rivalries mostly worked because of geographic fits

7/23/2021 4:08:12 PM

Geography matters (some) for travel. I would imagine especially for non-revenue sports. It’s cheaper and easier to not travel cross country to play an opponent. But we’re already really stretching that with current conference alignments.

7/23/2021 9:11:25 PM

Yeah there's no real difference in traveling to Miami or traveling to Oklahoma. You're gonna fly either way.

7/23/2021 10:07:32 PM

The ACC, B1G, & Pac 12 agreed to a little handshake deal today. Who will hurt who's feelings first?

8/24/2021 6:35:00 PM

i look forward to our allied scheduling partnership with rutgers or some shit

8/25/2021 6:27:46 AM

Maryland.

8/25/2021 11:12:51 AM

gross

no thanks

8/25/2021 12:07:36 PM

LOL at LSU and USC scheduling a 2024 game right after the supposed alliance

8/26/2021 11:33:20 AM

You do realize this alliance isn't really about scheduling right?

8/26/2021 12:31:42 PM

sounds like USC and UCLA to the B1G

6/30/2022 1:32:26 PM

Shoutout to the alliance

6/30/2022 1:55:00 PM

This will surely just end in 2 mega conferences with like 25 teams each, right? A national league and American League or whatever you wanna call it. Hopefully we don’t get left behind.

6/30/2022 3:34:12 PM

maybe 3 conferences if the top remaining schools from the ACC, Pac-12 and Big XII team up. But maybe just 2.

We need to go after Oregon and Stanford, who cares how far away they are

[Edited on June 30, 2022 at 6:03 PM. Reason : .]

6/30/2022 6:03:07 PM

there is no reason for conferences of any kind

6/30/2022 6:11:11 PM

Yeah this is fine and all until schools get really tired of flying their baseball/soccer/air rifle/golf/cross country/swimming across the country multiple times a month

Also people getting real worked up over the B1G/SEC adding teams who for the most part have been bad in football and basketball for the majority of the 21st century. Like Oklahoma has been fine, but USC/UCLA/Texas have been pretty fucking ass in football for a long time

6/30/2022 7:01:03 PM

OU has been more than fine. They’ve been easily one of the 10 best football programs of this century. Texas has underachieved forever though. But Texas and USC still have national titles this century.

Regardless. It’s not about whether those programs are winning titles or not. It’s about the money that they bring in. And the ACC is falling way behind.

The real winners are teams like rutgers or Vanderbilt that are benefiting from all this money even though they have no business being in a power 5 conference (if power 5 even means anything anymore)

Quote :

" Yeah this is fine and all until schools get really tired of flying their baseball/soccer/air rifle/golf/cross country/swimming across the country multiple times a month"

The logical next step feels like football splitting away completely to form a super league or 2-3 super leagues. and the other sports keeping conference affiliations for regional travel. I have no idea about how any of that would work. It just feels like where this is all headed.

[Edited on June 30, 2022 at 8:58 PM. Reason : A]

6/30/2022 8:54:44 PM

Swofford screwed the pooch years ago by inviting too many private schools for their basketball programs

We're probably fucked. Maybe there's a world where UNC goes to the B1G and we scrounge out the last SEC invite, but I doubt it

7/1/2022 12:16:49 AM

What have you done to my beloved ACC? Bring back the double round robin!

7/1/2022 7:10:46 AM

Definitely went all in on basketball with teams like Cuse and Pitt. VT and Miami being mediocre at best football programs hasn’t helped either.

7/1/2022 8:04:30 AM

Yeah FSU and Miami absolutely falling off a cliff football-wise has not been good for the ACC. VT didn't really do that, they've mostly maintained their history of being good but not great (besides that Michael Vick year)

Quote :

"But Texas and USC still have national titles this century"

True, but it's pushing 20 years since either of them won one, so trying to sell that to college kids is like NC State promoting the 83 championship to me when I was in school.

7/1/2022 9:06:38 AM

I completely understand wanting to be at the big kids table when this is all said and done. But how boring would it be to finish 16th out of 24 every year in a super conference? That kinda feels like best case scenario for State and other teams like us if that’s where this is all headed.

7/1/2022 10:37:05 AM

Honestly i will probably not give half a shit about college sports if that's how it's gonna be. The local-ish rivalries and whatnot is the big draw of the sports for me. If that's gone, I'm just gonna watch pro sports because they are 1000% better from a purely competitive sports standpoint.

