Far be it for me to want to enjoy a day or two of post-victory soak in the sunlight of vicarious triumph. Whatever happens through the rest of this seasonal plot-line, nothing, it seems, will get to overshadow the epic confusion and hysteria that is conference realignment and expansion. And while part of me still strongly suspects that, long term, this tendency of conferences to expand is actually part of some post-mortem bloat, even I have to admit that it's time to consider some short term options for the preservation and perseverance of Notre Dame's national brand. And so here we are, arguing that it's time to strongly consider joining the Atlantic Coast Conference.
Dan Wetzel has already hit on so many of the points I've been making the last two days on twitter in various conversations and debates over Notre Dame's place in this conference hoopla that I almost wonder if he follows us under an alias, but still, he bothered to put the arguments in a semblance of organized articulation, so let's just quote him possibly paraphrasing me (oh how cool would that be?):
At that point they’re better off being proactive and taking one of the two remaining spots in the ACC than getting left to hoping the Big Ten will take them.
The Big Ten always seemed like a natural fit. South Bend is surrounded by conference schools, the Irish enjoy long, historic rivalries with Michigan, Michigan State and Purdue and have regularly competed with other league members. The academics are strong. The alumni are familiar. It’s always made sense.
Except if you’re going to tie your football program to a conference for the next 50 years, do you want to do it in a region of the country (the Midwest) which is growing at a far slower rate than the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic?
Population trends are a major concern for all schools in the region. Michigan actually lost residents in the most recent census. In football it’s even more pronounced. More and more of the best players are coming from the South.
Notre Dame has always been a national recruiter, mainly because it’s been able to play a national schedule. That will end if it joins any conference. The Irish can keep its rivalry game with Southern California, but with the Big Ten moving to nine conference games a year, there won’t be many other open dates.
Big Ten or not, Notre Dame would remain a viable player in Midwest recruiting, especially in Chicagoland, the state of Michigan and the Cincinnati Catholic leagues. Playing in the ACC would offer additional access to talent-rich areas such as Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia and Washington D.C.
Notre Dame would also stand out in the ACC. Its potential comes in part from its vast tradition and incredible game-day environment. As grand as its history is, however, it isn’t appreciably stronger than Ohio State, Michigan, Nebraska or Penn State. And as lovely as Notre Dame Stadium can be, the aforementioned offer pretty incredible game-day scenes also, as do Wisconsin, Iowa and others.
There is little question that the Big Ten can provide more money right now, but money isn’t the major concern for Notre Dame. The school has money. With all those alums and a $6.1 billion endowment, it has as much money as it possibly needs. It’s not a lack of revenue that has held the program back. The ACC would provide enough.
The NBC deal would have to be worked into any conference membership, but it’s unlikely the new league would frown upon having all Irish home games broadcast on a major network. Things can be figured out.
Unfortunately for Notre Dame, any "best option" after continued independence can really only be arrived at via a process of elimination. There isn't a plan-B that's really worth attempting to spin as being serendipitously better than option-A. However, that doesn't mean the choice is necessarily a difficult one either. The process of elimination is rather simple.
Essentially, if (big 'if') Notre Dame is forced to join a conference, then to join the Big 10 would be brand suicide. It doesn't amplify Notre Dame nationally. Indeed, joining the Big 10 would just contract and regionalize the Notre Dame brand. The shear force of Notre Dame's physical location suffices to leave an imprint upon the region. The university's mission already speaks loudly to the area's populace. To join the Big 10 would simply redouble an already successful effort.
Joining the Pac-12-16 would also be a mistake. The obvious logistical nightmare of scheduling intra-conference matches not just in Football and Basketball, but in the non-revenue olympic sports is probably enough to eliminate this choice altogether, but the effects on the Notre Dame brand serve to forcefully make the point: The Pac-12-16 isn't for us. To understand this point, take a look at what Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight and the New York Times found while investigating the geography of college football fandom today:
The fact that Notre Dame’s fans are dispersed throughout the country explains why they’ve been loathe to join a conference. And that the West Coast is less enthusiastic about football than other parts of the country, making the Pacific-12 a harder sale to the television networks, explains why the conference is going to great lengths to expand into football-crazy states like Texas.
...
