Strategic For CUSA Is To Keep Houston & DFW In League...

[PlummMeanGreen]

And even more key for North Texas is that Rice U hangs in with CUSA (which appears that it will) and still give UNT football trips

to the Bayou City every other year.

SMU and UH can dance all over the "we want to be in this conference" or "we want to be in that conference" NCAA map till the cows come home,

but just watch a school from CUSA pull a "Northern Illinois" while those 2 Texas schools continue their

"search for some version of the NCAA holy grail." Hint to UH and SMU: You ain't going to find your holy grail in the Group of 5 in any way you mix it.......sorry.

GMG!

Edited January 1, 2013 by PlummMeanGreen

[Arkstfan]

And even more key for North Texas is that Rice U hangs in with CUSA (which appears that it will) and still give UNT football trips

to the Bayou City every other year.

SMU and UH can dance all over the "we want to be in this conference" or "we want to be in that conference" NCAA map till the cows come home,

but just watch a school from CUSA pull a "Northern Illinois" while those 2 Texas schools continue their

"search for some version of the NCAA holy grail." Hint to UH and SMU: You ain't going to find your holy grail in the Group of 5 in any way you mix it.......sorry.

GMG!

I'm not sure that the Holy Grail below the Mason-Dixon isn't anything more than being able to say, "We are in a better conference than those losers."

Look at a map.

UH/Rice, UTSA/TXSt, UNT/SMU, LaTech/ULM, Memphis/ASU, MTSU/WKU, UAB/Troy, Tulane/USM.

Realignment has been boiling seriously since 1995 and all that has been accomplished in the Southwest and Southeast has been breaking apart logical pairings of schools or insuring those pairings don't happen.

[wardly]

I'm not sure that the Holy Grail below the Mason-Dixon isn't anything more than being able to say, "We are in a better conference than those losers."

Look at a map.

UH/Rice, UTSA/TXSt, UNT/SMU, LaTech/ULM, Memphis/ASU, MTSU/WKU, UAB/Troy, Tulane/USM.

Realignment has been boiling seriously since 1995 and all that has been accomplished in the Southwest and Southeast has been breaking apart logical pairings of schools or insuring those pairings don't happen.

Substitute ULL for ULM. If La. Tech won't play ULM in a bowl game,they sure wont be in same conference with them.

[Arkstfan]

Substitute ULL for ULM. If La. Tech won't play ULM in a bowl game,they sure wont be in same conference with them.

That was my point. Outside of Florida and the East, no one wants to be in a conference with their nearby regional team.

[THOR]

That was my point. Outside of Florida and the East, no one wants to be in a conference with their nearby regional team.

why is that???

[CurveItAround]

That was my point. Outside of Florida and the East, no one wants to be in a conference with their nearby regional team.

It is kind of odd. You would think it creates heated rivalries and interest, but instead it results in attempted class separation. Look at Pac 12 and it is the exact opposite. Every team in the league has a local neighbor. The SEC also started out with a lot of closely located teams, but has spread out a little over the years.

[Side Show Joe]

I think North Texas is in a good spot. In the end I think the Big East, C-USA and the MWC all covet the Houston (#10) and Dallas (#5) markets. In Houston there is only U of Houston and Rice. In Dallas there is only UNT and SMU. The demand is greater then the supply. We have to be careful not to get stuck in the conference that becomes the next Sun Belt. If Rice and North Texas stick together both will come out winners in the end.

[Arkstfan]

It is kind of odd. You would think it creates heated rivalries and interest, but instead it results in attempted class separation. Look at Pac 12 and it is the exact opposite. Every team in the league has a local neighbor. The SEC also started out with a lot of closely located teams, but has spread out a little over the years.

Everyone in the SEC except TAMU and South Carolina has a neighbor to play.

[Arkstfan]

why is that???

In some cases, I can understand it.

If I'm Houston, I don't have any heartburn about Rice, the Owls aren't going to out-recruit me or draw away potential fans. If I'm SMU I think I fear what a large public in my neighborhood can do. In the case of LaTech and ULM, history says if you place them on equal footing, ULM soon moves past them.

[oldguystudent]

It is kind of odd. You would think it creates heated rivalries and interest, but instead it results in attempted class separation. Look at Pac 12 and it is the exact opposite. Every team in the league has a local neighbor. The SEC also started out with a lot of closely located teams, but has spread out a little over the years.

Yeah, since I grew up in Pac-10 country, I always thought that every conference would naturally set up local rivalries for everybody. The last weekend of the regular season featured Cal/Stanford, UCLA/USC, Oregon/Oregon St, Washington/Washington St and Arizona/Arizona state. it was the best football weekend of the year! And you wanna talk office smack talk the next day? Boy howdy!

Why everyone east of the grand canyon is so scared of this, I'll never understand.

[Arkstfan]

Yeah, since I grew up in Pac-10 country, I always thought that every conference would naturally set up local rivalries for everybody. The last weekend of the regular season featured Cal/Stanford, UCLA/USC, Oregon/Oregon St, Washington/Washington St and Arizona/Arizona state. it was the best football weekend of the year! And you wanna talk office smack talk the next day? Boy howdy!

Why everyone east of the grand canyon is so scared of this, I'll never understand.

My two-bit theory is it is the history of the region.

Look at the non-AQ in the southwest/southeast.

SMU, Rice, South Florida, UAB, FIU, FAU, MTSU, WKU are the only schools without at least a semi-significant history of being an independent.

Schools in the ACC, SEC, Big XII, Big 10, Pac-10, MAC (except for Marshall, UCF, Temple, Umass) and the MWC except for TCU have entered into their conference alignment looking at it as permanent.

The WAC was that way until after the WAC16 explosion and it was never really true of the Big East, CUSA or Sun Belt.

If you don't view your alliance as permanent, you don't think about who helps you and who fits as a member 5, 10, or 20 years from now, instead you angle for the greatest advantage in competing for that dream spot elsewhere.

Long-term UNT-SMU is healthy but SMU doesn't view nBE as the destination or permanent and I doubt UNT entered CUSA expecting that alignment to be the alignment in 2023 or even desiring it to be.

Again, its my two-bit guess but I think we are growing closer to a new period of stability. The power leagues are about to where they can be. SEC and Big 10 can't go larger without disrupting essential league games that form the core of who they are. Pac-12 after turning down UT/TT/OU/OkSt is likely done for some time because no potential in their region (UNLV, New Mexico, etc) is going to be up to their standards fairly soon.

Most likely the next big shake up is nBE, CUSA, Sun Belt. The question is will be done with a long-term view or an out-dated short-term view.

If long-term thinking controls, we see two regionalized leagues that can jostle with MWC (a southwestern/mid-south league and an eastern/southeastern league) with a catch-all league below them.

If short-term thinking controls, we see a single upper tier league and CUSA/Sun Belt devolve into regionalized catch-all leagues.

[PlummMeanGreen]

Just a flesh wound, Big Least?