Long-term potential of Mountain West & Conference USA
by mdak06 on Nov 4, 2011 4:40 PM PDT
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With both leagues under attack by the Big East, and neither league having tremendous satisfaction with its television status, should the two leagues join forces for more than just football?
Let's assume the following:
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Mountain West loses Boise State & Air Force
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Mountain West restocks, presumably with Utah State and/or San Jose State
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Conference USA loses Houston, SMU and Central Florida
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Conference USA restocks, presumably taking teams from the Sun Belt
I'm not completely sure of all of the television contracts that exist with the two conferences, but I'm aware that some of them are finished after the 2015-2016 season.
Combined, the Mountain West and Conference USA stretch across the entire country. Should the two conferences band together to create a dual-conference network and a dual-conference television deal in the future?
The teams would stretch from coast to coast. The "number of eyeballs" over that stretch of geography is much higher with both combined than for either conference alone. If the networks combine for a dual-conference TV network, it is far more likely to be carried by cable and satellite providers across the country compared to carrying The Mtn on its own merits.
Ideally, the two conferences could leverage their presence to bring in more money and to have more programming available across the country, on national broadcast networks, national cable sports networks, the dual-conference network and regional sports networks.
Other conference collaborations are possible. The ACC and Big Ten participate in the "ACC - Big Ten Challenge" each year, with basketball schools facing off. There's no reason the Mountain West and Conference USA could not do the same, or have agreements for other sports (even non "made for TV" sports).
I'm aware that it was stated at the teleconference (a few weeks ago) that the TV deals will remain separate for both leagues, but that may be out of necessity and could be simply for the short term. They probably can't legally renegotiate the TV contracts for other sports now, but they may be able to in the future for when the existing contracts expire.
If they worked to create this proposal, they may even be able to get BYU back as a football-only member (if they don't get taken by another conference).
I'm not suggesting an all-out merger (at least not right now), but the benefits of the two conferences working together might help both in the long term.
Thoughts?
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All out Merger
If we look at all of the guessing and wishes, there seems to be one thing in common through all of our threads: TV contracts. There is a sure fire way out and that is to kill both conferences and create something like the “Big West” (fill in other/better name, but this will do for now). If the MW goes down to 8 teams and C-USA goes down to 9, 17 teams won’t be easy to schedule. 18 – 20 teams, with an east west split, keeps the rivalries. As stated in mdak06’s proposal, that would be a ton of eyes, watching a ton of TV sets in a ton of markets. This agreement, for ALL sports, needs to have greater leverage to get contracts with major network for Tier 1 rights, such as ESPN/ABC or FOX, etc., then the league network for Tier 2 rights, which would televise anything the major network can’t and will also broadcast other sports throughout the year. The Tier 3 rights would be available to each university, which might bring back a BYU or allow others to generate extra income. Championship in every sport is then possible.
That might be the best option in the end
Whether or not a full merger or an expanded alliance is a good question. If there were enough teams in the Eastern Division and Western Division, and travel concerns were minimized, it might be the best option.
Strangely enough, I think if they did decide to do a full merger, “Conference USA” would be an appropriate name.
Assumption is the mother of all @#%-ups.
Alliance
I have posted this elsewhere already but will repeat it again.
both MWC & C-USA should go to 12 and have a conference championship in addition to the alliance game because more games on TV can only be good for both conferences
1. C-USA takes Louisiana Tech, UT San Antonio, and Texas State from the WAC to replace SMU, Houston, & UCF to stay at 12 teams
2. MWC takes Idaho, New Mexico State, San Jose State and Utah State from the WAC to go to 12 teams as well (minus Boise State & Air Force)
The Alliance game can be scheduled as a non conference game at end of season but ahead of bowl games. The Alliance game would be one between conferences rather than another conference championship playing at about the same time. Get this game promoted as a pre-bowl bowl game, or a semi-play off game. Play it in a neutral site and have it hosted by someone who is good at promotion. Possibly in Dallas, at Cowboys stadium, promoted by Jerry Jones.
The conference championship game would be a week or two before the other conference championship game, thus provide visibility without having to go against the SEC, PAC, B1G, ACC championship game for the same viewers had they all been in the same weekend. Most conferences have a bye week between end of season and their championship game. Squeeze it in this week to grab viewers who is looking for college football that weekend.
The two conferences must then start the season one week early to accommodate the alliance game. This too may be a good thing as sometime it is better to be first than to be best. The conferences could start playing each other early if it is difficult to schedule non-conference games this early. To minimize rematches and to increase strength of schedule, teams from one conference should not play teams from the other. Instead, both conferences should seek out nonconference games against BCS AQ conferences for strength of schedule assist.
