Fresh From The Oven - Which Conferences Love Cupcakes ?

MeanGreen61 · February 29, 2008

February 12, 2008

Fresh from the oven: Which conferences love cupcakes?

With the conference schedules firming up for the 2008-2009 football season, The Wizard of Odds and CFBStats have a conference-by-conference breakdown of games scheduled against DI-AA opponents during the last three seasons.

The biggest offenders? The WAC, Big XII, and SEC.

According to the study, the WAC scheduled 16.1% of their games against DI-AA teams, with the Big XII Conference just behind (15.6%). The SEC (15.2%) finished comfortably ahead of the Big East (14.5%) and Conference USA (13.4%), who round out the top five.

But it's not just D-IAA cupcakes that the major conferences enjoy. The BCS teams also love scheduling mid-major creampuffs to fill their schedules, too.

The Big XII again led the way, with nearly seventy-percent of their non-conference games scheduled against non-BCS opponents. The SEC faired slightly better at roughly sixty-three percent, but still weighed in as the second biggest offender, well ahead of the Pac10 (56.8%), Big 10 (55.9%), Big East (53.6%) and the ACC (52.6%).

According to the Wiz, the Big XII played 199 non-conference games from 2004-2007, with 167 of those against DI-AA or non-BCS opponents.

Runner-up among college football's elite is the SEC, which played 198 nonconference games in the four-year period, 30 against I-AA and 124 against non-BCS.

Other BCS breakdowns:

Pacific 10: 146 nonconference, 14 vs. I-AA, 83 vs. non-BCS.

Big Ten: 186 nonconference, 20 vs. I-AA, 104 vs. non-BCS.

Big East: 166 nonconference, 24 vs. I-AA, 89 vs. non-BCS.

Atlantic Coast: 196 nonconference, 25 vs. I-AA, 103 vs. non-BCS.

Anyone care to wager as to where this trend is going?

ARTICLE

http://www.fanblogs.com/ncaa/007494.php

jdennis82 · February 29, 2008

good findings, but not surprising

DallasGreen · February 29, 2008

good findings, but not surprising

If they look to schedule cupcakes, we must be the ultimate icing. Our LSU game is just one more example that our team is up to be prostitued out anytime for a high 6 figure payout. Never mind the injuries, loss of morale, or erosion of fan base just show me the $$$$$. Of course we don't dare ruffle our dirt poor students' feathers by charging an athletic fee comparable to now TX St @ San Marcos, UTSA, Or Lamar. Those must be bastions of the elite to charge the full state mandated fee of $225/ full time student. Until we fund for D-1, we continue to be a wannabe.

GreenAlums · February 29, 2008

If they look to schedule cupcakes, we must be the ultimate icing. Our LSU game is just one more example that our team is up to be prostitued out anytime for a high 6 figure payout. Never mind the injuries, loss of morale, or erosion of fan base just show me the $$$$$. Of course we don't dare ruffle our dirt poor students' feathers by charging an athletic fee comparable to now TX St @ San Marcos, UTSA, Or Lamar. Those must be bastions of the elite to charge the full state mandated fee of $225/ full time student. Until we fund for D-1, we continue to be a wannabe.

I see your point Dallas, why ask the players to pay for it all. When they go out to a blood-for-money game they pay a hefty price that eventually pays a return to the entire student body. Certainly some may argue to what extent does a good football budget or winning program mean to the students, but that's a topic for a different thread. The students must pay for something that will benefit them as well, not just the football players. There should be equal risk for equal gain, or at least closer.

good_ken · March 1, 2008

If they look to schedule cupcakes, we must be the ultimate icing. Our LSU game is just one more example that our team is up to be prostitued out anytime for a high 6 figure payout. Never mind the injuries, loss of morale, or erosion of fan base just show me the $$$$$. Of course we don't dare ruffle our dirt poor students' feathers by charging an athletic fee comparable to now TX St @ San Marcos, UTSA, Or Lamar. Those must be bastions of the elite to charge the full state mandated fee of $225/ full time student. Until we fund for D-1, we continue to be a wannabe.

Your general lack of knowledge of athletics (more specifically the economics of athletics) continues to leave me in awe.

FirefightnRick · March 1, 2008

I'll say it again. Nothing good comes out of scheduling LSU last year, for this upcoming season. I don't care if they were to pay us $1Million to come to Baton Rouge. The damage in fan base moral is too great and places the team in a mental downward spiral that they will have to dig out of. On the other hand, if we were to play them well like we have done with other money games in the past I can see the potential. Still, following up a 2-9 season by scheduling LSU for the next season makes me truly wonder what our overall goals are in building a winning program here?

