Arkstfan

My theory on rivalries. 1. Helps for the fan base to travel to the away games. 2. Games have to be played regularly. 3. There has to be a triumph you cherish. 4. There has to be a loss that burns at your heart. Arkansas State and UNT will meet for the 13th consecutive season this year. Louisiana and UNT will be the 12th consecutive meeting. This year marks the 11th consecutive meetings for UNT with ULM and MT, 8th with FAU, 7th with FIU and Troy and 5th with WKU. UNT - ULM will be the 28th meeting in the series. ULM had the benefit of being the last league loss before "the streak" but a loss like that only matters in retrospect because UNT football took on a new life after that game. If you look at the 10 last meetings since the series renewed, only three were close. The schools are 320 miles apart. ASU - UNT this year marks 21st playing of the series. It just really hasn't had any winner take all meetings since renewed regularly. Of the last 12 games since regular renewal of the series, seven have been determined by a TD or less. There were the exchanges of grenade celebrations to add a little spice. One thing that drags the series is that most of the ASU fans who come to Denton are from Little Rock or they are from the DFW region. UNT doesn't have a similar alumni base to tap into. The UNT base faces a 460 mile or so trip to ASU, while the ASU fans coming to Denton, many are driving 330 miles or much less. UL - UNT the entire series has only had 15 games played. Of the 11 games played consecutively, only three were determined by a TD or less. Roughly a 430 mile trip. The decline of UNT football has taken some of the fun out of it all. Since 2005 only 11 wins against teams currently in the Sun Belt. To have a healthy series, UNT has to play good football again (appears to be addressed) and then good UNT football has to coincide with good football at one of those three schools because everyone else is really too far away for the fans to follow the team.

They did the math. An unequal share of Big XII revenue was better than an equal share of what they could earn on their own. Personally I think those schools made a huge mistake long-term and a great decision short-term. In the short-term fans are happy to remain in a major conference. In the long-term the financial gap will widen to such a point that they will become irrelevant as long as UT, OU, and TAMU have reasonably competent management. They would be better served aligning with schools like Louisville, TCU, and Cincinnati who would be more compatible financially, rather than sink into a Vanderbilt/Miss.St. existence. There is no real money on the table in the Sun Belt except in basketball, just the way it is. Right now we give the team earning a basketball unit something like 75% of the unit the first year it is paid and the next five years it is shared equally. We would fix basketball quickly if we changed the system. The league takes six units off the top (one per year). Everything earned above that or 80% of that goes to the school earning it. Example 1 UNT gets the only bid, loses first round. UNT gets the NCAA per diem but the unit goes to the conference. Example 2. UNT gets the only bid but advances to the second round. UNT gets the per diem check, the first unit goes to the leage and UNT gets 80% of the second unit (roughly $200,000 after the deduction) for each of the six years. Example 3. ASU wins the tournament to get the auto bid. UNT gets in at-large. ASU loses, UNT advances to the second round. The league takes one unit for the first round and 20% of the other first round unit and 20% of the second round unit. ASU and UNT split the remaining first round unit and UNT takes 80% of the second round unit. ASU takes roughly $100,000 a year for the next six years, UNT takes $300,000 per year. Do this and success pays and pays pretty nicely. A check of $100,000 a year will buy two non-returned home games in basketball.

Let's jump into the wayback machine. If Tech doesn't balk at joining for football sending UCF scurrying for the exits, and then Boise (who was intent on joining) and Tech had not received WAC invites, ULM isn't in the Sun Belt as a football only member. The league had the chance to invite them as a full member when UNT, MTSU, and NMSU were offered full membership and instead football only was offered. Now fast forward a few more years. The NCAA declares that a conference must have eight full members playing FBS to be an FBS league, the Sun Belt only has five such schools but Utah State, Idaho, Troy and ULM are football only. The Sun Belt offers full membership to Troy, Utah State and Idaho who accept, ULM was not offered. Then the WAC comes calling and takes USU and NMSU and later Idaho. Then FIU agrees accelerate their move, FAU is brought in for all sports in return for their accelerated move. Only then does ULM come onboard as a full member. While ULM has been essential to the existence of the Sun Belt, I think the history very clearly indicates that the Sun Belt membership did not want to go with ULM football only but did so in what we now hear called "survival" mode and did not want to invite ULM as a full member but did so in "survival" mode. Survival mode doesn't always lead to bad decisions. Troy and FAU have worked out well despite complaints about Troy academics. I'm not for booting anyone out but I believe that ULM has not found an effective strategy for Sun Belt membership and the school should undertake an honest evaluation of whether they have a good means of righting the ship. When 10 of 16 sports finish in the bottom third of the league, and 5 of 7 completed so far have finished either last or next to last, there are clearly problems to correct.