These arrangements would differentiate both conferences, as well as the Alliance, from all the other conferences. Both the C-USA and MWC conferences have to differentiate themselves, which is essential to marketing success. The Alliance can help with this.
worry about the BCS later.
The weekend for a conference championship would be Thanksgiving Weekend
Unfortunately, the TV eyes wouldn’t be there. Rivalry games rule that weekend and always have. LSU vs Arkansas, Auburn vs Alabama, Ohio State vs Michigan (this year), Florida vs FSU, Oklahoma vs Oklahoma State (not this year but has been for the past decade), Texas vs A&M (now possibly Tech), Notre Dame at USC or Stanford (alternating years), Georgia vs Georgia Tech, and Pittsburgh vs West Virginia. If you move it to the week before no teams in the alliance would have a bye week during the season.
NCAA rules won't allow starting the season one week earlier as well.
There is no zero week in college football unlike high school ball.
NCAA rules get in the way of your plan
Right now, conferences are only allowed one extra game past the 12-game regular season limit (for a conference championship). There’s no way under the current rules to hold a MWC championship and a C-USA championship and then after that have a combined championship game, unless that game is at a bowl game (and that would mean the two conference winners could not go to another bowl game).
Bylaw 17.9.5.2 is the bylaw that lists exceptions to the 12-game regular season limit, FWIW. The bylaws are here: http://www.ncaapublications.com/productdownloads/D110.pdf
Hopefully the BCS is gone in a few years, and both the MWC and C-USA will be able to get a bid into a 16-team playoff.
Assumption is the mother of all @#%-ups.
An Alliance Play-In Idea:
What if the two conferences simply played an 11 game schedule during the “regular” season. Then create an Alliance game 12 for every member wherein they would play the 1 versus 1 and 2 versus 2 and 3 versus 3, etc for all teams in both conferences.
This idea would probably support the two 9 team conference concept better than two 12 team conferences. With an 8 game conference schedule each team would be able to schedule 3 out-of-conference games each year.
The annual “Alliance” game could add more meaning to regular season games and the outcomes could guide where teams would go bowling. This would be a very unique setup in college football. If marketed well, it could create significant value for the “Alliance”, which would help both conferences.
Finally, it may be best to just terminate both the CUSA and MWC and then form a completely new “Alliance” with two (or four) conferences/divisions. This might allow the “Alliance” leadership to negotiate much better TV deals for all members. They need to do something to maximize their own TV funding because it is very obvious that the BCS gurus are not looking out for the non-AQ schools. This new “Alliance” needs to create enough value to make it a difficult decision for any memebers to go to any BCS conference simply based on economics.
Pipe dream? Perhaps! But simply being reactionary to the moves of the BCS has not yielded very good results to date.
by Chris Holly Taylor on Nov 5, 2011 7:38 AM PDT up reply actions 1 recs
Exactly what I’ve been thinkg… “semi-final” isn’t somekind of playoff, but a 12th final game “play-in” which everyteam plays. 1v1, 2v2, 3v3… Doesn’t violate the NCAA 12 game rule, and only sets up a game that isn’t pre-scheduled to start the season. That game is scheduled based on the rssults on the 11 prior games.
Alliance weekend
is a really neat idea. I don’t know what (if any) rules exist regarding scheduling “on the fly” for the last weekend of the season.
Assumption is the mother of all @#%-ups.
no more low performers!!!
Its already bad enough with unm, unlv, memphis, uab, tulane among others. I think utep should go west n put mwc at 9. c-usa picks up 1 more strong team n they’re at 9. Each individual conference plays 8 conference game n then we have a true merger championship game. I really like the idea of a mwc/c-usa basketball challenge. Imagine memphis vs unm or uab/utep vs san diego st.
by el javi on Nov 4, 2011 10:36 PM PDT via mobile reply actions
Without Boise State and AFA
MWC falls below Sun Belt per Sagarin
http://www.hustlebelt.com/2011/11/2/2532799/a-modest-proposal-for-teh-mac-sunbelt
WAC > CUSA > MAC > Sun Belt > MWC
Mountain West should stand alone.Next year with Nevada,Freson st. and Hawaii.
Pick up Utah st, San Jose st, U tep and tulsa to go to 12.
WEST EAST
Nevada Utah st
Freson st Wyoming
Hawaii Colorado st
San Diego st New Mexico
UNLV Tulsa
San Jose st Utep
The Big East will get raided again and when it does it will break up.
What's with the love for Tulsa?
