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

So, with our loss last night in the AAC baseball tournament, UC has finished it's last competition as a member of the AAC. All that is left is to let the clock run out to the end of June.

Feel free to share your favorite...or infamous...memories of the old Conference here.

Favorite, having a CCG and winning it at home twice.

Infamous, UConn getting 1.5 seconds to throw a basketball 3/4 court with .8 seconds on the clock.

I rejoice at no longer being affiliated with the likes of Eastern Carolina, Temple, Tulsa, Tulane and yeah... Memphis.

I vomit at the memory of watching freaking Tulane walk out of Nippert with the championship, the NY6 bowl and our home winning streak.

I laugh at how ECU and Wichita St. came in here thinking they were going to kick a$$ and take names.

I look forward to never again having to just suck on it whenever some B1G or SEC blowhard says "now WHO is in the AAC again???"

Playing road games with more than 1500 people in the stands again should be fun.

Football wise the AAC ended up being a better conference than I expected. Basketball was a massive disappointment.

Some of my favorites that come to mind are beating Houston in the AAC tournament, I was at a local restaurant both times and it felt like I was at the game with how loud everyone was. Beating Houston again in the football championship game and storming the field after the game was something I'll never forget.

The UConn game with extra time is definitely a bad memory. Just in general, the end of the Tuberville era. I can't remember if it was his last or second last year, but there was a night game that we were losing towards the end of the year where I was thinking, man, how far we have slid since Brian Kelly left.

Favorite: UC/AAC breaking through the glass ceiling of the CFP for all the little guys.

Least Favorite: The AAC struggling to get more than 2 bids to the NCAA tournament most years.

(05-25-2023 09:55 AM)The Big O Wrote:  Some of my favorites that come to mind are beating Houston in the AAC tournament, I was at a local restaurant both times and it felt like I was at the game with how loud everyone was. Beating Houston again in the football championship game and storming the field after the game was something I'll never forget.

The UConn game with extra time is definitely a bad memory. Just in general, the end of the Tuberville era. I can't remember if it was his last or second last year, but there was a night game that we were losing towards the end of the year where I was thinking, man, how far we have slid since Brian Kelly left.

I believe you are thinking of the game at USF when we were down 51-3 at the half.

Good times!

Plenty of "worsts" enumerated here already but I'll only add, going from the Big East Championships in MSG to a nearly empty Dickey's Arena in Fort Worth for the AAC Championships was a downer. I'm sure getting the rodeo aroma out of the place from the week before the basketball championships tipped off, required some very potent chemicals.

The best? Leveraging a decent football conference for an undefeated season, top five ranking, and CFP invitation--launching UC football into international headlines and assuring Cincinnati would be "next man in" to the P5 as the Big 12 expanded.

there weren't many good memories outside of leaving. in hoops we had a mini rivalry with smu early on, wichita for two games, houston later. got to rekindle rivalries with memphis and to an extent, temple. the uconn rivalry had some teeth. lots of classic games and a kinship of sorts which they would never agree to so that's why i always say f*ck uconn anymore. every ten years or so i say we travel to greenville to exorcise demons

Best (only conference games):

Football
The Wiggins pick 6 to beat smu
Sauce pick six / Warren long run into the 4th quarter against smu
The 3rd quarter of the conference championship vs Houston

Basketball
Clinching the regular season championship at Wichita
Beating Houston back to back seasons in the conference championship
The comeback win in Brannen's first year against Houston (part of that is i read Courtside)

Baseball
Winning the conference championship (by scoring 5000 runs against uconn)

Worst
Tommy tuberville and John Brannen

Bearcats making CFP...the first ever not major conference school to do so...taking down Notre Dame in the same year. Undoubtedly the best college football year of our lives!!!!

(05-25-2023 06:32 PM)bcat1997 Wrote:  Bearcats making CFP...the first ever not major conference school to do so...taking down Notre Dame in the same year. Undoubtedly the best college football year of our lives!!!!

I'm still partial to 2009. And honestly 2008 and 2021 are pretty close for me...

We've been really lucky the last decade and a half.

(05-25-2023 09:43 AM)BcatMatt13 Wrote:  Playing road games with more than 1500 people in the stands again should be fun.

Football wise the AAC ended up being a better conference than I expected. Basketball was a massive disappointment.

I agree on basketball.

Which is super odd, considering that the conference had two national titles in 10 tournaments (Louisville in 2013, UConn in 2014), and Houston was ranked in the top-10 consistently for three straight years and made it to four straight Sweet-16s and a national title game.

Houston was the only school that overperformed expectations over the 11 years. SMU and UCF met expectations, and arguably so did Tulsa (if you had low expectations for Tulsa, like I did). All the rest underperformed.

What was the bigger problem? Was the problem that many of the expected stalwarts of the conference (Temple, Memphis, Wichita, and post-2014 UConn) massively underperformed? Or was the problem that several of the bottom-feeders (ECU, pre-2023 Tulane, and especially USF) were even worse than advertised?

(05-26-2023 10:24 AM)Captain Bearcat Wrote:  

(05-25-2023 09:43 AM)BcatMatt13 Wrote:  Playing road games with more than 1500 people in the stands again should be fun.