Actually peaked at just over 180 before I-A and I-AA were created.

With 'Nova likely joining Big East for football it isn't very likely that the Big East makes any other moves in the next two years so C-USA is unlikely to make any moves. Arkansas State, athletic fee just got bumped and football ticket sales are already about 20X over last year (I suspect a high early renewal rate is a big factor) but I know donations are up significantly as a number of people (me included) have doubled their donations to show approval of the Freeze hire.

If Tech asked they would almost certainly be invited. Unless there is a major change there or ULM leaves, they aren't asking. Take a gander at Sagarin. Of returning WAC schools, the highest rated is below two Sun Belt teams. They are losing three top 50 programs and bringing in the second lowest rated Southland school and a school that has never snapped the ball. Look at the RPI. Outside of an outstanding USU program, the WAC is no big prize over the Sun Belt and one of their prize additions our 8th rated team. Women's basketball? Sun Belt put two in the dance, same as the WAC. Tech is rated a little above MTSU and UALR is rated 46 to Fresno's 45 and Fresno is leaving. Volleyball? Western schools are good but the Sun Belt has been a two bid league the last four years. There is also a sport called baseball. Sun Belt is 6th in RPI WAC 17th, the Sun Belt has had multiple teams invited in baseball for 22 consecutive seasons. Hard to see where the Sun Belt / Suck Belt talk comes from when the pesky facts don't back that up if the comparison point is the WAC. Right now the only bowl they are firmly with is Boise and scuttlebutt is that Boise will pull the plug after this year. While the new rule changes have saved the WAC's auto bid in other sports, the changes still leaves the league one short of conference status in football. That means a BCS payment of $100,000 per team ($700,000) rather than the guaranteed minimum of about $1.8 million. It also means that unless the WAC champ finishes ranked #1 or #2 they don't have to be selected by a BCS game because they go into the at-large pool. I don't know why "fans" trash the best league willing to have their school as a member but given the list willing to invite the school, the Sun Belt is pretty clear winner.

ESPN gets about half its revenue from subscribers and half ad revenue. The game is on ESPN because: 1. Don't want fans giving up cable or going to Internet providers not subscribing to ESPN3. 2. Need must have content to raise fees charged to cable and Internet. 3. Want to boost viewership to raise ad rates. 4. Making ESPN more essential let's them force cable to add more ESPN channels and services. ESPN is basically maxes out on number of subscribers so higher fees and higher ad revenue only growth avenue left.

BCS play-in is fantasy unless they give up a regular season game NCAA rules would have to change. Sun Belt, MAC and WAC (assuming they still have a vote) are NO votes. Now which BCS leagues are yes votes?

Just don't drag it out like ASU did.

