(06-03-2021 06:39 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 05:56 PM)solohawks Wrote:  To answer the original question, I bet they get another waiver (attributed to COVID) or the CCG becomes deregulated and round robin divisons aren't required

Frankly, thats what I think will happen. I also think the AAC will be at 11 for some time. That said---as a fan of an existing AAC western division team, I think its less of a hassle to take Boise by itself in "all sports" than it is to add an entire western wing including 3 MT/PT time zone teams. Just take Boise in all-sports and be done with it. Im not saying the western wing concept cant work---but I think it will put a lot of unneeded strain on the budgets of existing western division AAC schools.

M Basketball is the only inconvenient Men's sport

Women's sports are the real burden as in addition to Basketball you have softball, Volleyball and soccer.

Boise sponsors beach volleyball which is independent and only needs one other women's team sport per NCAA rules. They could drop the women's team sports causing travel conflicts and reallocate those scholarships to non team sports or team sports like Acrobatics and Tumbling, Field Hockey, Ice Hockey, Lacrosse, Rowing, Rugby, and Water Polo.

Make it where M/W Basketball is the only travel burden

(06-03-2021 07:32 PM)schmolik Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 07:21 PM)ken d Wrote:  I wasn't suggesting ND should be accommodated. What is the point of forcing a move to a P4? Is it intended to accomplish something? What's wrong with having five power conferences?

Ask the conference champion(s) that gets left out of a four team Playoff.

You mean that 66 teams should always get left out of a four team playoff? As it now stands, at least 6 conference champs get left out. My take is that if you don't want to get left out, just recruit better and play better.

So, your answer to my question should have been different than it was. Your answer to what it's intended to accomplish would be: to force a power conference champions only playoff with no champion left out. If we are going to do that, we should first purge the P5 conferences of all their weak teams. Ask schools like Illinois, Rutgers, Kansas etc. if that's OK.

(06-03-2021 08:59 PM)Fresno Fanatic Wrote:  So, I have a question. This “waiver”. Why does it matter if AAC is at 11 as long as they have a CCG? I don’t understand the reason for the rule in the first place.

The rule is, to have a CCG, you have to have round-robin competition either in your division or whole-conference round robin. With an odd number of teams, that gets mathematically challenging.

If you have 5 teams in the North and 6 teams in the South, the Northern teams play 4 division games, the Southern teams play 5 division games. So, to make 8 game conference schedules, the Northern teams need 5*3=15 cross-division games. But the Southern schools need 6 * 3 = 18 division games. So you have to do something unconventional to make the math work, or let the math not work (even more unconventional).

Quote:Anyone know why there has to be a “waiver”?

so that the AAC can continue to have a CCG when, under the rules, they don't qualify for one.

Quote:It seems like a silly rule to me. How does it hurt the other 9 FBS conferences if AAC stands at 11 and has a CCG? Maybe 10 or 20 years ago the rule mattered, but I just don’t see why it does still today.

Well, up until a couple of years ago, P5 conferences were blocking the ACC's proposal to deregulate CCG's. Maybe they're worried that, if there are no CCG rules, maybe the ACC gets Notre Dame to join as a "full member" by making some kind of concessions--maybe Notre Dame plays 6 conference games, I dunno.

Nobody can 100% say why, but the big boys were definitely blocking a rule change about 5 years ago. The AAC isn't the same type of competitor, so they got their waiver when UConn walked. Was the waiver because The Powers That Be have gradually decided, what the heck, just let everyone have CCGs and don't sweat it? Or was it that the AAC isn't important enough to block? Or was the AAC told they can have the waiver for a couple of years, but they need to come up with a plan to get back to 12.

Quote:And making any conference of 10 or 11 play more than 8 or 9 conference games is a silly rule to me too. If Sunbelt and Big 12 decides to play only 8 conference games, why not let them? AAC 9 conference games...let them! Whoopty doo!

There are wheels within wheels, and power games being played.

