jpschmack

#1 - The CAA has invited them for football only, but not all-sports.

#2 - The Am East has never had an at-large bid to the NCAA MBB Tournament, 20 total bids and four wins.
The MAAC has gotten an at-large bid, as recently as last season, 43 total bids and 16 wins.

College Hoops

Rutgers has taken the proactive approach and sued the Big East over the exits fees and presumably other items as well. An interesting aspect to their suit is their claim the BE has not collected exit fees from those schools who have already left WVU & TCU, and if they have collected any monies they had not been distributed to member schools.I'm sure the litigation is intended as a negotiating tool to perhaps speed up their departure, and lessen monies they may have to pay,

DukesDan

Uh oh

Gary Parrish Post

Big East's non-football members meet, discuss possible breakaway

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Simms

http://espn.go.com/college-sports/st...tholic-schools


Meh, I want the current A10 to stick together.

jpschmack

This is not good if you're a Saint Joe's, LaSalle, Rhode Island, Fordham, George Washington or St. Bonaventure fan. And might not be good if you're a Duquesne, VCU, Richmond, Butler or UMass fan.

DistrictBaller

There seems to be a lot like posturing from the basketball schools. There is no scenario where they are better off financially by splitting off and starting a new basketball conference.

Of course, if it happens, I agree that it's bad for the schools left behind. As a VCU fan, I'd think worst case even if we were left behind we'd be in a better basketball conference than the CAA, so it's not as bad as the alternative.

Say the catholics take Xavier, Dayton, Butler and Saint Louis, neither Dayton or Saint Louis are regularly in the NCAA tournament at all. Xavier and Butler would be huge losses, but Butler is brand new anyway and has yet to play a game in this conference. X is the big kingpin that would be pretty much impossible to replace.

Either way, the chances of the basketball schools splitting off and poaching the A-10 are slim IMHO. I can see why they are extremely unhappy with the current state of affairs in the Big East however. There is little that is major about that conference from both a football and basketball perspective.

An A-10 with St. Joe's, VCU, UMass, Richmond, La Salle, Rhode Island, George Washington, Duquesne, St. Bonaventure, and Fordham isn't the greatest basketball conference, but still decent. We'd also have plenty of leverage to get schools like George Mason which is a positive geographically for VCU and still better than the current CAA from our standpoint.

That is far from what I'd like to see, but as a worst-case scenario, it's not half-bad compared to being in the current CAA.

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A10BBall

Not really much to be worried about.. Those 7 big east basketball schools are as a whole just not that good. If CBS thinks that the Big East basketball school are going to get $1 million per year from a TV deal which is higher than I thought then the basketball schools will not go. Why? Because a TV deal for that proposed basketball will not nearly come close to achieving that number. The newly proposed schools won't go there as a part of the full conference as one the football schools won't allow it and plus they have a fair amount of schools already. Georgetown is broke. Nova is struggling for cash. They can't even fill a third of their NBA arenas for home games, they will go for the largest TV dollar which will come from the TV deal with the Big East football schools.

Medford

I'll agree w/ district baller that the chances remain slim, but there are rumors that the BBall onlies may only get roughly $1 mil out of the deal being negotiated. What if it drops, or what if there is language in the deal that allows the total money to drop should UConn, UC, Boise, etc... depart???

The key question in that regard, is what is a TV deal worth comprised of those 7, plus a handful of choosen schools. You also have to balance out the travel expenses they're going to see for non revenue sports traveling to New Orleans and Texas on a regular basis for conference games, vs the shorter travel they could arrange in say a 6x6 format split East-(mid)west. I have little doubt they have an "ish" figure from ESPN, CBS, NBC or elsewhere that tells them what that deal would be worth. Could they talk the "right" partners into joining that conference? Would Butler, X, UD, SLU, Creighton, VCU, Richmond, etc... listen??? Are the committed to each other and willing to tell the Big East 7 to go walk a plank? Would one team "chicken out" and jump at first offer in fear that others would take their place like colorado did when moving to the P12?

If the current a-10 deal w/ 14 teams (moving forward) is worth the reported $375k a season, then its not that hard to assume that a TV deal w/ the Big East 7 plus 2-7 more of the cream of the non football world is worth mroe than $375k. How close it gets what they can get out of the Big East is the key.

Moliva

Not that I disagree with anything you said but can you expand on this? I figured both schools were fairly well capitalized.

Medford

Save Xavier, I'm not sure that any A-10 school can feel totally good. From a Dayton perspective, what if they choose to go to 9 or 10 schools and felt like the Dayton-cincy overlap was too much to generate the TV dollars they could get out of adding, Butler, SLU & X? or Xavier, SLU & Richmond? or whatever other combo you want to throw out there.

Of course those teams that often get talked about have to ask themselves how much better would that conference be than the A-10 moving forward? How much more would the TV dollars be?

Moliva

Unfortunately, I think the answer to that question is probably 'yes'.

What I can tell you is that University of Richmond won't be making any decisions on a couple hundred thousand dollars of TV money.

Bill Russell

The A10 has something special building here and it would be a damn shame if a shell of the Big East broke it up.

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rworkman09

Apparently if the conference gets $80MM in television money (which is on the high side of what was being reported by CBS), then the basketball schools will actually see their television revenue drop.

Running a basketball program really isn't all that expensive. Xavier does it very well on A10 money, the Catholic schools in the BE could as well. They'll be seeing some very empty arenas while hosting SMU, Tulane, and some of the other mediocre to bad programs pulled into the Big East. The loss of ticket revenue alone may more than cancel out any television revenue they get from staying vs leaving.

Pull in Dayton, Butler, and Xavier to go with Georgetown, Marquette, and Villanova and you have a damn good basketball conference.

Anything that happens could happen relatively quickly because this has to be done before the new schools become members of the conference. If it doesn't happen before July 1, then people need to drop the "the Big East schools will eventually break away" argument because that point is is obvious that they won't.

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A10BBall

Problem is that.. When you take that 7 and add 2-7 of the cream of the NF world, you get the current A-10.. The reason why their original isn't good... We have been over this.. Their contract is not going to be that good... or not that much better than the A-10 TV Deal.. AND DEF NOT ENOUGH TO WARRANT A CHANGE AND THE RISK OF LOST DOLLARS... We have been over this numerous times

A10BBall

That is exactly what this is going to be and why they won't be listening