RT @slmandel: Pac-10 to conduct “serious evaluation” of possible expansion over the next 6-12 months. http://bit.ly/9f78Af
RT @slmandel: Pac-10 to conduct “serious evaluation” of possible expansion over the next 6-12 months. http://bit.ly/9f78Af
PAC-12, anyone? Boise State a BCS team? Probably not. But Louisiana Tech is a member of the WAC, so who knows?
Utah and BYU are the most likely candidates. They fit the competitive profile, they are regionally convenient, they are ranked in the top two academic research tiers by the Carnegie Foundation (Utah is a Very High, which nine of the Pac-10 schols are, the highest grouping, BYU is a High, like Oregon). They are natural rival schools as well.
Boise State doesn’t have the academic depth to be included as they are not a research institution and offer only a single Doctoral degree (Education).
You’d end up with a North and South division.
North:
Washington
Washington State
Oregon
Oregon State
BYU
UTH
South
Cal
Stanford
USC
UCLA
Arizona
Arizona State
For football I imagine the breakdown for scheduling being, 5 games against your division opponents, 3 games against an alternating set of non-dvision opponents, i.e. UW would play a two year set against USC, Arizona, Cal, and then a two year set against UCLA, ASU and Stanford. Leaving 4 non-conf games, and a conference championship game.
I defer to someone who knows the PAC-12. 😀
My guess is this would then have a second realignment with the Mountain West grabbing Boise, Hawaii, and possibly Fresno, or possibly TCU and Air Force bolting for the WAC. I think TCU and Boise need each other in this situation
David: UTH? 🙂
I agree that BYU/Utah are the logical pair, though I’ll continue to hope against hope for the highly unlikely Colorado/Colorado State scenario (unlikely because, why would Colorado bolt the Big 12?), since it would mean I’d get to see USC games on a semi-regular basis. 🙂
I also agree that the logical result of the Pac-10 grabbing BYU & Utah would be the Mountain West cannibalizing the WAC. But why stop at three? They’ve currently got 9 teams; this would bring them down to 7, so if they add 5, they could have a championship game too. (“Mom, all the cool kids are doing it!”) To wit: Boise, Nevada, Fresno, Hawaii, and… uhh… Utah State, for basketball reasons? Or perhaps San Jose State, to get a Bay Area team into the new Mega Mountain West?
That would, of course, completely decimate the WAC, leaving the remaining four — Idaho, Louisiana Tech, New Mexico State, and either USU or SJSU — to fend for themselves. Louisiana Tech could join the Sun Belt easily enough; heck, I suppose NMSU could, too, considering Denver’s already a member (!), but it’s a bit more of a stretch. I’m not sure where the others go. Idaho to the Big East? Utah State to the MAC? Heh.
P.S. Conference alignment for the new Mountain West.. assuming they take SDSU for the Bay Area angle, as I suspect they would try to…
MOUNTAIN WEST WEST (okay, that name needs some work)
Boise State
Nevada
Fresno State
San Jose State
Hawaii
San Diego State
Heck, forget “Mountain West West,” you could just call that the “WAC + SDSU.” Anyway…
MOUNTAIN WEST EAST (heh)
Wyoming
Colorado State
Air Force
UNLV
New Mexico
TCU
The West division looks a bit stronger in football than the East division, but UNLV has potential, and so does, uh, Wyoming?!? I dunno. Hey, if nothing else, the annual TCU-Boise title game rematches would be fun. 🙂
Alternatively, UNLV and Boise could readily be switched, though then you arguably have an even more severe imbalance, with TCU and Boise in the same division.
Yet another alternative…
MOUNTAIN WEST NORTH
Boise State
Nevada
Wyoming
Colorado State
Air Force
San Jose State
MOUNTAIN WEST SOUTH
Fresno State
UNLV
San Diego State
New Mexico
TCU
Hawaii
Hey, I actually think those are pretty good divisions. And you don’t have to deal with the “Mountain West West” problem. North-South it is.
Re: David’s proposed Pac-10 regions, what’s especially nice is that all the rivalries and sub-rivalries (e.g., Washington-Oregon in addition to the “main” Washington-Wazzu rivalry, USC vs. the Bay Area schools in addition to the “main” USC-UCLA rivalry) are contained within the divisions, so there’s no need to do what the SEC does, for instance, and guarantee that Tennessee always plays Alabama, etc. The proposed solution — USC/Arizona/Cal, then UCLA/ASU/Stanford, etc. — is downright elegant.
Also, the Trojans would only have to travel to Corvallis once every fourth year. FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, MAKE THIS HAPPEN. 🙂
The question here may become: how does the PAC-12 realignment affect the Big Mystery Number’s thoughts about realignment, and if this affects the Big Kinda East But Some Schools Are In The Midwest.
(unlikely because, why would Colorado bolt the Big 12?)