(06-03-2021 09:14 PM)solohawks Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 06:39 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 05:56 PM)solohawks Wrote:  To answer the original question, I bet they get another waiver (attributed to COVID) or the CCG becomes deregulated and round robin divisons aren't required

Frankly, thats what I think will happen. I also think the AAC will be at 11 for some time. That said---as a fan of an existing AAC western division team, I think its less of a hassle to take Boise by itself in "all sports" than it is to add an entire western wing including 3 MT/PT time zone teams. Just take Boise in all-sports and be done with it. Im not saying the western wing concept cant work---but I think it will put a lot of unneeded strain on the budgets of existing western division AAC schools.

M Basketball is the only inconvenient Men's sport

Women's sports are the real burden as in addition to Basketball you have softball, Volleyball and soccer.

Boise sponsors beach volleyball which is independent and only needs one other women's team sport per NCAA rules. They could drop the women's team sports causing travel conflicts and reallocate those scholarships to non team sports or team sports like Acrobatics and Tumbling, Field Hockey, Ice Hockey, Lacrosse, Rowing, Rugby, and Water Polo.

Make it where M/W Basketball is the only travel burden

It's 3 sports only. They tell Boise State to park Softball somewhere else, and that any future Olympic team sport they decide to sponsor (e.g., Baseball) does not get automatic admission. There are landing spots that work for Boise State softball as an associate.

Soccer is not a big deal. It's one Saturday in the Fall every other year. No lost class time. As is schools are often playing one or two cross country games anyway, Boise just becomes that game every other year. Impact is pretty minimal.

All the other sports (Tennis, Track, Cross Country, Swimming) are zero impact, as the only conference scheduled event is the championship meet. That is not going to be held in Boise, the Broncos will have to fly to the same city everyone else is going to, whether Orlando or New Orleans or Memphis or Houston or Philadelphia. There is ZERO extra expense to AAC schools.

You get down to it, just three sports involve any significant travel issues for the AAC schools: Men's and Women's Basketball and Women's Volleyball. Boise State is top 100 in Basketball pretty much every year, which will help NET. They were one of those borderline NIT or NCAA teams this year. But it's a long trip to Boise and every other year schools will get the dreaded Thursday game losing two days of class time (well one and a half); the other years they get a Saturday game. This can be mitigated by pairing Men's and Women's games so that it's a single day. Also two of the five home weeks can be placed on school holidays or breaks to reduce the impact.

It's doable if you want Boise State football and that near lock on the G5 spot. And they don't hurt your basketball at large chances, even help. It's more a question of money. And I think ESPN would provide enough to make it worthwhile.

What is left is the psychological resistance, the "we can't do that" mentality that permeates.

As I have said which do you value more Football and the needs of the Football coaches, or Women's Volleyball and Basketball, and even grumbling Women's Soccer and their coaches needs. So far the answer seems to be those Women's teams are more important to your identity that the football. I'd have never thought that UCF Women's Volleyball coach and Cincinnati's Women's Soccer coach were more important than the Football team. But what do I know?

(06-03-2021 10:49 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 09:14 PM)solohawks Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 06:39 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 05:56 PM)solohawks Wrote:  To answer the original question, I bet they get another waiver (attributed to COVID) or the CCG becomes deregulated and round robin divisons aren't required

Frankly, thats what I think will happen. I also think the AAC will be at 11 for some time. That said---as a fan of an existing AAC western division team, I think its less of a hassle to take Boise by itself in "all sports" than it is to add an entire western wing including 3 MT/PT time zone teams. Just take Boise in all-sports and be done with it. Im not saying the western wing concept cant work---but I think it will put a lot of unneeded strain on the budgets of existing western division AAC schools.

M Basketball is the only inconvenient Men's sport

Women's sports are the real burden as in addition to Basketball you have softball, Volleyball and soccer.

Boise sponsors beach volleyball which is independent and only needs one other women's team sport per NCAA rules. They could drop the women's team sports causing travel conflicts and reallocate those scholarships to non team sports or team sports like Acrobatics and Tumbling, Field Hockey, Ice Hockey, Lacrosse, Rowing, Rugby, and Water Polo.