I practiced family law long enough to know that when people get a divorce and then remarry, no matter how much they hated their spouse, they are most likely going to marry someone similar to the person they divorced. They will either share similar interests or have a similar phyisical appearance to when they married or both. MWC has officially added four schools since forming. I do not believe MWC took TCU for DFW. The Frogs had four ranked teams in the five years before they joined. Boise State had busted the BCS twice and was high enough to do it a third time before they were taken. Nevada has been ranked and is ranked this year. Fresno has a history of quality wins though they've not finished ranked of late. Likely to be invited Hawaii is in the exclusive club of four schools that have busted the BCS. There is a commonality to their invites all are schools that have achieved at a high and fairly consistent level. MWC has shown a vision of what they aspire to be in who they take. They want to build a league that fills that gap in major teams between the Big XII and Pac-12 footprint. They place home gate receipts over TV (see how many weeknight games they play). CUSA has shown they pursue large markets with no regard to success. They will go to small markets if you have had success and sell lots of tickets. CUSA's vision is to achieve maximum television dollars. Obviously, MWC hasn't accomplished its vision. They can do the buster thing but appear short in AQ status. CUSA has in my opinion botched its vision badly. Right now I'm hearing they don't want to do many weeknight games and will have to back down off that or accept less money than the Sun Belt because they've failed to create a must-watch product. Because of this, I don't believe the MWC is likely to go to 12 if TCU leaves because there aren't two schools they can get that fit the model they've followed. Are they compelled to stick with the model? Of course not, but I wouldn't bet the house on them departing from it. I don't think Big East is likely to add more than TCU and Villanova because no one they can add helps football the way TCU does and no one can help keep the full 16 circuit as stable as adding Villanova. They can go crazy and pursue some 20 team alignment that brings multiple schools with iffy basketball resumes but that just seems out of character. Their new commish might favor it and smooth talk the members into it, but I wouldn't bet on it.

Announcing they planned to go FBS when the WAC desperately needed members helped more.

Don't call either until you've got a firm idea from ESPN what adding them is worth. If it is same dollars per school as we would get without them, exactly why would we call them?

San Jose State is the uber-ULM. Plug their athletic budget into a cost of living calculator that compares cities and the number you get comparing San Jose and ULM is nearly identical. When 15,000 butts in seats looked to be a hard fast rule, their AD said they couldn't make it but their solutions were: close the school cafeteria on Saturday and set-up food service at the stadium so the only way students could eat on Saturday with their meal plan would be by coming to the stadium. They put temporary fencing around all the parking and brought in a carnival and craft fair and charged like $2. Your admission for the event also got you in the game free and they counted everyone who came and put their kid on the tilt-a-whirl and bought a corn dog as having attended the game. Called Cal and Stanford about playing a home game at their home stadium against them or at a Candlestick and both rejected the idea. At least Arkansas called ULM with their deal rather than other way around it isn't UA's primary facility. Of course in the history athletics was there ever anything more shameful than Rice moving CONFERENCE home games against Arkansas to Little Rock in 1983 and 1991?

What a face plant from a school that in 2008 was one win from being in the BCS buster discussion.

What I like was a week ago, Hawaii was the centerpiece of the league, a school that had been to the BCS that could set the pace. Now it's boy we are glad we don't have to travel there.

Yes, Dwayne actually projected Tech would go financially bust earlier but Boise's BCS runs have pushed back those dates.

Absolutely not true. Benson admitted later in the press conference that the BCS would treat the WAC as a group of independents and would NOT have the guarantee of a BCS appearance and would be paid as independents. Under the last deal that was a difference of $87,500 per school less for an independent. Based on the anticipated growth in BCS revenue the difference will be at least $109,000 by the end of this BCS contract and that's not factoring in the league distribution growing by only having four leagues because I don't want to do the math right now. Key phrase regarding auto bids from your post. IF IT DOES PASS. Benson is relying on a convoluted reading of legislation designed to make it harder to change divisions. It is questionable that the members who wanted that legislation would want to see it used to move two or more FCS schools to FBS since slowing the moves from FCS to FBS was one of the main points.

Listen to Karl Benson's press conference today. He admits he has to sit down with ESPN once they have membership resolved. ESPN cut C-USA's TV deal 50% when USF, Cincinnati, Louisville, etc left and CUSA ADDED UTEP, UCF, Marshall (multiple ranked teams and bowls), Tulsa, Rice, and SMU. The WAC is losing every team that has had any notable success and adding non-football Denver, FCS TexSt and never played football UTSA. The WAC will throw a massive beer bust if ESPN gives them one-third of what they were getting.

