No one is surprised that the game of musical chairs in college sport is about money, or that the big money is in football. (In this writer’s now less frequent articles in this space, the NCAA has often been called the National Collegiate Allocation Association). Those of us from New York and the northeast may not realize it, and the growth and ratings of the NCAA Tournament has closed the gap a bit, but the really big money is still in football. There are many more men’s basketball games than football games, you might say, but the ratings are a fraction of football ratings. College football – with SEC, Notre Dame and many other games on major networks – dominates fall Saturdays and BCS week, with probably 10-20 times as many watchers per telecast than college basketball. Ok, fine.
So the experts – including my editor here – think we’ll soon have four super-conferences, sixteen teams in each. That means two more schools into the best football conference, the SEC, and living in Tallahassee, I can tell you that Florida State desperately needs to be one of them. The ACC is quickly going the way of the Big East, as Maryland accurately predicted. And based on their academic profiles – and rivalry with one another – this writer expects Duke and North Carolina to fill out the Big Ten. That leaves thirteen combined ACC and Big East football schools to combine for the fourth conference, with applicants like Central Florida, Massachusetts, and Temple to fill out that group. A few more schools will join the old Southwest Conference (Big 12), to join Texas, et al. And then there are the seven “non-football Catholics,” logically joined by Notre Dame if its football remains independent.
All of this makes perfect sense for football. And this writer has no problem with maximizing money; surely it has been bowl money – and not academic calendars – that has kept football from having a playoff all these years.
Now, those super-conferences make sense for football, but not for other sports. Yes, in some ways men’s basketball is more like football, as at the highest level men’s basketball also makes money. That said, men’s basketball does not need these super-conferences, and I remember that when the Big East was first formed in 1979 it was for all sports except football, had 8 teams, and was largely a northeast corridor “bus league.” That was just fine. Now, I know that the conferences all want to “expand their footprint” and place their TV networks on cable systems in new cities (I assume that’s why Rutgers and Maryland were added to the Big Ten), but bus leagues make much more sense than “airplane leagues.” Not that academics means anything, but teams in largely bus leagues get to come home at night after a game, rather than having to stay an extra night in a hotel and fly back in the morning. And as the first head coach I assisted used to say, “nothing good ever happens to a team in a hotel.”
On the subject of “bus leagues” and “airplane leagues,” this writer spent a couple of seasons recently covering an Ivy League team, and a couple covering a CAA team. Harvard bussed to most or all of its league games (some years they’ve flown to Cornell and Columbia, some years to Philadelphia to play Penn), and Northeastern flew to most of theirs (the only game I remember busing to was Hofstra). Now, the basketball is better in the CAA, and the crowds are larger, but not so much better and larger as to justify all those plane fares and the cost of extra hotel nights. And, if all that flying makes no sense for men’s basketball, how can anyone on earth justify plane travel for the other men’s sports, or for any women’s sports? Heck, I was a coach and administrator when the Division III national league was formed, the UAA (teams in Boston, New York, Rochester, Atlanta, Cleveland, St. Louis and Chicago), and I never understood flying across the country to play in front of two girlfriends and two fathers! And that’s for men’s basketball, the “biggest time” sport other than football. Fly women’s swimming to Atlanta? Are you kidding me?
Now, we live in a country that can’t balance its budget, with states and cities often in the same predicament. As athletic departments, how can we justify full stadiums, major network contracts, ESPN, and conference networks for the less important games, and yet losing money on athletics? That makes no sense!
So do what you will with football; the money justifies all else, they play just once a week, and return flights are available after Saturday afternoon games. But let’s get men’s basketball – and all of the other sports – back to fiscal sanity, and return to regional conferences like the original Big East. Heck, Northeastern needs to drive cross-town to play BU, rather than fly to Atlanta to play Georgia State (plus, the local schools are more sensible rivals, and may even bring fans cross-town to help fill arenas!)
So, this writer says lets form four super-conferences for football only. Call them “Football North,” “Football South,” Football East,” and “Football West.” Let’s restore fiscal sanity to men’s basketball and all other sports, through traditional regional conferences. And this writer won’t mind one bit watching the great basketball in a conference reminiscent of the original Big East – with or without Notre Dame or other members – whether they’re called “the Seven Catholics,” “the New Big East,” or something else.