Make it where M/W Basketball is the only travel burden

It's 3 sports only. They tell Boise State to park Softball somewhere else, and that any future Olympic team sport they decide to sponsor (e.g., Baseball) does not get automatic admission. There are landing spots that work for Boise State softball as an associate.

Soccer is not a big deal. It's one Saturday in the Fall every other year. No lost class time. As is schools are often playing one or two cross country games anyway, Boise just becomes that game every other year. Impact is pretty minimal.

All the other sports (Tennis, Track, Cross Country, Swimming) are zero impact, as the only conference scheduled event is the championship meet. That is not going to be held in Boise, the Broncos will have to fly to the same city everyone else is going to, whether Orlando or New Orleans or Memphis or Houston or Philadelphia. There is ZERO extra expense to AAC schools.

You get down to it, just three sports involve any significant travel issues for the AAC schools: Men's and Women's Basketball and Women's Volleyball. Boise State is top 100 in Basketball pretty much every year, which will help NET. They were one of those borderline NIT or NCAA teams this year. But it's a long trip to Boise and every other year schools will get the dreaded Thursday game losing two days of class time (well one and a half); the other years they get a Saturday game. This can be mitigated by pairing Men's and Women's games so that it's a single day. Also two of the five home weeks can be placed on school holidays or breaks to reduce the impact.

It's doable if you want Boise State football and that near lock on the G5 spot. And they don't hurt your basketball at large chances, even help. It's more a question of money. And I think ESPN would provide enough to make it worthwhile.

What is left is the psychological resistance, the "we can't do that" mentality that permeates.

As I have said which do you value more Football and the needs of the Football coaches, or Women's Volleyball and Basketball, and even grumbling Women's Soccer and their coaches needs. So far the answer seems to be those Women's teams are more important to your identity that the football. I'd have never thought that UCF Women's Volleyball coach and Cincinnati's Women's Soccer coach were more important than the Football team. But what do I know?

Or just drop Women's volleyball and replace it with another women's team sport like Women's Acrobatics and Tumbling. Boise already sponsors a Women's Gymnastics team so Acrobatics and Tumbling would be a natural fit with that.

If softball and soccer have a west coast home or can be accommodated without issue, keep it. If not replace them with Lacrosse and Water Polo, both of which can be accommodated with West Coast conferences.

Make basketball the only issue

(06-04-2021 08:51 AM)solohawks Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 10:49 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 09:14 PM)solohawks Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 06:39 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 05:56 PM)solohawks Wrote:  To answer the original question, I bet they get another waiver (attributed to COVID) or the CCG becomes deregulated and round robin divisons aren't required

Frankly, thats what I think will happen. I also think the AAC will be at 11 for some time. That said---as a fan of an existing AAC western division team, I think its less of a hassle to take Boise by itself in "all sports" than it is to add an entire western wing including 3 MT/PT time zone teams. Just take Boise in all-sports and be done with it. Im not saying the western wing concept cant work---but I think it will put a lot of unneeded strain on the budgets of existing western division AAC schools.

M Basketball is the only inconvenient Men's sport

Women's sports are the real burden as in addition to Basketball you have softball, Volleyball and soccer.

Boise sponsors beach volleyball which is independent and only needs one other women's team sport per NCAA rules. They could drop the women's team sports causing travel conflicts and reallocate those scholarships to non team sports or team sports like Acrobatics and Tumbling, Field Hockey, Ice Hockey, Lacrosse, Rowing, Rugby, and Water Polo.

Make it where M/W Basketball is the only travel burden

It's 3 sports only. They tell Boise State to park Softball somewhere else, and that any future Olympic team sport they decide to sponsor (e.g., Baseball) does not get automatic admission. There are landing spots that work for Boise State softball as an associate.

Soccer is not a big deal. It's one Saturday in the Fall every other year. No lost class time. As is schools are often playing one or two cross country games anyway, Boise just becomes that game every other year. Impact is pretty minimal.

