The National Conference
Maybe I wind up on Message Board Geniuses for this. Or maybe it’s just genius.
With the backdrop of the Big Ten media rights news and with their SoCal additions, beginning to call themselves “The National Conference”; I’ve been thinking about this stuff even more so than normal the last 24 hours. One of the things that comes up during long term conference realignment discussions is: would a conference ever contract a school? “Trim the fat” people will ask, off the SEC with Vanderbilt or from the PAC with Oregon State and Washington State. Big 8 administrators were literally drawing up plans to remove Kansas State from the conference in the late 80’s, when Bill Snyder came to Manhattan. But it’s never been done before… it’d be messy, awkward and absolutely litigious. So then I started thinking about which conference has the least amount of fat. The ACC— with only Wake Forest probably being the least attractive to media partners-- I’d say easily has the highest floor of all the conferences. And even Wake is riding a string of six straight bowl games and played in the Orange Bowl the year before we did… so that’s a pretty nice floor.
So then I started thinking, what would it look like if you took the most valuable schools from the Big 12 and PAC (who both just so happen to have expiring TV deals and GOR’s-- in other words, there's nothing binding those schools to anyone else) and added them to the ACC’s collection of schools. And here’s what I came up with.
1. Boston College
2. Clemson
3. Duke
4. Florida State
5. Georgia Tech
6. Louisville
7. Miami
8. North Carolina
9. North Carolina State
10. Notre Dame
11. Pittsburgh
12. Syracuse
13. Virginia
14. Virginia Tech
15. Wake Forest
16. Baylor
17. Iowa State
18. Kansas
19. Oklahoma State
20. Texas Tech
21. West Virginia
22. Arizona
23. Arizona State
24. Cal Berkley
25. Colorado
26. Oregon
27. Stanford
28. Utah
29. Washington
Is it a BIG conference (hey, maybe that’s the name: The BIG Conference)? Yes, yes it is at 28 schools, not counting Notre Dame. But is it that much bigger— if any— than what the B1G and SEC appear to be aiming towards? It is not. And 28 divides nicely into four pods of 7.
So I took these 28 schools and for football, divided them into four 7 team pods… that— get this!— actually make geographic sense.
Northeast Pod
Boston College
Pittsburgh
Syracuse
Virginia
Virginia Tech
Wake Forest (Wake gets a little bit of a short end of the stick here, splitting from the other North Carolina schools... sorry. We’re trying to build a geographically sensible set up. And again, they’re probably the least valuable of any of these schools)
West Virginia
Southeast Pod (bonus points that the name would really grind the SEC’s gears)
Clemson
Duke
Florida State
Georgia Tech
Miami
North Carolina
North Carolina State
Central Pod
Louisville
Baylor
Iowa State
Kansas
Oklahoma State
Texas Tech
Colorado
West Pod
Arizona
Arizona State
Cal Berkley
Oregon
Stanford
Utah
Washington
For football, you play the six games against the rest of your pod, a rotating game from each of the other three pods, and then you still have room on the schedule for three out of conference games. The four pods are then seeded to play a conference semifinal and then championship game.
For basketball, this instantly becomes the top conference by a mile with Kansas, Carolina and Duke. After those three you have Arizona, Louisville, Oregon, Notre Dame, Syracuse, Virginia, Florida State, Miami, North Carolina State, Baylor, and more. Imagine the postseason conference tournament! Perhaps it's the top 12, 14 or 16 that qualify.
All of these additions would create cause for the ACC schools to re-open their horrendous TV deal with ESPN. Then, tell me why this National Conference-- across EVERY time zone-- with the least fat and highest floor, isn’t as valuable as the deals the Big Ten and SEC just did. Especially going to market in the next couple of years, while ESPN is feeling a little thin on content at the moment… and with college sports rights only continuing to rise. Crazy as it is to say, the SEC’s deal that’s just a couple of years old is now looking a bit light, next to the B1G’s. The Big Ten got more for their second and third packages than the SEC got for their number one package!
I’ve long heard that all things equal— or even close to equal— North Carolina (and Virginia) would strongly prefer to stay where they are. A founding member of the ACC, half of the greatest rivalry in college sports (at least in their own minds) and in the Research Triangle (or Research Rhombus, according to Wake).
All of this, plus remember Notre Dame still has it’s five football games against this group; and is a full participant in every other sport. And when the money is huge— B1G comparable— I say this conference is every bit the equal of the B1G or SEC. And with Notre Dame, it’s better. And if the Irish finally do join, you invite one more school (Maryland?) to even things out and you reshuffle the pods.
Tell me who says no to this? Conference Realignment will never, ever end until every single school is happy where they are. Who’s not happy in this BIG Conference? The True National Conference.
And who would be just the two men to pull this off? Jim Phillips and… Travis Goff.
