The Mighty Merger

[Harry]

“The first thing we do, let’s kill the rule book” – With apologies to Bill Shakespeare.

The Mountain West and Conference USA have announced they will merge for all sports. The first thing that leaps out of the announcement is that they plan to go 18 to 24 teams.

But the second thing that jumps out is this “Championship football game format that includes semifinal match-ups”. If you take a gander at the Division I Manual there is simply no provision to play 12 regular season games, a conference semi-final, conference final and a bowl game. You get but one game for the purpose of determining a conference champion and you have to play everyone in the division (which must have at least 6 members per division) to have that single game.

You get 12 games to play. You can get an extra playing in Hawaii. You can get one extra game for a league title game (not games A GAME) if everyone in the division plays each other. You can play a bowl game. That’s it. That is all the rules permit.

To play that semi-final round the merged league is going to have to get special NCAA legislation (fat chance) or the members must give up a regular season game to fit the semi-finals in or play the semis in Hawaii until the NCAA closes the loophole. If you don’t believe me, check out NCAA rule 17.9.5.2 even though clearly the 16 university presidents and chancellors behind this merger haven’t been troubled enough to to take a peek. There is a chance that the NCAA might waive the requirement that everyone in a division play everyone else but that waiver has only been given to deal with the weird MAC schedule problems of a 6 team and a 7 team division. There is no assurance the folks in Indy won’t laugh when told they need a waiver because the league is too darn large.

It is hard to take seriously a group of 16 institutions that do not know or do not care what the rules are they operate under.

Click here to read entire article: http://www.arkst.com/?p=1688

[eulessismore]

Click here to read entire article: http://www.arkst.com/?p=1688

There's some evil genius right now figuring out how to make it work.

[UNTexas]

Any idea how soon this entire ordeal will take to conclude?

[ADLER]

There's some evil genius right now figuring out how to make it work.

No, it doesn't take an evil genius at all. Here's a thought for a 24 team conference divided into four 6 team quadrants.

All the conference teams have only an 11 game set schedule which includes all five opponents in their quadrant. The twelfth week games would be semifinal game between winners of the eastern quadrants and a semifinal game between winners of the western quadrants. The winners of these two games would proceed to the conference championship game. These semifinals and championship game are designed to maximize the chances of getting a team into the BCS level bowls.

The remaining 20 league members that didn't qualify for those semifinal games would have their twelfth game scheduled by seeding according to record (best teams would host worst teams). That would maximize the quantity of conference teams that would be bowl eligible.

It's a system to get as many teams as possible into postseason play, and hopefully it will generate sufficient revenue to make bodybag games unnecessary. It's designed to get 14 of the 24 member schools into bowl games each year.

[NorthTexan95]

Any idea how soon this entire ordeal will take to conclude?

Accordingto the ECU chancellor, the goal is to have the paperwork completed and the league office by May 1st of this year with the league kicking off July 1st, 2013.

[Bottomgreen]

Relegation....Is this the first step to two super conference with regional divisions? Add relegation between the two conferences then this can be amazing.

[FirefightnRick]

No, it doesn't take an evil genius at all. Here's a thought for a 24 team conference divided into four 6 team quadrants.

All the conference teams have only an 11 game set schedule which includes all five opponents in their quadrant. The twelfth week games would be semifinal game between winners of the eastern quadrants and a semifinal game between winners of the western quadrants. The winners of these two games would proceed to the conference championship game. These semifinals and championship game are designed to maximize the chances of getting a team into the BCS level bowls.

The remaining 20 league members that didn't qualify for those semifinal games would have their twelfth game scheduled by seeding according to record (best teams would host worst teams). That would maximize the quantity of conference teams that would be bowl eligible.

It's a system to get as many teams as possible into postseason play, and hopefully it will generate sufficient revenue to make bodybag games unnecessary. It's designed to get 14 of the 24 member schools into bowl games each year.

Makes sense.

Rick