Listen to the press conference. Karl sounds awful. He takes a lot of heat but how bad can it be that the day you are supposed to get press for shoring up your league, most of the news talk is you lost a bowl game AND Montana said no. Then you call a press conference and in the course of it admit you've been rejected by Cal Davis who finished transition from Division II to FCS just a year or two ago then say you are pursuing a school you should know you have no shot at.

Utah State isn't feasible. Way too much travel. I'm fine with Tech if they find the courage to apply. As for ULM, when Tech said no they said yes and took football only. When we had to add full members to stay FBS, we passed on ULM but Tech didn't ride to the rescue. When the WAC raided the western Sun Belt, Tech didn't ride to the rescue and ULM was essential to not being where the WAC is today. I just have a problem with booting one school in a university system that has been there for us for another member of the same system that has not only not been there at our time of need, they've screwed our members from having post-season opportunities.

The first step is for La.Tech to apply. How do they take that step? They've spent years boasting about separation and the superiority of the WAC, they threw a WAC member under the bus and cost them a bowl just avoid playing a Sun Belt team in a bowl in 2001 (ie. North Texas) scuttling a deal that would have given MTSU and Boise a bowl trip. Tech preferred losing money going to Boise for a beating by Clemson over playing in New Orleans. They threatened to decline an invite to the Independence Bowl in 2008 lest ULL or Arkansas State be invited. Their past AD insulted ULM's academics and had to drive to Monroe with the president to apologize in person to avoid losing ULM games in multiple sports. This is just the official stuff without worrying about the message board crap. Tech officials mocked Waters prediction that the WAC would eventually collapse and Dewayne from Minden took up that theme boasting that the New Orleans Bowl would fold in a couple years and it would be the Sun Belt that collapsed. Who was correct? They've had the same president through all of that. Tech isn't likely to apply because they understand they are painted into a corner that they painted. Their president has to back off a decade of trashing the conference and privately mocking the prediction the WAC would fail. While belittling the league for its limited post-season appearances, they had a hand in the league missing two post-season appearances. Tech can apply to the league we have or they can hang out with the rest of the Big West/Sun Belt/Southland schools of their league and wait for a CUSA invite while declaring that the Sun Belt with more BCS money and more TV money is doomed to fail.

Go for it. More travel cost. Less TV money. Less BCS money. Less NCAA money. NCAA auto bid in basketball IF NCAA approves new rule AND deems it applies to auto bids and not just divisional shifts since it won't be in the auto bid section of the rules.

SJSU and La.Tech are the only schools staying in the WAC that have ever posted a winning record in WAC play.

Last year the Sun Belt received about $187,500 per school in BCS money, if Troy wins its bowl it would have been $225,000. WAC will get $100,000 per school. WAC TV deal was $3 million. Per a person close to the deal, ESPN was paying for (in order): Boise State, Fresno, Friday nights, Hawaii, and Nevada. Which of those remains? The willingness to play Friday nights. Just as New Mexico dumped the WAC, ESPN will cut the WAC TV deal. They will be lucky to get what the Sun Belt got in the most current deal (and will start the renegotiation process soon). CUSA's opening offer for their new TV deal looks to be less than the Sun Belt deal because at this point C-USA is taking the stance that they will no play Tuesday or Wednesday and want few if any Friday games. Unless CUSA has a change of heart, the next Sun Belt TV contract will be larger than the CUSA deal because we will take Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday as well as Thursday nights on ESPNU. I suspect MAC will take the same terms we would. If that happens the largest non-AQ contract will be MWC (and they won't go up in dollars), Sun Belt/MAC, CUSA, WAC

The BCS would treat them as "non-Notre Dame" independents. Each school would get a check for $100,000. Last slot money for the Sun Belt in 2009 was $187,500 per school. With the WAC out of the way, that would increase. BCS rules guarantee one slot to an non-AQ. To qualify you have to be the highest rated non-AQ champion be rated 12 or better. A WAC champion rated #4 once everyone leaves would not qualify for the guaranteed slot and would go in the at-large pool. For example in in 2008 had Ball State remained #12 and been the only non-AQ champ in the top 12, they would have gone to the BCS while a #4 WAC would be in the at-large pool.