Maybe I wind up on Message Board Geniuses for this. Or maybe it’s just genius.
With the backdrop of the Big Ten media rights news and with their SoCal additions, beginning to call themselves “The National Conference”; I’ve been thinking about this stuff even more so than normal the last 24 hours. One of the things that comes up during long term conference realignment discussions is: would a conference ever contract a school? “Trim the fat” people will ask, off the SEC with Vanderbilt or from the PAC with Oregon State and Washington State. Big 8 administrators were literally drawing up plans to remove Kansas State from the conference in the late 80’s, when Bill Snyder came to Manhattan. But it’s never been done before… it’d be messy, awkward and absolutely litigious. So then I started thinking about which conference has the least amount of fat. The ACC— with only Wake Forest probably being the least attractive to media partners-- I’d say easily has the highest floor of all the conferences. And even Wake is riding a string of six straight bowl games and played in the Orange Bowl the year before we did… so that’s a pretty nice floor.
So then I started thinking, what would it look like if you took the most valuable schools from the Big 12 and PAC (who both just so happen to have expiring TV deals and GOR’s-- in other words, there's nothing binding those schools to anyone else) and added them to the ACC’s collection of schools. And here’s what I came up with.
1. Boston College
2. Clemson
3. Duke
4. Florida State
5. Georgia Tech
6. Louisville
7. Miami
8. North Carolina
9. North Carolina State
10. Notre Dame
11. Pittsburgh
12. Syracuse
13. Virginia
14. Virginia Tech
15. Wake Forest
16. Baylor
17. Iowa State
18. Kansas
19. Oklahoma State
20. Texas Tech
21. West Virginia
22. Arizona
23. Arizona State
24. Cal Berkley
25. Colorado
26. Oregon
27. Stanford
28. Utah
29. Washington
Is it a BIG conference (hey, maybe that’s the name: The BIG Conference)? Yes, yes it is at 28 schools, not counting Notre Dame. But is it that much bigger— if any— than what the B1G and SEC appear to be aiming towards? It is not. And 28 divides nicely into four pods of 7.
So I took these 28 schools and for football, divided them into four 7 team pods… that— get this!— actually make geographic sense.
Northeast Pod
Boston College
Pittsburgh
Syracuse
Virginia
Virginia Tech
Wake Forest (Wake gets a little bit of a short end of the stick here, splitting from the other North Carolina schools... sorry. We’re trying to build a geographically sensible set up. And again, they’re probably the least valuable of any of these schools)
West Virginia
Southeast Pod (bonus points that the name would really grind the SEC’s gears)
Clemson
Duke
Florida State
Georgia Tech
Miami
North Carolina
North Carolina State
Central Pod
Louisville
Baylor
Iowa State
Kansas
Oklahoma State
Texas Tech
Colorado
West Pod
Arizona
Arizona State
Cal Berkley
Oregon
Stanford
Utah
Washington
For football, you play the six games against the rest of your pod, a rotating game from each of the other three pods, and then you still have room on the schedule for three out of conference games. The four pods are then seeded to play a conference semifinal and then championship game.
For basketball, this instantly becomes the top conference by a mile with Kansas, Carolina and Duke. After those three you have Arizona, Louisville, Oregon, Notre Dame, Syracuse, Virginia, Florida State, Miami, North Carolina State, Baylor, and more. Imagine the postseason conference tournament! Perhaps it's the top 12, 14 or 16 that qualify.
All of these additions would create cause for the ACC schools to re-open their horrendous TV deal with ESPN. Then, tell me why this National Conference-- across EVERY time zone-- with the least fat and highest floor, isn’t as valuable as the deals the Big Ten and SEC just did. Especially going to market in the next couple of years, while ESPN is feeling a little thin on content at the moment… and with college sports rights only continuing to rise. Crazy as it is to say, the SEC’s deal that’s just a couple of years old is now looking a bit light, next to the B1G’s. The Big Ten got more for their second and third packages than the SEC got for their number one package!
I’ve long heard that all things equal— or even close to equal— North Carolina (and Virginia) would strongly prefer to stay where they are. A founding member of the ACC, half of the greatest rivalry in college sports (at least in their own minds) and in the Research Triangle (or Research Rhombus, according to Wake).
All of this, plus remember Notre Dame still has it’s five football games against this group; and is a full participant in every other sport. And when the money is huge— B1G comparable— I say this conference is every bit the equal of the B1G or SEC. And with Notre Dame, it’s better. And if the Irish finally do join, you invite one more school (Maryland?) to even things out and you reshuffle the pods.
Tell me who says no to this? Conference Realignment will never, ever end until every single school is happy where they are. Who’s not happy in this BIG Conference? The True National Conference.
And who would be just the two men to pull this off? Jim Phillips and… Travis Goff.
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