Smallest school by number of students in all of D-1A (less than 3000 undergrad). Has little to no alumni base. Even worse it a 3rd teir team on it’s own campus… Most are Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, or other Big 12 team fans first. And finally has connection to and is an unknown to the rest of the conference. It brings far less to the table than the expansion costs (travel, etc).
I see why people want UTEP, and it makes sense in terms of geography and history. But UTEP has made it clear that it wants to play in C-USA with the other Texas schools. I could see UTEP staying commited to C-USA noSMU or Houston… Pushing to add fellow UT school in UTSA and maybe Texas State.
We have saying in engineering that “this isn’t legos” and what I see is plenty of people playing legos instead of thinking out the entire picture (both us on fan sites and AD sitting in isolated bubbles).
Once SMU and Houston leaves
Only rice is left
Unless CUSA takes UT San Antonio and Texas State to replace lst texasprograms
With Tulsa and Southern Miss
C-USA is almost certainly a stronger football conference vs. the MWC (presuming Boise State leaves).
Assumption is the mother of all @#%-ups.
Tulsa is strong in football
Its about football Tulsa is doing well this year. TCU also has a small student erolment.
Tulsa will lose its Texas partners and is closest to the west.
Tulsa doesn't begin to replace TCU
TCU has 8,696 enrollement, while Tulsa has 4,192 and MWC average is 20,932
TCU MY Times # of followers is 370,469, while Tulsa is 119,686 and MWC average is 243,171
TCU Directors Cup average is 369, while Tulsa is 217 and MWC average is 190
TCU wins in 00’s is 95, Tulsa is 62 and MWC average 62
TCU football attendance average is 32,347, while Tulsa is 21,058, and MWC average is 27,793
Tulsa ranks as an average WMC team on the field the last 10 years, is tiny, and brings littel if any fan suppport (on the level of New Mexico and UNLV).
Plenty of Texas options
There are far more Texas based options for C-USA… Texas might as well call itself the State of Football. I wouldn’t be looking forward to UTEP, Tulsa, of Rice to want to leave C-USA. C-USA can easily reload with the following options:
- North Texas (has long wanted in C-USA)
- UTSA (new program but has good start in the Alamodome and Larry Cocker)
- Texas State (brings strong following and has a good start in Dennis Franchione)
In addition to other close-to-Texas options in Louisiana Tech and New Mexico State
The MWC could make sense for UTEP because UTEP has some existing rivalries with MWC teams. UTEP is also in the Mountain Time Zone (the only one in C-USA) so that is another reason. It had reason to stay in C-USA with some in-state rivals, but it may not consider that a strong factor anymore with Houston and SMU leaving.
Tulsa has no reason to join the MWC as far as I see. If (hypothetically) the MWC had invited Houston and SMU to join (and they’d accepted) then maybe at that point Tulsa might join up too. But I don’t see any reason for Tulsa to join now.
Assumption is the mother of all @#%-ups.
MW is stronger now and will be stronger after the realingment. With Utah st. and San Jose st they will have lager markets as well.
without AFA and Boise State
it is debatable whether the MWC will be better than CUSA without UCF, SMU and Houston.
as things look now, the CUSA will still have a rank team (Southern Miss) whereas the MWC has none. And have been suggested, Tulsa (another CUSA team) is on the verge of being ranked.
yup
I would say with Southern Miss and Tulsa, C-USA definitely has the stronger remaining football lineup over the MWC. Hawaii and Nevada will help, but those two C-USA programs give that conference a better top end.
Unless the MWC can suck back BYU as a football-only member (which would only happen with a better TV deal), C-USA has better football.
Assumption is the mother of all @#%-ups.
link?
because CUSA has 2 ranked teams
WAC has none
having a strong SoS isn’t enough, you have to win with a strong SoS as well
Which confernece offer more money?
CUSA or MWC?
enough to offset travels to Hawaii every other year?
easier to take from the WAC
that is why i suggested Idaho, Utah State, San Jose State and New Mexico State and go 12.
their weakness is offset by an extra game (Conference championship)
New MWC
East: Wyoming, Colorado State (stronger teams) with Utah State, New Mexico, New Mexico State, and Idaho
West: Hawaii, San Diego State, Nevada (the stronger teams) with Fresno, UNLV, and San Jose State
this looks solid to me
why not just pick up la tech n live
up to your name Mountain Wac Conference
by el javi on Nov 5, 2011 9:57 PM PDT via mobile up reply actions
Hawaii pays for itself
Mountain West (and Big West) had long discussions with Hawaii and its membership to assure Hawaii didn’t introduce a financial burden. For Mountain West and football the addition of the 13th regular season game can covers the cost of a single trip to the islands. If the particular teams home income can’t cover than they can go on the road for a pay-for-play game at big school (Texas, Nebraska, etc).