Rick

Edited March 1, 2008 by FirefightnRick

good_ken · March 1, 2008

If they look to schedule cupcakes, we must be the ultimate icing. Our LSU game is just one more example that our team is up to be prostitued out anytime for a high 6 figure payout. Never mind the injuries, loss of morale, or erosion of fan base just show me the $$$$$. Of course we don't dare ruffle our dirt poor students' feathers by charging an athletic fee comparable to now TX St @ San Marcos, UTSA, Or Lamar. Those must be bastions of the elite to charge the full state mandated fee of $225/ full time student. Until we fund for D-1, we continue to be a wannabe.

Your general lack of knowledge of athletics (more specifically the economics of athletics) continues to leave me in awe.

March 1, 2008

I'll say it again. Nothing good comes out of scheduling LSU last year, for this upcoming season. I don't care if they were to pay us $1Million to come to Baton Rouge. The damage in fan base moral is too great and places the team in a mental downward spiral that they will have to dig out of. On the other hand, if we were to play them well like we have done with other money games in the past I can see the potential. Still, following up a 2-9 season by scheduling LSU for the next season makes me truly wonder what our overall goals are in building a winning program here?
Rick

Rick, I realize that we can't continue doing this to a great extent but what if we play the defending national champions to, say a 14-21 point loss? A close loss will boost morale, give some of the players an experience to last them for their lives, and put a lot of money in our coffers.

UNTflyer · March 1, 2008

Man, what's all this talk about playing close? We're going to WIN!

:ph34r:

GoMeanGreen1999 · March 1, 2008

It is not shocking to me that the SEC is at the top of this list - and I can totally understand why the teams do it. If you had to play in the SEC, you probably would too. But as we have seen from the last two seasons and really over the last 8 years, it really hasn't hurt the SEC.

eulessismore · March 1, 2008

I haven't dismissed the idea of beating LSU. Last year, despite the brave words of our AD, I did have that familiar feeling of dread before we went to play Oklahoma. I have several actual reasons to be hopeful:

1. More of Dodge's recruits will be playing. This includes those redshirted last year as well as those who will play as true freshmen or JC transfers this year.

2. Whether Dodge's recruits or not, the defensive players (perhaps special teams as well) will benefit from the years of college coaching experience of one Gary Deloach.

3. Those who were disciplinary problems from last year will most likely not return this year.

4. We will have better quarterbacking from the start. If, in the unlikely case of Riley playing and starting, that would mean he had to beat out an incredibly talented sophomore in Giovanni Vizza.

5. We will have a system which has been in place for a season, and personnel who have weathered mighty storms and showed good character.

GoMeanGreen1999 · March 1, 2008

I know this isn't the thing so many of you like to hear, but you are either drunk from too much green koolaid, or just simply fooling yourself if you truely believe this team that was 2-9 this season is going to go into LSU and win. Would love for it to happen, but it is not going to.

eulessismore · March 1, 2008

I know this isn't the thing so many of you like to hear, but you are either drunk from too much green koolaid, or just simply fooling yourself if you truely believe this team that was 2-9 this season is going to go into LSU and win. Would love for it to happen, but it is not going to.

In my heart of hearts, I agree with you (as far as the 2008 game), but at some point, maybe 2008, maybe 2009, UNT will win a game that none of us fans truly expected to win. I think what will be a major key is one or two guys who become dominant for us defensively.

NT80 · March 1, 2008

I know this isn't the thing so many of you like to hear, but you are either drunk from too much green koolaid, or just simply fooling yourself if you truely believe this team that was 2-9 this season is going to go into LSU and win. Would love for it to happen, but it is not going to.

ULM wasn't suppossed to win at Bama either.

FirefightnRick · March 1, 2008

Rick, I realize that we can't continue doing this to a great extent but what if we play the defending national champions to, say a 14-21 point loss? A close loss will boost morale, give some of the players an experience to last them for their lives, and put a lot of money in our coffers.

Oh that would be awesome. But I'm simply stating the odds here. This won't be a lowly Michigan or Alabama. This will be the national champions who will be hungry for more of what they got last year. If we had Deloach for a year prior with his defensive system set up already I would feel better about this game like I did against OU and Texas in '01, '02' and '03. When he gets his defense shored up it's going to get much better around here. A solid defense gives you a fighting chance no doubt.

Rick

FirefightnRick · March 1, 2008

Rick, I realize that we can't continue doing this to a great extent but what if we play the defending national champions to, say a 14-21 point loss? A close loss will boost morale, give some of the players an experience to last them for their lives, and put a lot of money in our coffers.

Oh that would be awesome. But I'm simply stating the odds here. This won't be a lowly Michigan or Alabama. This will be the national champions who will be hungry for more of what they got last year. If we had Deloach for a year prior with his defensive system set up already I would feel better about this game like I did against OU and Texas in '01, '02' and '03. When he gets his defense shored up it's going to get much better around here. A solid defense gives you a fighting chance no doubt.