All the other sports (Tennis, Track, Cross Country, Swimming) are zero impact, as the only conference scheduled event is the championship meet. That is not going to be held in Boise, the Broncos will have to fly to the same city everyone else is going to, whether Orlando or New Orleans or Memphis or Houston or Philadelphia. There is ZERO extra expense to AAC schools.

You get down to it, just three sports involve any significant travel issues for the AAC schools: Men's and Women's Basketball and Women's Volleyball. Boise State is top 100 in Basketball pretty much every year, which will help NET. They were one of those borderline NIT or NCAA teams this year. But it's a long trip to Boise and every other year schools will get the dreaded Thursday game losing two days of class time (well one and a half); the other years they get a Saturday game. This can be mitigated by pairing Men's and Women's games so that it's a single day. Also two of the five home weeks can be placed on school holidays or breaks to reduce the impact.

It's doable if you want Boise State football and that near lock on the G5 spot. And they don't hurt your basketball at large chances, even help. It's more a question of money. And I think ESPN would provide enough to make it worthwhile.

What is left is the psychological resistance, the "we can't do that" mentality that permeates.

As I have said which do you value more Football and the needs of the Football coaches, or Women's Volleyball and Basketball, and even grumbling Women's Soccer and their coaches needs. So far the answer seems to be those Women's teams are more important to your identity that the football. I'd have never thought that UCF Women's Volleyball coach and Cincinnati's Women's Soccer coach were more important than the Football team. But what do I know?

Or just drop Women's volleyball and replace it with another women's team sport like Women's Acrobatics and Tumbling. Boise already sponsors a Women's Gymnastics team so Acrobatics and Tumbling would be a natural fit with that.

If softball and soccer have a west coast home or can be accommodated without issue, keep it. If not replace them with Lacrosse and Water Polo, both of which can be accommodated with West Coast conferences.

Make basketball the only issue

I think you guys are missing the political dimension to this. Dropping one established women's sport, even to replace it with another, just to accommodate some egotistical football conference goal would probably not go down very well with the feminist-liberal contingent on campus. This would be viewed as a very cynical effort to manipulate women's athletics for the benefit of football.

And like it or not, that's a big and influential contingent on most campuses.

(06-04-2021 09:29 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(06-04-2021 08:51 AM)solohawks Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 10:49 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 09:14 PM)solohawks Wrote:  

(06-03-2021 06:39 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  Frankly, thats what I think will happen. I also think the AAC will be at 11 for some time. That said---as a fan of an existing AAC western division team, I think its less of a hassle to take Boise by itself in "all sports" than it is to add an entire western wing including 3 MT/PT time zone teams. Just take Boise in all-sports and be done with it. Im not saying the western wing concept cant work---but I think it will put a lot of unneeded strain on the budgets of existing western division AAC schools.

M Basketball is the only inconvenient Men's sport

Women's sports are the real burden as in addition to Basketball you have softball, Volleyball and soccer.

Boise sponsors beach volleyball which is independent and only needs one other women's team sport per NCAA rules. They could drop the women's team sports causing travel conflicts and reallocate those scholarships to non team sports or team sports like Acrobatics and Tumbling, Field Hockey, Ice Hockey, Lacrosse, Rowing, Rugby, and Water Polo.

Make it where M/W Basketball is the only travel burden

It's 3 sports only. They tell Boise State to park Softball somewhere else, and that any future Olympic team sport they decide to sponsor (e.g., Baseball) does not get automatic admission. There are landing spots that work for Boise State softball as an associate.

Soccer is not a big deal. It's one Saturday in the Fall every other year. No lost class time. As is schools are often playing one or two cross country games anyway, Boise just becomes that game every other year. Impact is pretty minimal.

All the other sports (Tennis, Track, Cross Country, Swimming) are zero impact, as the only conference scheduled event is the championship meet. That is not going to be held in Boise, the Broncos will have to fly to the same city everyone else is going to, whether Orlando or New Orleans or Memphis or Houston or Philadelphia. There is ZERO extra expense to AAC schools.

