big XII a few years ago. What a joke.

I believe Duke and UNC joined Virginia in opposing any expansion. Virginia broke the deadlock when VT was invited. Miami had wanted Syracuse and BC, and did not immediately accept the ACC's invitation.

From https://virginiatech.sportswar.com/artic...2000-2004/

Quote:June 10, 2003: ACC athletic directors hold a teleconference and come out of it nearly united in favor of expansion. Virginia is the only school to vote against it. The presidents hold a conference call that evening — their first with the intention of voting to extend invitations — and come to no conclusion.

June 11, 2003: A second conference call of the presidents yields no vote. UNC and Duke express doubts, and along with Virginia, that’s enough to stall expansion.

June 18, 2003: The presidents hold a third conference call, at 7 a.m. No vote to extend invitations is taken, and in a surprise move, Virginia Tech is reintroduced as an expansion candidate, meaning (the media assume) the ACC would go to 13 teams. Georgia Tech president Wayne Clough meets with Virginia Tech president Charles Steger in Blacksburg that night to tell him the news.

June 21, 2003: The fourth conference call occurs, with no voting action taken. Representatives from Virginia, Maryland and NC State form a three-person committee and are tasked with putting together a report on the financial state of Virginia Tech athletics.

June 22, 2003: Reports emerge that BC or Syracuse may be dropped in favor of Virginia Tech. The ACC trio mentioned above talks to VT executive vice president and C.O.O. Minnis Ridenour for 90 minutes to gather the information they need.

June 24, 2003: UVa’s Leonard Sandridge presents the committee’s finding to the ACC presidents in a fifth teleconference. In light of the favorable report on Virginia Tech’s financial status and academic support system, resistance to Virginia Tech disappears. A shocking result occurs: The ACC presidents vote to include Virginia Tech and Miami in an 11-team expansion, without BC or Syracuse. Virginia Tech and Miami get the necessary votes, but when BC comes up for a vote, NC State chancellor Marye Anne Fox votes no to the Eagles, leaving them out. Syracuse is reportedly never voted upon.

June 25, 2003: The ACC makes a whirlwind site visit to Virginia Tech and extends a formal invitation to the Hokies. Virginia Tech indicates that they’ll accept.

June 26, 2003: Shalala expresses disappointment at BC and Syracuse’s rejection and says that Miami will mull over offers from the Big East before deciding.

June 27, 2003: Virginia Tech officially accepts the invitation in a letter from Charles Steger that is posted on Virginia Tech’s web site and sent to members of the media.

June 30, 2003: After a couple days of grandstanding, Shalala holds a press conference to announce Miami’s decision to join the ACC.

(05-22-2019 08:29 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  1) FSU had zero cultural affiliation with the ACC and still has none. They are a football mercenary hire and have been for 28 years. If you care about the culture of a conference and not money, opposing FSU was a very defensible move.

They didn't care about the culture of the conference, they only cared that no instead of being the #2 football program in the conference they were going to be #3 at best. Of course they then set out and made themselves one of the bottom feeders for the next decade, blaming the ACC the entire time when it was their own mismanagement that got them there.

Quote:2) That's hearsay and of course Maryland engaged in behind the scenes machinations with B1G before joining, every body leaving one conference for another does that. Doesn't count because it was part of their process of *leaving*, meaning they weren't ACC 'conference mates' at that point.

I'm fairly certain that the people I gt my information on know far more about the inner workings of the ACC since they are intimately involved in it than some message board poster.

Quote:3) Very defensible. The ACC has always been too politically NC-centric, and so Maryland, being pretty far from NC, has always been sensitive about all the big events being in NC and wanting to move them around. No more "anti-ACC" than say Florida or LSU not wanting the SEC basketball tournament to be in Lexington each year would be "anti-SEC" if it was.

They didn't want to move them around, they wanted them in Baltimore and DC. As was proven by the years it was held in Jacksonville and Tampa the game needed to be in a more central location. This was confirmed in 2016 when despite having two of the largest traveling fanbases in the conference the game in Orlando was another flop.

Quote:Maryland was an ACC founder and always a good partner. They did a lot of good, particularly in fighting the tendency for the conference to be too NC-centric. Totally committed to the ACC, until they decided to leave.

Maryland had been looking for greener pastures since at least the early 80's. They weren't "totally committed" by any means whatsoever, and anyone who says different is pulling that straight out their ass.