The Big Televen is reportedly very interested in Missouri, and certain Missouri people are interested in them, despite the fact that rivalries against Kansas, K-State, Nebraska, and Iowa State go back to the 19th Century. The difference between hypothetical Colorado/Pac-12 and Missouri/Big Teletwelve is that the Pac-10 has even worse TV contracts. 😛
*I hereby claim coinage of “Big Teletwelve.”
Either one puts the Big Not-Twelve-Anymore in a deep bind. Basically, the only options are former Southwest Conference schools not named Arkansas and, uh, Wyoming? Colorado State? TCU or any other Texas school (or Tulsa), the South division gets overloaded (no way Oklahoma and Okie State split). No big schools immediately to the west, locked out to the east by other conferences.
The not-Notre-Dame obvious choice geographically for the Big Ten is Pitt, which will happen over Joe Paterno’s dead body.
The worst part is what I alluded to in the first paragraph: Conference affiliation changes kill even state-next-door rivalries and prevent others from happening. In the past 40 years, Iowa State has played Illinois once and Northwestern never, despite the fact it was the first Northwestern game that led to the nickname “Cyclones.” Iowa State never played Minnesota from 1924-89. On the other side of the coin, the Hawkeyes have not played Missouri in 99 years!!
@ JD: From what I’ve read, the Big Not-Twelve-Anymore’s first option should it lose CU or Missouri would be to acquire TCU and switch to an East-West format. That way you’d get something like Colorado/Texas Tech/TCU/Texas/Kansas State/Baylor in the West and Oklahoma/Oklahoma State/Texas A&M/Kansas/Nebraska/Iowa State in the East.
Missouri is the more likely departure given its butthurt from being passed over by the Insight Bowl (a slap in the face if ever there was one). With the craptastic leadership, bowl tie-ins and TV deal within the Big 12, I couldn’t blame them or Colorado for looking elsewhere. All Missouri would have to do is replace the annual non-conference game against Illinois with Kansas and it’s as you were schedule-wise.
@ Brendan: A 12-team Mountain West brings back memories of the old 16-team Super WAC. What fun that was to cover. As for the WAC remnants, Idaho and Utah State would probably find the Big Sky to their liking for everything but football, where they could do any of the Sun Belt, CUSA or go independent.
All Missouri would have to do is replace the annual non-conference game against Illinois with Kansas and it’s as you were schedule-wise.
Except for the games against Iowa State, Nebraska, and Kansas State that wouldn’t exist anymore. ISU-Missouri even has a trophy, for crying out loud (not that anyone else knows or cares).
Missouri is the more likely departure given its butthurt from being passed over by the Insight Bowl (a slap in the face if ever there was one).
1. The Insight Bowl has the indignity of being “televised” on the NFL Network. By going to a different bowl, Missouri paradoxically got more exposure.
2. Bowl officials had much more confidence that Iowa State would sell its ticket allotment. Teams that travel well get higher priority. (And if ISU hadn’t completely collapsed in the second half against Missouri, both teams would have been 7-5, but I simultaneously digress and concede the rationale behind that word I’m not going to repeat.)
3. The Big 12’s bowl hierarchy, and locations, leave a lot to be desired. Houston should be above Tempe, and the bottom team should be punished by being shipped to Shreveport.
All this talk does is reaffirm my belief that the Big Ten Network is one of the worst things to happen to college football since the corporate hijacking of bowl game names.
“The Big 12’s bowl hierarchy, and locations, leave a lot to be desired”
Alas, so do the Pac-10’s. The SEC and the Big Ten are really the only conferences that have awesome bowl arrangements. Everyone else’s sort of suck (though I guess the ACC’s are OK).
However, the Colorado possibility is getting serious buzz on Twitter and elsewhere, to my surprise. I posted a new tweet linking to a Wizard of Odds blog post about the topic.
Well the Pac-10 DOES have the Rose Bowl, and with the addition of the Alamo Bowl, its not a horrible lineup anymore.
I take for granted that all the major conferences’ BCS bowl tie-ins are awesome — though admittedly, the Rose Bowl is awesomer than most. 🙂 But I was talking about the non-BCS bowls. The Alamo Bowl does improve things a bit, but it’s still not a great lineup.
Morever, with reference to BCS bowls, again the Big Ten and the SEC have a leg up, because (for reasons relating primarily to travel tendencies and the almighty dollar) they are far more likely than the other conferences to get multiple BCS bids, so they end up with, e.g., a team in the Rose Bowl AND a team in the Orange Bowl — or a team in the National Championship Game AND a team in the Sugar Bowl — and then their third-choice team gets the best of a great non-BCS bowl lineup.
What really needs to happen, obviously, is a couple of SEC vs. Pac-10 bowl games. But I guess that’s difficult because of travel or something. I blame Obama.