You get down to it, just three sports involve any significant travel issues for the AAC schools: Men's and Women's Basketball and Women's Volleyball. Boise State is top 100 in Basketball pretty much every year, which will help NET. They were one of those borderline NIT or NCAA teams this year. But it's a long trip to Boise and every other year schools will get the dreaded Thursday game losing two days of class time (well one and a half); the other years they get a Saturday game. This can be mitigated by pairing Men's and Women's games so that it's a single day. Also two of the five home weeks can be placed on school holidays or breaks to reduce the impact.

It's doable if you want Boise State football and that near lock on the G5 spot. And they don't hurt your basketball at large chances, even help. It's more a question of money. And I think ESPN would provide enough to make it worthwhile.

What is left is the psychological resistance, the "we can't do that" mentality that permeates.

As I have said which do you value more Football and the needs of the Football coaches, or Women's Volleyball and Basketball, and even grumbling Women's Soccer and their coaches needs. So far the answer seems to be those Women's teams are more important to your identity that the football. I'd have never thought that UCF Women's Volleyball coach and Cincinnati's Women's Soccer coach were more important than the Football team. But what do I know?

Or just drop Women's volleyball and replace it with another women's team sport like Women's Acrobatics and Tumbling. Boise already sponsors a Women's Gymnastics team so Acrobatics and Tumbling would be a natural fit with that.

If softball and soccer have a west coast home or can be accommodated without issue, keep it. If not replace them with Lacrosse and Water Polo, both of which can be accommodated with West Coast conferences.

Make basketball the only issue

I think you guys are missing the political dimension to this. Dropping one established women's sport, even to replace it with another, just to accommodate some egotistical football conference goal would probably not go down very well with the feminist-liberal contingent on campus. This would be viewed as a very cynical effort to manipulate women's athletics for the benefit of football.

And like it or not, that's a big and influential contingent on most campuses.

Yes, but the right messaging could help. Especially now that Acrobatics and Tumbling is an official NCAA Women's sport and Boise already does sponsor gymnastics.

Message it as creating better female opportunities in emerging sports as opposed to sports where success is going to be much harder to obtain.

My post on the AAC board based on previous waiver info search:

Quote:Tom Bowen is the gift that keeps on giving. A search for waiver info turned up this interview with ex Memphis/ current Ark. St. AD Bowen. Around the 12 min mark, he talks about the AAC waiver continuing for the next two years. Says the waiver allows for the opportunity to wait until alignment begins to make a decision w/o putting pressure on the conference. Guess I'll have to add Bowen back into my AAC searches.

This was super interesting! Thanks for sharing

It basically comes down to this. AAC fans/ADs are unwilling to compromise. They expect everyone else to accommodate them.

Look at the crazy ass suggestions that a school drop women's volleyball. Are you really going to turn down a top football program because your don't want your women's volleyball teams to have to fly to Boise, Idaho?

You get right down to it, that is the entire sticking point. Who looks ridiculously inflexible when you look at the details? The money of the travel can even be offset by a small contribution from ESPN who want Boise State football in the American anyway.

(06-04-2021 03:43 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  It basically comes down to this. AAC fans/ADs are unwilling to compromise. They expect everyone else to accommodate them.

Look at the crazy ass suggestions that a school drop women's volleyball. Are you really going to turn down a top football program because your don't want your women's volleyball teams to have to fly to Boise, Idaho?

You get right down to it, that is the entire sticking point. Who looks ridiculously inflexible when you look at the details? The money of the travel can even be offset by a small contribution from ESPN who want Boise State football in the American anyway.

Not really. I suspect there are any number of compromises that the AAC would probably be willing to make for BYU---Boise too. But just like the the party receiving the offer---the compromises have to make sense for the AAC as well.