Will Stewart is writing from an outsiders perspective so some important details are missing.

VT is in the ACC in 2003 because Duke and UNC ptb wanted VT. Boosters and alumni in business in the State of Va wanted VT over Syracuse because it was better for their pocket. People attached to the McGuire-Woods firm helped it along and Duke and UNC accurately gauged that UVa would be over a political barrell and forced to vote for VT. Duke and UNC could ACT like they opposed expansion and get what they wanted - someone to fill their football stadiums and not threaten their basketball teams.

VT was NOT introduced as a sunrise candidate because Virginia could not vote for expansion without voting for VT. These "site visits" are bull **** to keep the faculty mouths shut. They mean nothing. Shalala mulled over nothing, what she did was not immediately slap Syracuse in the face as a measure of grace.

The reality is that Swofford moved forward on a deal that began under Corrigan without going back to the ptb at Duke and UNC. He assumed they backed the Syracuse, BC, Miami play. He was wrong.

It's amazingly frustrating to hear people from the outside of the ACC give their take on old ACC affairs. It's particularly frustrating to hear it from New England Yankees who are culturally out of step with how class-based clubs operate in the mid-Southern United States. The ACC was not run like a business until recently, in the past it ran like a Debutante Club. The club started with MD as the Belle of the Ball. She faded and had been a ***** for the past 25-30 years. None of the ACC presidents were particularly fond of Syracuse and everyone who was basketball-centric despised Jimmy Boeheim who in NC, SC, and Va would be comparable to Jim Valvano and Bobby Cremins without the charm to NY edge.

It's not "personal" so much as cultural.

No X, MAF's support of ND did not "cost her her job". MAF didn't like system president Molly Broad ******* NC State and her - MAF intended to restore athletics at NC State and Broad didn't like that. Just because MAF pissed on Broad's alma mater is coincidence.

(05-22-2019 08:38 AM)ken d Wrote:  The premise of the OP was what would have happened if Va Tech hadn't been included in the ACC's 2003 expansion. Would they have been a target for the SEC?

Well, what if it had been the SEC that struck first and took Va Tech off the table, pairing them with Texas A&M? Might the SEC have then gone after NC State as well, to be paired with another B12 school for geographic balance and reach?

Would a wounded ACC have been as attractive to the other Big East schools then?

NC State had the power on paper to change conferences back then, but it's akin to triggering the Infinity Gauntlet or Galactus Ultimate Nullifier - it's one shot and it kills you dead as hell. The UNC BOG would also have retaliated for some time against NC State if NC State left the ACC for the SEC. All of this before you get to the real issue which is that NC State is a styled as a B10, Graduate Research STEM, not a SEC style university. The fanbase is culturally "southern", but the the university is squarely modeled on Purdue.

Three reasons why VT doesn't join the Big Ten:

A
A
U

As a non-member they are a no go.

Let me reiterate that if Missouri has no where to go they remain in the Big 12. If VT is a tour de force in a weakened Big East or in a proto-AAC if they follow through on the original plan to split in 2010 they definitely get into the SEC over Missouri as the stronger overall brand in a state that's roughly the same size.

The question though is if the ACC is performing extremely weak without the Hokies does the ACC rather than the Big East fall prey to the SEC? If Florida St is unhappy enough in 2012 to actually leave the ACC then they get picked over VT and all bets are off and crap starts flying everywhere. The Big Ten and SEC declare open season on both the ACC and Big East and in the end only one of those 2 is left standing after adding the remnants of the other. We usher in an era of 16+ member conferences.

(05-21-2019 09:09 PM)ColKurtz Wrote:  

(05-21-2019 06:22 PM)RutgersGuy Wrote:  No, they don't. No matter how you try and spin it VT does not deliver the DC market. You don't get the carriage fees for DC when you are closer to Tennessee than DC. Thats not how it works at all.
.

You're clearly confused. The "DC market" is the greater DC metro area, 6.2M (not including northern MD/Baltimore). The largest portion of the DC metro area is northern VA, roughly 3.3M. So if carriage fees are your definition of carrying a market, VT (and/or UVA) carry more than half of the nation's 6th largest market. The District itself is only 630k, roughly half of the Raleigh/Durham market. No one really cares about DC itself.