7/1/2022 10:50:58 AM

Maybe it's already here/known but Giglio has been tweeting a storm about unc/Duke going to big 10 and State getting left behind

7/1/2022 10:55:03 AM

It's been a theory for a looong time among the conference realignment junkies, for some reason they think they fit in better there, plus something about AAU accreditation. I'm still leaning towards thinking it's just smoke, but it seems to be getting... smokier?

7/1/2022 11:03:13 AM

Yeah it's all just talk at this point. His tweets about a fucking league with app/ecu/wvu/vt do not get me excited. Like I said, if that happens i will 100% not give a shit about college sports

7/1/2022 11:13:25 AM

Theoretically the big 10 would want UNC and it would be a good fit academically (let’s just pretend that AFAM thing never happened I guess). And then nobody would want to pass up on the potential Duke/UNC basketball matchups. So for that reason Duke and UNC do feel tied together.

Again. The real winners are fucking northwestern who just happened to already be in the Big 10 and will continue to get richer

[Edited on July 1, 2022 at 11:45 AM. Reason : G]

7/1/2022 11:37:52 AM

I don't know what Duke brings to the table for the SEC or B1G to want them. Their football is trash, and their basketball is TBD without Coach K. Bringing in a school solely to have a bball rival of UNC doesn't seem like a great reason.

7/1/2022 8:07:00 PM

UNC brings Duke with them as carry on

7/1/2022 10:30:59 PM

Duke might have the biggest basketball brand in the country. I’m not saying they have the biggest fan base in the country. But I’d venture to guess Duke basketball games have some of the best ratings of any CBB games in the country. Football is the big money maker and driving factor but basketball still matters, especially the big name programs. That’s what they bring to the table.

7/2/2022 9:01:33 AM

Yeah also the Duke-UNC basketball games always get huge ratings. B1G/Fox would love to pull those away from ESPN.

7/2/2022 9:56:54 AM

Hard to envision a scenario this works out well for us.

7/4/2022 7:02:04 PM

Hard to imagine a scenario where this works out well for any college sports fan

7/4/2022 7:45:08 PM

I’m sure the profits will trickle down to the fans

7/4/2022 7:52:49 PM

How about - unc / Duke / UVA / ND - B1G.

State / Miami / VT / Clemson - SEC

Makes sense football / non - revenue sports / academics

7/9/2022 11:24:29 AM

Sure. But at some point for the B1G or SEC it becomes a point of diminishing returns. Does State really bring that much to the table for the SEC? Adding one more team means the money gets divided one more time. There are big 12 and pac 12 teams that bring more to the table. So you’d have to factor in where they land in these scenarios too

[Edited on July 9, 2022 at 5:24 PM. Reason : A]

7/9/2022 5:23:14 PM

they can just kick out Vandy

7/9/2022 9:23:18 PM

Everyone wants them to, but there has been zero evidence they intend to

7/10/2022 10:38:23 PM

Some of the teams in the conference probably like a free win every year

7/11/2022 6:11:44 AM

Quote :

"Hard to imagine a scenario where this works out well for any college sports fan"

7/12/2022 1:04:52 PM

7/12/2022 4:15:20 PM

So looks like this is being kicked up again

Supposedly the Big 10 is looking at bringing in 4 teams (Oregon and Washington are the ones that I have heard are the most likely, but also heard FSU, UNC, Notre Dame, Clemson and Miami)

FSU wants out of the ACC they think their brand (which is all they have now) is being hurt by the ACC revenue losses.

I don't think UNC leaves without Duke too much history plus they would more than likely want SEC so they could play Kentucky every year in basketball. I think that puts us in a dangerous spot, we are likely to get left behind.

8/3/2023 8:43:24 AM

FSU is cracking me up. All these other realignment deals seemed to happen in total silence. There wasn’t the slightest rumor about OU/TX to SEC or UCLA/USC to B1G. It was all under wraps until time to announce. FSU on the other hand is planting a giant FOR SALE sign in their yard because they’re begging for somebody to take them and help them figure out a way around the GOR. It sounds like the GOR for ACC is pretty air tight and doesn’t really make sense for anybody to get out financially for at least a few more years.

Either way. Fuck FSU. Mediocre ass football team that can’t consistently beat State or Wake. I’d love to watch them go 6-6 in the SEC or wherever they end up.