Sure, I'd prefer a "football only" Boise deal---but I could live with an all sports deal. I suspect it's Boise demanding the AAC also add a whole western cluster of teams. Frankly, I'm just not sure its worth adding all that travel when all you really want is to just add one reasonably valuable team to get to 12. I think that kind of "compromise" would be a tough sell for the current western division AAC members and thats probably why it hasnt happened. Frankly---its also why I think we will be holding at 11 for a while. There is just a few teams that add value and Im not sold on the idea that adding 3 to get just one of the teams on the "value added" list makes sense. If two of the three are Boise and BYU---I'd be all for it. Im a lot more "meh" about the 3-team expansion as it currently is being reported. Heck---to me---even Boise, SDSU, and Air Force is better (assuming AF is football only).

(06-04-2021 07:05 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(06-04-2021 03:43 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  It basically comes down to this. AAC fans/ADs are unwilling to compromise. They expect everyone else to accommodate them.

Look at the crazy ass suggestions that a school drop women's volleyball. Are you really going to turn down a top football program because your don't want your women's volleyball teams to have to fly to Boise, Idaho?

You get right down to it, that is the entire sticking point. Who looks ridiculously inflexible when you look at the details? The money of the travel can even be offset by a small contribution from ESPN who want Boise State football in the American anyway.

Not really. I suspect there are any number of compromises that the AAC would probably be willing to make for BYU---Boise too. But just like the the party receiving the offer---the compromises have to make sense for the AAC as well.

Yes, if the reports we are getting are true, I think the AAC has been very reasonable in its interactions with Boise. Boise wants all sports, we don't, and for a good reason. The AAC has the right to look out for its own interests, it isn't forcing anything on anyone else.

Do the western division schools really want to play a combination of 3 Rocky Mountain and West Coast Schools after joining an ORIGINAL EAST COAST CONFERENCE. Didn't they join the OBE / current AAC for east coast coverage and east coast TV's for a larger media contract and payout. I can see one more western FB only school to get back to 12 FB schools, but are 3 additions really worth the headaches and additional travel costs.

(06-04-2021 07:14 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(06-04-2021 07:05 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(06-04-2021 03:43 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  It basically comes down to this. AAC fans/ADs are unwilling to compromise. They expect everyone else to accommodate them.

Look at the crazy ass suggestions that a school drop women's volleyball. Are you really going to turn down a top football program because your don't want your women's volleyball teams to have to fly to Boise, Idaho?

You get right down to it, that is the entire sticking point. Who looks ridiculously inflexible when you look at the details? The money of the travel can even be offset by a small contribution from ESPN who want Boise State football in the American anyway.

Not really. I suspect there are any number of compromises that the AAC would probably be willing to make for BYU---Boise too. But just like the the party receiving the offer---the compromises have to make sense for the AAC as well.

Yes, if the reports we are getting are true, I think the AAC has been very reasonable in its interactions with Boise. Boise wants all sports, we don't, and for a good reason. The AAC has the right to look out for its own interests, it isn't forcing anything on anyone else.

AAC could treat Boise like the Hawaii of the MWC/Big West in both scheduling and travel subsidies

(06-03-2021 10:08 PM)johnbragg Wrote:  Nobody can 100% say why, but the big boys were definitely blocking a rule change about 5 years ago. The AAC isn't the same type of competitor, so they got their waiver when UConn walked. Was the waiver because The Powers That Be have gradually decided, what the heck, just let everyone have CCGs and don't sweat it? Or was it that the AAC isn't important enough to block? Or was the AAC told they can have the waiver for a couple of years, but they need to come up with a plan to get back to 12. ...

The last one would be what a waiver is.

So far, the only one of the current P5 that have had to react to losing schools was the Big12, and it didn't have a CCG at the time, so whether its losses and additions were synchronized wasn't an issue. The other ones were dealing with additions, and the additions were synchronized.

So none of the P5 have been in the position of needing to say, "we are out of compliance with the rule, but we need some time to get back into compliance."

One thing the MAC experience would give a precedent for is announcing the move to balance things in the very last year of the first waiver, and then applying for another waiver because it will take some time to execute the move. Hence no rush right now.