I agree with this...
Hawaii, especially football only, is a goldmine for any conference that can lure them. I am really surprised that the Big East would look at SDSU before Hawaii. Plus Hawaii brings some BCS points right?
If the merger sticks together, then this is the best plan.
You bring up some good points about televsion deals and such that could have some positive long-term effects. The only thing is that I think the MWC would be better off without the C-USA merger. I don’t think that there is any going back on that at this point, but if it is at all possible, then I think it would be best for the MWC to break off the merger.
If that doesn’t happen (And it most likely won’t), then this is by far the best plan I’ve seen for the merger.
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The BCS is the big issue
From my view, the idea of the football merger is an attempt to do two things at the same time:
(1) have enough “top teams” combined to hopefully obtain an AQ bid from the BCS, and
(2) do this without destroying the two conferences in the process.
If the best football programs from the two conferences had left and formed their own conference, it would have beaten the Big East in terms of football strength, but it also would have been a geographic mess. While it might have had the best chance to obtain an AQ bid, it would have raised travel costs (in money and time) for all sports and destroyed a lot of rivalries in the process.
But if the BCS didn’t exist (and there was a16-team playoff with, let’s say, at least nine automatic bids), both conferences could have kept their own identity, maintained some notion of geographic sanity (and kept rivalries intact), but still reaped the benefits of partnering for television and out-of-conference games.
Another benefit is that each school (with more of a national TV presence) would be able to promote itself to more people across the entire country, something even the university presidents would be able to get behind and support.
Glad you hear that like the plan. Hopefully the BCS will die soon and there will be better options for everyone.
Assumption is the mother of all @#%-ups.
Completely agree with everything you just said about the BCS
Pretty much all of this conference realignment crap would stop if there were playoffs in place rather than the BCS. The money that all schools would make from a playoff would make the need for more TV dollars go down significantly and the need to strengthen your football conference would go away as well. Oh well, guess we’ll just have to deal with the BCS and all of this crap for now.
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Twitter: @rebelfan1_
Air Force on the Fence
According to SI this morning, Air Force is on the fence about going to the BE. If AF does’t go, that makes Boise iffy.
Several of the people blogging on the SI site are of the opinion that the MW should invite all of the Big East football teams and instead of the BE having a western division, the MW should have an eastern division. With 10 teams in the MW next year, and the remaining football teams were to come into the MW (which will never happen because CT doesn’t have the capacity to do this), that would be 5 new teams. Houston number 6 for 16? Take television contract, AQ bid and improve the situation.
Not sure you could just get Houston
Houston would have to leave C-USA to do so … and so they’d have to join either the Mountain West or the Big East, either of which would make them a bit of an outpost (only Central Time Zone team in either league in this scenario).
How about Temple or Navy? If Air Force is in the “East” division, it might work for Navy.
West
Hawaii
San Diego State
Fresno State
Nevada
UNLV
Boise State
Wyoming
Colorado State
East
Air Force
New Mexico
South Florida
Louisville
Cincinnati
Rutgers
Connecticut
Navy or Temple
If Air Force & New Mexico are ok with making 3-4 trips to the east, and wouldn’t mind playing the eastern teams instead of the MWC for football, it could work. I’d presume only one non-division conference game would be desired (for a total of 8 conference games). Nobody leaves their conference for non-football sports, so travel would remain the same for all of those games.
Assumption is the mother of all @#%-ups.
East / West split
I see your point and I like your divisions. I was thinking Houston because of its rank in the current BCS poll and the fact that Houston is the 4th biggest city in the US: a ton of TV sets! This leaves recruiting and advertising in Texas, Florida, California and New York (the 4 biggest markets in the US). What about an expanded roster:
West:
Hawaii
San Diego State
Fresno State
Nevada
UNLV
Boise State
Wyoming
Colorado State
Air Force
New Mexico
East
UCF
ECU
South Florida
Louisville
Cincinnati
Rutgers
U Connecticut
Navy
Houston (They are already considering this)
SMU (They are already considering this)
9 conference, 3 out of conference with a championship game in Dallas / New Orleans or Las Vegas (some place warm at that time of year that people would like to fly to). That would be a hell of a basketball tournament in KC or St. Louis!
Wacky but cool
The best theoretical way to make this happen (not that it’s terribly likely) is to convince the Big East to invite the entire Mountain West Conference as football-only members so that they make up the Big East’s “Western Division” of football.
