The unofficial online home for fans of the University of Cincinnati Bearcats. Part of Collegiate Sports Nation (CSN).

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/sports/u...story.html

Aresco says they’ll have the exit fees negotiated by the exiting teams this spring. The AAC recognizes the teams do not want to be there any longer than they have to and the conference is ready to move on with their new additions.

Count me as a fan of Mike Aresco. He understands this is a business, and that the departing members would be crazy not to make the jump. I wish the AAC nothing but the best going forward.

(01-27-2022 12:48 PM)robertfoshizzle Wrote:  Count me as a fan of Mike Aresco. He understands this is a business, and that the departing members would be crazy not to make the jump. I wish the AAC nothing but the best going forward.

yep. i've always liked aresco. at times, i know a lot of posters have gone after him, but, he hasn't always been working from a position of strength. there's been times that he / the league just had to take the hit and keep on going

(01-27-2022 01:26 PM)dave108 Wrote:  

(01-27-2022 12:48 PM)robertfoshizzle Wrote:  Count me as a fan of Mike Aresco. He understands this is a business, and that the departing members would be crazy not to make the jump. I wish the AAC nothing but the best going forward.

yep. i've always liked aresco. at times, i know a lot of posters have gone after him, but, he hasn't always been working from a position of strength. there's been times that he / the league just had to take the hit and keep on going

I think it's incredible what Aresco's done negotiating and planning from a position of weakness. Now, it took success on the field to make his pitches make sense, but he seemed to project this conferences ability right on the money. In football, at least. Basketball nothing to blame but the schools involved.

I'm not a big fan of the additions they made and would have just gone with 4 schools for now, but maybe he just went ahead with six to avoid having to add two more in the event Memphis/SMU/South Florida get called up. Maybe it was better TV money. Idk but I trust he made the right decision.

Agreed; Aresco did the best possible job of building the AAC and carrying the "P6" banner. He didn't create the P5 barrier; he was powerless to change it. But the American forged a really good football reputation as the clearly dominant tweener. And American basketball hung a national championship banner with UCONN and returned to the Final Four with Houston.

I'm certainly not wistful about leaving for the Big 12 but the AAC provided a stable platform for launching UC football to the next level and seizing the Power Five bid when the opportunity arose.

The one thing he did that I did not like was moving the HQ to Dallas. It needed to be moved but somewhere like Atlanta would have been more central to membership. That said with the addition of NTSU, Rice and UTSA I guess it is less bad.

(01-28-2022 11:34 AM)doss2 Wrote:  The one thing he did that I did not like was moving the HQ to Dallas. It needed to be moved but somewhere like Atlanta would have been more central to membership. That said with the addition of NTSU, Rice and UTSA I guess it is less bad.

Bolded, interesting. It makes me wonder if the writing was on the wall for insiders long before TX and OK set off the chain reaction last summer? If Aresco knew that would cost him two or three teams in realignment and anticipated re-building as a more Texas-centric conference?

CFB is basically run out of suburban Dallas anymore. The CFP Committee HQ is across the street, and the BXII and CUSA are in the area as well. There are also three FCS conference whose HQ is there as well as the Football Writers Association of America. It all makes sense really, any of these people can get together for lunch/dinner real easy and conduct meetings.

(01-28-2022 11:49 AM)CliftonAve Wrote:  CFB is basically run out of suburban Dallas anymore. The CFP Committee HQ is across the street, and the BXII and CUSA are in the area as well. There are also three FCS conference whose HQ is there as well as the Football Writers Association of America. It all makes sense really, any of these people can get together for lunch/dinner real easy and conduct meetings.

Guessing taxes are friendly too. What's really the benefit of a centralized local? Why would it matter?

Selling the Big East name was still a huge mistake.

It wouldn’t have changed this round of realignment but it would certainly helped the basketball recruiting side.

Big East football would have still meant something more than the AAC would have too.

(01-28-2022 12:12 PM)UCBearcatlawjd2 Wrote:  Selling the Big East name was still a huge mistake.

It wouldn’t have changed this round of realignment but it would certainly helped the basketball recruiting side.

Big East football would have still meant something more than the AAC would have too.

People aren't stupid. We weren't fooling anyone by being named "The Big East." That's just silly.

(01-28-2022 12:16 PM)bearcatmark Wrote:  

(01-28-2022 12:12 PM)UCBearcatlawjd2 Wrote:  Selling the Big East name was still a huge mistake.

It wouldn’t have changed this round of realignment but it would certainly helped the basketball recruiting side.

Big East football would have still meant something more than the AAC would have too.

People aren't stupid. We weren't fooling anyone by being named "The Big East." That's just silly.

It fooled a bunch of people into making the break off league relevant.

(01-28-2022 12:24 PM)UCBearcatlawjd2 Wrote:  

(01-28-2022 12:16 PM)bearcatmark Wrote:  

(01-28-2022 12:12 PM)UCBearcatlawjd2 Wrote:  Selling the Big East name was still a huge mistake.