(06-04-2021 09:08 PM)panite Wrote:  Do the western division schools really want to play a combination of 3 Rocky Mountain and West Coast Schools after joining an ORIGINAL EAST COAST CONFERENCE. Didn't they join the OBE / current AAC for east coast coverage and east coast TV's for a larger media contract and payout. I can see one more western FB only school to get back to 12 FB schools, but are 3 additions really worth the headaches and additional travel costs.

Yes, SMU/Tulane/Tulsa/Navy should just get together and sponsor Rice for the 12th member.

(06-05-2021 11:28 AM)ESE84 Wrote:  

(06-04-2021 09:08 PM)panite Wrote:  Do the western division schools really want to play a combination of 3 Rocky Mountain and West Coast Schools after joining an ORIGINAL EAST COAST CONFERENCE. Didn't they join the OBE / current AAC for east coast coverage and east coast TV's for a larger media contract and payout. I can see one more western FB only school to get back to 12 FB schools, but are 3 additions really worth the headaches and additional travel costs.

Yes, SMU/Tulane/Tulsa/Navy should just get together and sponsor Rice for the 12th member.

I favor backfill - if we must backfill, and I don't think we need to now - from the East. But Rice is maybe the only school from Texas or west I would support. Can't have too many top 20 academic schools, IMO.

(06-05-2021 11:41 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(06-05-2021 11:28 AM)ESE84 Wrote:  

(06-04-2021 09:08 PM)panite Wrote:  Do the western division schools really want to play a combination of 3 Rocky Mountain and West Coast Schools after joining an ORIGINAL EAST COAST CONFERENCE. Didn't they join the OBE / current AAC for east coast coverage and east coast TV's for a larger media contract and payout. I can see one more western FB only school to get back to 12 FB schools, but are 3 additions really worth the headaches and additional travel costs.

Yes, SMU/Tulane/Tulsa/Navy should just get together and sponsor Rice for the 12th member.

I favor backfill - if we must backfill, and I don't think we need to now - from the East. But Rice is maybe the only school from Texas or west I would support. Can't have too many top 20 academic schools, IMO.

If they could get Army, Air Force, and Rice they could create a "Magnolia" Divison

(06-05-2021 11:50 AM)solohawks Wrote:  

(06-05-2021 11:41 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(06-05-2021 11:28 AM)ESE84 Wrote:  

(06-04-2021 09:08 PM)panite Wrote:  Do the western division schools really want to play a combination of 3 Rocky Mountain and West Coast Schools after joining an ORIGINAL EAST COAST CONFERENCE. Didn't they join the OBE / current AAC for east coast coverage and east coast TV's for a larger media contract and payout. I can see one more western FB only school to get back to 12 FB schools, but are 3 additions really worth the headaches and additional travel costs.

Yes, SMU/Tulane/Tulsa/Navy should just get together and sponsor Rice for the 12th member.

I favor backfill - if we must backfill, and I don't think we need to now - from the East. But Rice is maybe the only school from Texas or west I would support. Can't have too many top 20 academic schools, IMO.

If they could get Army, Air Force, and Rice they could create a "Magnolia" Divison

If this "Eastern" view holds up, AAC needs to take a very serious look at Buffalo. They have 32,000-plus enrollment in a nice market where only competition is the NFL ... BUT being in the AAC vs. MAC teams would draw more attention. Attendance not terrific, but if I'm a Buffalo alum do I really care about playing Ball State, NIU and Akron? Can play them o-o-c if there's a reason. Buffalo set a fund-raising goal of $650 million, recently announced they raised $711 million and are now going for a "Buffalo billion." Good chance they'll get it. They're AAU with a good alumni base.

IMO, AAC has to look at potential ... again, if this Eastern view is credible. I don't see Army copying Navy (AAC FB only, west division) in the AAC East. Navy wanted the west/Texas access; the AAC gave Navy what it wanted. Army doesn't need the AAC for anything.