Rick

filmerj · March 1, 2008

ULM wasn't suppossed to win at Bama either.

Yea , what he said!

PlummMeanGreen · March 2, 2008

Rick, I realize that we can't continue doing this to a great extent but what if we play the defending national champions to, say a 14-21 point loss? A close loss will boost morale, give some of the players an experience to last them for their lives, and put a lot of money in our coffers.

Seems as if so many posts on this board we base most of our future playing the Big Boys based on how we've played them in the past under past coaching regimes (lets allow TDodge more than 1 year, ya' think, since we have every other new coach in Denton); yet most of our past coaches had been in Denton more than long enough to establish some kind of football program that could play the Big Boys competitively. Funny how so many other schools (Troy U & La Tech for starters) seem to have found the formula to do these kind of things while we at UNT seem to trip all overselves trying to find our own).

YET...........if like any normal growing institution of higher learning that alleges to aspire improvement across the board in whatever endeavor (athletic and academics); anyway, if we plan to advance this football program beyond this present quasi-NCAA D1-AA conference we're in now (of which now some of you are now trying to make a case of how future conference trips to San Marcos, Huntsville, Nacogdoches & San Antonio would be the real "future" deal for UNT, yet if all that became the future of NT Mean Green football, well, (based on the past)........

.........way too many of our UNT community, alumnus body and Mean Green fans would merely see all this as being a case of UNT waving the white flag as far as our aspiring to ever be a NCAA D-A Top 25 program. If we downgrade (once again), all upward bound aspirations would be completely dismantled if we have to make trips to the aforementioned Texas college outposts to play conference games (again no matter how any of us are classified whether as "would be" D1-A schools or the obvious 1-AA traits that all such schools would continue to have while holding each other down, out and in the Bottom 10.)

Remember those trips to Nacogdoches, San Marcos and Huntsville? Think much has or will change if they are in bed with us? If we go back to all that we can look forward to away games playing in front of those huge crowds of 7,000 and on a good day (Homecoming versus UNT?), maybe 10,000. WHOOPS! All those kind of attendance number already sounds like what we're doing already in the Sun Belt, now doesn't it?

AND.............if we choose the road well traveled by our former Southland Conference 1-AA mates now apparently making overtures to get into D1-A (which is their rightful perrrogative) you'd find many on GMG.com and well beyond all the limited opinons (when you consider there are over 100,000 of us in the Metroplex); anyway, such a collegiate association of where we've already been before would bring about a loud, sudden rush of wind which would be NT Exes/Mean Green fans all over the great Southwest wondering yet one more time: "How did we once again get ourselves in such another athletic pickle of a mess" but worse....................many of these multi-decades of most loyal fans and alums saying.............."how can we dis-associate or remove ourselves from this athletic cesspool of poor decision-making on our leader's part coming from our own alma mater, ie, the future 2'nd Largest University in Texas which just keeps on operating athletically as if we were a souped up JUCO or a school in old Lone Star Conference of NAIA days gone by?

So yeppers, All Ye of Young Gun Alums Fame & Fortune, we Old Gunners have heard that rushing wind before as on that fateful day back in 1982 when our North Texas officials announced it would put us full speed back on our varsity athletics roller-coaster and join a new NCAA classification group--namely NCAA D1-AA and then after spending a "too short" era playing & beating schools like Tennessee, Houston (1 yr before they went to the Cotton Bowl), SMU for the first time since Coolidge was president................... NEVERTHELESS.............

...............dear ol' alma mater would spend the next 13 years in what many of us "not so fondly" call our NCAA college football purgatory. One only has to wonder if UNT had hung in there in NCAA D1-A during this era as a few did, would we today still have those 15,000 empty seats here in this milleneum? Better yet, if we let everbody & their dogs into the SBC with UNT in it, are we prepared to lose another generation or 2 of Mean Green fans?

Many of you Young Gun Alums were still eating Gerbers back in 1982 when we went "down" to NCAA D1-AA, but rest assured, any semblance of a conference affiliation with those now wanting to join us in the Sun Belt (which is, again, their perrogative), yet you cannot begin to know what this will do the pysche (and helplessness) of a multi-year fan base that I fear will not choose this time around to go back to NCAA purgatory (or what might be called hell this time around).

Strong UNT leadership can take this ship to new, exciting uncharted waters or they can make decisions now that would all but sink our ship.

Of course, the upside of being in another Southland Conference grouping of schools is that we would save ourselves about $60 million that a new stadium will cost us because Fouts Field will more than meet the demands for a SBC/Southland Conference athletic affiliation.

Edited March 3, 2008 by PlummMeanGreen