Football wise the AAC ended up being a better conference than I expected. Basketball was a massive disappointment.

I agree on basketball.

Which is super odd, considering that the conference had two national titles in 10 tournaments (Louisville in 2013, UConn in 2014), and Houston was ranked in the top-10 consistently for three straight years and made it to four straight Sweet-16s and a national title game.

Houston was the only school that overperformed expectations over the 11 years. SMU and UCF met expectations, and arguably so did Tulsa (if you had low expectations for Tulsa, like I did). All the rest underperformed.

What was the bigger problem? Was the problem that many of the expected stalwarts of the conference (Temple, Memphis, Wichita, and post-2014 UConn) massively underperformed? Or was the problem that several of the bottom-feeders (ECU, pre-2023 Tulane, and especially USF) were even worse than advertised?

For the record Louisville’s championship* was when the conference was still named the Big East not the AAC.

(05-25-2023 06:40 PM)bearcatmark Wrote:  

(05-25-2023 06:32 PM)bcat1997 Wrote:  Bearcats making CFP...the first ever not major conference school to do so...taking down Notre Dame in the same year. Undoubtedly the best college football year of our lives!!!!

I'm still partial to 2009. And honestly 2008 and 2021 are pretty close for me...

We've been really lucky the last decade and a half.

The CFP playoff is more special to me because of how certain almost every single person was that a G5 team would never make it, even down to the people on this board going into the final weekend. The few hours from Ok State/Baylor ending at the goal line to walking into Nippert, and the phone lights coming on at the end of the game will probably go down as the best Bearcat sport memory I'll have, until the next one.

(05-26-2023 12:38 PM)Cataclysmo Wrote:  

(05-25-2023 06:40 PM)bearcatmark Wrote:  

(05-25-2023 06:32 PM)bcat1997 Wrote:  Bearcats making CFP...the first ever not major conference school to do so...taking down Notre Dame in the same year. Undoubtedly the best college football year of our lives!!!!

I'm still partial to 2009. And honestly 2008 and 2021 are pretty close for me...

We've been really lucky the last decade and a half.

The CFP playoff is more special to me because of how certain almost every single person was that a G5 team would never make it, even down to the people on this board going into the final weekend. The few hours from Ok State/Baylor ending at the goal line to walking into Nippert, and the phone lights coming on at the end of the game will probably go down as the best Bearcat sport memory I'll have, until the next one.

as someone who grew up on 90s Bearcat football, first as an independent then as a CUSA afterthought, what happened in 2008 and 2009 was unfathomable.

And they did it against what was the Sagarin number 2 conference in 2009. Hell in 2009 they were actually closer to playing the a national championship (1 second put back on the clock for Texas).

All three are insanely great seasons, there was something about the rise from the oblivion that was just different in 2008/2009.

I get the other argument though.

I know we are talking AAC, but since the conversation deviated a little to the 2009 team, Pike to Binns was the loudest and most excited I ever got for a football play in my entire life, and it still is. I'm with Mark on this one. I'm partial to the 2009 team.

The only moment that would have ever topped that excitement would have been another rise from oblivion when McPherson made the kick to beat KC to send the Bengals to the SB, but that one brought me to tears.

(05-26-2023 01:26 PM)Cat-Man Wrote:  I know we are talking AAC, but since the conversation deviated a little to the 2009 team, Pike to Binns was the loudest and most excited I ever got for a football play in my entire life, and it still is. I'm with Mark on this one. I'm partial to the 2009 team.

The only moment that would have ever topped that excitement would have been another rise from oblivion when McPherson made the kick to beat KC to send the Bengals to the SB, but that one brought me to tears.

2008 and 2009 were also BIG EAST years, not the AAC.

Just sayin'...

(05-26-2023 12:38 PM)Cataclysmo Wrote:  

(05-25-2023 06:40 PM)bearcatmark Wrote:  

(05-25-2023 06:32 PM)bcat1997 Wrote:  Bearcats making CFP...the first ever not major conference school to do so...taking down Notre Dame in the same year. Undoubtedly the best college football year of our lives!!!!

I'm still partial to 2009. And honestly 2008 and 2021 are pretty close for me...

We've been really lucky the last decade and a half.

The CFP playoff is more special to me because of how certain almost every single person was that a G5 team would never make it, even down to the people on this board going into the final weekend. The few hours from Ok State/Baylor ending at the goal line to walking into Nippert, and the phone lights coming on at the end of the game will probably go down as the best Bearcat sport memory I'll have, until the next one.

I'm still convinced without the Big12 already a done deal, they still wouldn't have put us in.

(05-26-2023 01:28 PM)BearcatJerry Wrote:  

(05-26-2023 01:26 PM)Cat-Man Wrote:  I know we are talking AAC, but since the conversation deviated a little to the 2009 team, Pike to Binns was the loudest and most excited I ever got for a football play in my entire life, and it still is. I'm with Mark on this one. I'm partial to the 2009 team.

The only moment that would have ever topped that excitement would have been another rise from oblivion when McPherson made the kick to beat KC to send the Bengals to the SB, but that one brought me to tears.

2008 and 2009 were also BIG EAST years, not the AAC.

Just sayin'...

I know. That's why I made the comment alluding to the conversation deviating from the AAC.