And Blacksburg is nowhere near that market. Thy are closer to Tennessee and Kentucky than they are to Maryland and DC by a substantial distance. A rural school on the other side of the state isn't going to demand higher carriage fees from the NoVA households.

(05-21-2019 06:55 AM)Hokie Mark Wrote:  A Clemson fan who goes by MSTiger02 [IIRC] on this site wrote a guest article for ACCFootballRx in which he contends that the ACC's original plan was to add Miami, BC and Syracuse (not VT). He goes on to assert that if that had happened, VT would most likely be in the SEC today (instead of Missouri).

What if everything had gone according to plan?

Sometimes it works out best when things DON'T go according to plan (e.g. Louisville replacing Maryland also).

Thoughts?

Link doesn't seem to link to article anymore, but I'd love to see the article!

(05-21-2019 11:01 PM)Statefan Wrote:  https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=htt...mrc&uact=8





As you will notice, there are a number of DMA's serving Virginia. All of those DMA's serve VT sports programming to their Virginia audiences even if the dead center of the DMA is located in DC, Bristol TN, etc. I was wrong to insult your map reading ability. It's obviously a cognitive problem instead.

If you are going to send me the box of donuts you owe me I will take Krispy Kreme with chocolate glazing, not dry NJ donuts made of dust and other undesirable things from NJ.

Unless you have DRIVEN, not just flown into all 50 States, plus the Yukon, BC, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario, Manitoba, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Quebec, PEI, as well as Puerto Rico, you are not as well traveled in the United States. I've also been to Africa, Asia, and Europe and lived to tell about it. The bucket list only contains Australia, South America, and Antarctica.

But do you really want a pissing match?

You started the pissing match pal, don't get your panties in a twist because someone tells you you're not as smart as you think you are.

You're flat out wrong about VT carrying DC. It's not even close to being true no matter how much you post a map that shows VT isn't anywhere close to the Dc market. It's like saying Fresno carries both the LA and SF markets. It's a dumb argument.

Kripsy Kreme sucks just like your opinions. Now get in the old RV with your old lady and tell the kids to get off your grass.

(05-22-2019 05:18 PM)RutgersGuy Wrote:  

(05-21-2019 09:09 PM)ColKurtz Wrote:  

(05-21-2019 06:22 PM)RutgersGuy Wrote:  No, they don't. No matter how you try and spin it VT does not deliver the DC market. You don't get the carriage fees for DC when you are closer to Tennessee than DC. Thats not how it works at all.
.

You're clearly confused. The "DC market" is the greater DC metro area, 6.2M (not including northern MD/Baltimore). The largest portion of the DC metro area is northern VA, roughly 3.3M. So if carriage fees are your definition of carrying a market, VT (and/or UVA) carry more than half of the nation's 6th largest market. The District itself is only 630k, roughly half of the Raleigh/Durham market. No one really cares about DC itself.

And Blacksburg is nowhere near that market. Thy are closer to Tennessee and Kentucky than they are to Maryland and DC by a substantial distance. A rural school on the other side of the state isn't going to demand higher carriage fees from the NoVA households.

To play devils advocate, do you think the university of Tennessee has any sway in the Memphis market? Or penn state in Pittsburgh?

(05-22-2019 05:18 PM)RutgersGuy Wrote:  

(05-21-2019 09:09 PM)ColKurtz Wrote:  

(05-21-2019 06:22 PM)RutgersGuy Wrote:  No, they don't. No matter how you try and spin it VT does not deliver the DC market. You don't get the carriage fees for DC when you are closer to Tennessee than DC. Thats not how it works at all.
.

You're clearly confused. The "DC market" is the greater DC metro area, 6.2M (not including northern MD/Baltimore). The largest portion of the DC metro area is northern VA, roughly 3.3M. So if carriage fees are your definition of carrying a market, VT (and/or UVA) carry more than half of the nation's 6th largest market. The District itself is only 630k, roughly half of the Raleigh/Durham market. No one really cares about DC itself.

And Blacksburg is nowhere near that market. Thy are closer to Tennessee and Kentucky than they are to Maryland and DC by a substantial distance. A rural school on the other side of the state isn't going to demand higher carriage fees from the NoVA households.

You're putting on a clinic as to how to lose an argument. You continue to conflate proximity to the center of a market with how many schools can carry said market. VT and UVA are both in VA, so would by definition carry over half the DC Metro market with in-state carriage fees.