It wouldn’t have changed this round of realignment but it would certainly helped the basketball recruiting side.

Big East football would have still meant something more than the AAC would have too.

People aren't stupid. We weren't fooling anyone by being named "The Big East." That's just silly.

It fooled a bunch of people into making the break off league relevant.

The breakoff league has teams that were actually Big East teams for a long time. St Johns, Villanova, Georgetown, Providence, Seton Hall...these are all old school Big East programs. (nevermind Marquette/Depaul having been for a few years and UConn returning)

And the conference isn't relevant because it fooled anyone...It's relevant because Villanova has been a top 5 program, they made smart basketball additions, and everyone else has been pretty good. It's a good conference, so it's relevant. It's not relevant because of its name and people don't equate it to what the big east used to be even so.

(01-28-2022 12:30 PM)bearcatmark Wrote:  

(01-28-2022 12:24 PM)UCBearcatlawjd2 Wrote:  

(01-28-2022 12:16 PM)bearcatmark Wrote:  

(01-28-2022 12:12 PM)UCBearcatlawjd2 Wrote:  Selling the Big East name was still a huge mistake.

It wouldn’t have changed this round of realignment but it would certainly helped the basketball recruiting side.

Big East football would have still meant something more than the AAC would have too.

People aren't stupid. We weren't fooling anyone by being named "The Big East." That's just silly.

It fooled a bunch of people into making the break off league relevant.

The breakoff league has teams that were actually Big East teams for a long time. St Johns, Villanova, Georgetown, Providence, Seton Hall...these are all old school Big East programs. (nevermind Marquette/Depaul having been for a few years and UConn returning)

And the conference isn't relevant because it fooled anyone...It's relevant because Villanova has been a top 5 program, they made smart basketball additions, and everyone else has been pretty good. It's a good conference, so it's relevant. It's not relevant because of its name and people don't equate it to what the big east used to be even so.

Would they be in the same spot if had to rebrand as the Eastern Athletic Conference or the Eastern-10. I don’t think they get the same recruits and it plays out very differently.

UC is going to a Big XII that has lost six core members including the two who have defined that conference in football. The brand name matters a lot.

I just feel that if AAC kept the Big East name it would helped a great deal in recruiting. UC, UCF, and Houston did a lot of the heavy lifting and deserve a promotion but I think downstream it would helped the likes of ECU, Temple, USF, SMU, and Memphis build and maintain their programs. UConn probably doesn’t fall apart either.

I just don't buy it. I think the name mattered some to the current Big East and that's why it made sense for them to pay for it. I don't think it would have mattered a bit to us. People aren't stupid. The brand can help all things equal, but nobody would have been fooled by our southern based conference stretching out to Texas/Oklahoma being called the "Big East". It was a smart sell that brought immediately needed money.

With the Big 12 it still has most the founding members and has a very similar footprint. The name still makes sense for the conference.

Yeah, our league retaining the name Big East for a southern and Texas-centric league makes no sense at all. The name became tainted. Good riddance.

(01-28-2022 12:47 PM)bearcatmark Wrote:  I just don't buy it. I think the name mattered some to the current Big East and that's why it made sense for them to pay for it. I don't think it would have mattered a bit to us. People aren't stupid. The brand can help all things equal, but nobody would have been fooled by our southern based conference stretching out to Texas/Oklahoma being called the "Big East". It was a smart sell that brought immediately needed money.

With the Big 12 it still has most the founding members and has a very similar footprint. The name still makes sense for the conference.

I agree. The name "Big East" clearly had more value to the basketball group than the football group. They couldn't share it and it would be a waste to let the name die especially for the key long-term members associated with it. Having the basketball group pay to keep the name seems like a win all around.

Regardless of what you call it, AAC basketball has been a huge flop. Temple, Memphis, Wichita State, Tulsa, UConn (while they were here) and for the last two years UC failed to play to their historical level. SMU started out hot but quickly fizzled. I guess Tulane and ECU are finally better than what they have historically been, but still not good enough. Its been good for Houston obviously and USF has basically been what they have always been.

Hopefully the move to the BXII along with more donors to give out NIL money will help get UC recruiting back on track.

(01-28-2022 01:04 PM)CliftonAve Wrote:  Regardless of what you call it, AAC basketball has been a huge flop. Temple, Memphis, Wichita State, Tulsa, UConn (while they were here) and for the last two years UC failed to play to their historical level. SMU started out hot but quickly fizzled. I guess Tulane and ECU are finally better than what they have historically been, but still not good enough. Its been good for Houston obviously and USF has basically been what they have always been.

Hopefully the move to the BXII along with more donors to give out NIL money will help get UC recruiting back on track.

No doubt basketball has been the biggest disappointment. If you'd have told me Houston and SMU would have given us what they did, and we added Wichita State, I'd have been very optimistic about the conference. Memphis, Temple and Uconn (after a couple years) were huge disappointments. I think Wichita has been fine, but their trajectory is questionable because they lost an elite coach. They are an unknown going forward.

Oh well... we're out and off to the best conference in college basketball.