With the above lineup, the Big East would have 17 Olympic sports members (9 of which play Big East football) and 11 football-only members. It’s a bit insane but it could work. It would also have the benefit of not ripping apart the Mountain West Conference (although Conference USA would take a big hit).
They might consider Memphis instead of ECU. Memphis is awful at football but very good in basketball (which is what the Big East is theoretically about) and it also adds an additional school closer to Houston/SMU. They also might consider Temple instead of Navy to have an even 18 Olympic sport members.
I’d suggest that the uber-big football league championship should probably be hosted by the best division winner. This league would be so large that it would be impractical to stick the championship at a neutral site.
I’m tending to think this would only work for football. Keep in mind, the Big East has eight members that don’t participate in Big East football, and I’m not convinced Louisville and UConn would want to leave their basketball partners.
Assumption is the mother of all @#%-ups.
Wacky... Definitely
I agree… Personally, I would jettison the non-football members and have them make their own Basketball only league. That would calm things down. In my opinion, the split of no-football and football members is what is holding the Big East back.
I was figuring a neutral site to try to get a bigger stadium for more ticket sales and a bigger atmosphere. The money is in Football, not BB and Louisville and Cincy can play the rest in non-conference games. Any thoughts?
The sad, sad mess that is the Big East
The hybrid football / non-football setup is a complete mess. Originally, the Big East was a basketball-only conference, and that was fine until football started dominating the landscape. Historically, I think the biggest issue is that the conference has never been proactive – it has always been reactive. Now they’re down to only ONE of the original football members (Rutgers). It’s a continuous story of “what could have been” that never materialized. If only they’d gotten Penn State in the mid-80s (they had the chance). If only they had gone after Louisville & Cincinnati before they lost BC/VT/Miami. If only they’d tried to get the “northern four” of the Big 12 after Colorado & Nebraska left. The story never ends.
I’m not convinced UConn and Louisville (who have the best basketball programs of the football schools) would want to leave Georgetown, St. John’s, Villanova and Marquette behind (as far as basketball goes). Also, if they left the Big East they would lose Madison Square Garden as the site of their conference basketball tournament, something they wouldn’t be thrilled about. UConn has been with the Big East since its founding in 1979, so it has a ton of history in the conference, although with BC, Syracuse and Pittsburgh (three of the first nine BE schools) out the door, not all of that history will continue.
However … the half-and-half hybrid model is a failure, and with so many non-football teams on board I could see it getting to the point where the five remaining football schools decide that enough is enough, and they leave. But if leaving the Big East meant losing their BCS AQ status, they wouldn’t go (as long as the AQ status exists).
If they only had a few of the non-football schools (e.g. the four I mentioned above) with them it would be a much better setup. If they still wanted an NYC tournament, they might be able to if they could convince the new Barclays Center (in Brooklyn) to host it.
With such a large geographic footprint, I’m not convinced that a neutral-site game is the best option for this potential conference. TV would much prefer a game that has a full stadium with loud fans rather than a neutral-site that many fans can’t make the trip to. Imagine if the championship was South Florida vs. Bosie State. What good does it do to have it at Yankee Stadium, 1000 miles away from one school and 2000 miles from the other? The ACC made this mistake when they gave the championship game to a Florida city (look what happened when Virginia Tech and Boston College were the contenders).
As long as TV money rules, the MWC is in a bad position because its teams don’t cover many big markets. That’s why I think the MWC/C-USA alliance (not merger) would have been a great option, even if they’d had separate football championships. Both conferences would see benefits. However, the Big East’s failure to think long-term, combined with the fact that they still have the magical BCS AQ status, has given us this mess that we see now. Sadly, that BCS AQ status is allowing them to attract other schools (Houston, UCF, Boise State, etc.) that they otherwise would probably not have a chance to get.
Assumption is the mother of all @#%-ups.
Exactly what I've been thinking
The power brokers in Birmingham, and Park Ridge seethed about an unranked UConn team getting a BCS slot last year. BCS will assure that never happens again in the next contract… And how do you do that? By eliminating the AQ status and basing it on rankings. Basically qualification status is conference champion + ranking of 16 or above. I think all conferences, but the Big East would go with this. But look for the fine print because this will be how the SEC and Big Ten get the maximum of 2 school limit killed at the same time. Which might get the Big 12 and ACC to vote against… But if the PAC-12 goes along with the SEC/Big Ten than its a done deal.
No More AQ...
Here is a similar story by MSNBC:
http://collegefootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2011/11/10/elimination-of-bcs-aq-status-being-discussed/
This would be a step in the right direction, but still doesn’t help the MW get some TV revenue and national visibility. Those issues have to be resolved, or things won’t really change.
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