I think UNC would definitely leave without Duke. Their priorities might not align.

The best solution is for football to breakaway and create some 40-50 team super league(s) and let the non football sports continue to compete in their current conferences. No reason ucla tennis needs to travel to Maryland or rutgers while we keep lying to ourselves about ACADEMICS FIRST though.

[Edited on August 3, 2023 at 8:57 AM. Reason : A]

8/3/2023 8:53:23 AM

Quote :

"The Pac-12 is about to pay to put its games on the Weather Channel and Notre Dame’s next deal will have more games on Bravo and Peacock than NBC but Florida State thinks there’s a giant bag of TV money waiting out there just for them."

- Luke The Cock on artist formerly known as twitter

8/3/2023 8:58:24 AM

Yeah, we've definitely popped a bubble. The companies have realized they tied too much money in the SEC and BIG to invest much in the other leagues.

We have two options moving forwards: hope it all implodes and reverts to normalcy, or stop trying to compete and accept the new G5 status. The sooner either happens, imo, the better

8/3/2023 9:34:21 AM

NIL has ruined college sports.

[Edited on August 4, 2023 at 2:01 PM. Reason : The greedy kids are greedy and bad. The greedy adults are good at business. ]

8/4/2023 2:00:34 PM

The whole situation is stupid, and we have only Everett Case to blame.

8/5/2023 7:09:51 AM

We’re never gonna compete for a national title in football. And that’s ok. I just hope that being left out of the Super League, or whatever it becomes, doesn’t prevent us from being competitive in other sports. I think you can draw a direct line between the SEC’s recent rise in basketball and the huge money that football is bringing in for them. It lets you go get the best coaches in all sports. And build the best facilities for all sports.

Football should break away from all the other sports. Let there be a 30 ish team super league. And the other sports continue (or go back) to competing in more regional conferences

8/5/2023 11:01:19 AM

Because of the GOR, the ACC has some time. But unless something changes drastically, I think the acc is headed the way of the Pac 12. The big name/money programs will leave. And there’s nobody out there that can be added to the ACC that will increase its value. So then the middle tier programs (potentially State) will either be thrown a lifeline by the Big 12 (although at some point the Big 12 gains less and less by adding mediocre programs) or State will be left out like Wazzu and Oregon St currently.

It’s probably far fetched but maybe the ACC and Big 12 and what’s left of the Pac 12 could form some kind of super league (except it would lack top end football programs) to stay afloat.

8/5/2023 12:48:27 PM

What is the GOR? And can you really have meaningful conferences with 30+ teams? If the thought is that the top programs from the ACC will bolt at first opportunity, don't they still need somewhere to go? And where is that?

8/5/2023 3:18:34 PM

GOR - Grant of Rights. It’s a contract among the ACC teams that runs through 2036. It means if a team leaves for another conference before 2036 they must pay an exit fee in addition to guaranteeing their media rights go to the ACC until 2036 even if they leave for another conference. So if you leave the ACC for the SEC and start getting $50M/year in TV money, contractually that is all funneled back to the ACC until 2036. It makes it very very very difficult for a team to move out of the ACC. But because it expires in 2036, each year it gets a little cheaper to leave the ACC. It won’t keep the ACC together until 2036 because teams like fsu and Clemson are so eager to leave. It will eventually make financial sense for them to leave and just pay the penalties. It’s also been speculated that private equity gets involved and helps finance some of these big exit fees as an investment. The only real landing spots for teams like Clemson or FSU or UNC or Miami would be the SEC or Big 10. Anywhere else would a downgrade.

Conferences are no longer what they used to be. You don’t play every team annually. It’s not geographically based. It’s all about negotiating media rights and getting more money for member institutions. So as long as you can keep getting more money for member institutions, they’ll keep adding teams that make no geographic sense. Unlike the NFL or other pro leagues, there is very little oversight at a national level. The NCAA has shown no interest in ramping down conference expansion and realignment. They’ve been too focused on making sure players can’t earn a salary. So the individual conference negotiate their own media rights deals and go cannibalize each other with nobody to answer to.

And truthfully, conference realignment is not new. It’s happened for the last century. But the amount of money that’s now involved and the fact that a (previously) power 5 conference has now been totally gutted feels kinda like it’s reaching a critical mass.

8/5/2023 3:51:20 PM