Here’s one of those cliches that turns out to be valid: Notre Dame has a highly nationalized fan base. Its best markets — by the total number of fans, not market share — are New York, Chicago and Boston, each of which rank ahead of its native market of South Bend. It also has decent numbers of fans in markets as far afield as Los Angeles and Washington.
It’s no wonder, then, that the school has been reluctant to join a conference, which could limit its national exposure.
Be sure to read the full piece, as the full layout of data and visualizations is well worth it, and Nate does a pretty nice job discussing Notre Dame's place in this mess pretty fully.
To join the Pac-12-16 would effectively be abandoning the East Coast. And the East Coast, particularly the South East part, is where college football lives and breathes today and in any predictable future. The South East is where the machine that drives college football churns, turning out rabid fan-bases and athletes who watched Friday Night Lights and thought it was an understated drama. And the East Coast, by and large, goes to bed when a lot of Pac-12-16 games are still being played. It's unfair, but that's what the Pac-12-16 gets for the absurdly temperate climate.
Some have suggested that Notre Dame ought to join a conference made up of cast-offs; Sort of an island of misfit toys lead by the Irish and ideally the Texas Longhorns, but we've seen very little evidence that such a thing is in the works or is even being imagined by athletic directors at any institutions in play at this point. And beside that, whatever conference Texas might join, it's almost certain to be forced to agree to un-even revenue sharing and the continued existence of the Texas Longhorn Network. Which means aside from Notre Dame, the only other institutions that would join such a conference would be the ones that weren't "elite" enough to garner invites to better parties. To join such a conference would be to weaken the Notre Dame brand by association. And, quite likely, you'd experience much the same constrictive, quasi-isolationist effects of joining the Big-10. Nobody on the east coast would care what the Bible Belt Conference of Castaways were up to.
And that, of course, leaves us with the new Super-ACC, because reality dictates that after all of this happens (eventually) there will really only be 4 conferences playing the top-tier of collegiate football, whatever that means. And assuming Notre Dame still wants to participate in such a paradigm, then, failing independence, the Irish should take an ACC invitation.
Luckily, even after the last 15 or so years of relative mediocrity for the Notre Dame program, Notre Dame still gets to play this game with a bunch of power. 3 BCS appearances may not seem much to the average Irish fan, but they represent 3 moments of legendary triumph to most programs, including the ones already sitting in any of the major conferences today. Notre Dame also, of course, enjoys a monetary situation that no other program enjoys. As even the mainstream media have been able to decode, the Irish are in the upper echelon of college football finances.
Although the NCAA did not list the 14 schools turning a net profit, Notre Dame is one of them. Athletic Director, Jack Swarbrick, has revealedthat Notre Dame actually pours money back into the college’s coffers, to the tune of about $10 million in 2009.
Other schools that have been confirmed to be part of the 14: Alabama, University of Missouri, University of Texas, University of Florida, University of Tennessee and Ohio State University.
But what so many of the mainstream media miss is that among the 14 turning a profit and/or the top revenue generating programs, Notre Dame is by and large the smallest, operating with a total student-body of approximately 11,300 (8,300 undergraduates), while the other top financial programs are massive state schools with much larger student populations (and much larger overall financial demands). This provides a financial flexibility to Notre Dame, allowing for a strategy that can serve the university's mission without having to jump at the best short-term money opportunity (likely to come from the Big 10).
Further, an ACC membership would mean, effectively, a nearly-national footprint in both recruiting and college football's competitive narrative. Under an ACC membership scenario, Notre Dame would play and recruit from Boston to Miami and over to Pittsburgh, effectively triangulating vital territories that aren't part of ND's "natural" footprint. Combined with the inherent presence in Indiana and Chicago, Notre Dame will be nearly impossible for fans and recruits in Ohio to ignore. And by maintaining the annual series with Southern Cal, Notre Dame continues to be a major player in the LA market. No other conference can offer that sort of territorial access.
I'm still not convinced that conference membership in an inevitable fate for Notre Dame, but at least the university faces a situation today where one of the choices enables the Irish to maintain several key advantages it's utilized to maintain its brand over the last 10-20 years. And while ACC membership might be a bitter pill to swallow for the vast majority of Irish fans, such a move today may allow the Irish to garner and hold a position in the future that would facilitate independence again.
By The Biscuit September 19, 2011 - 11:08 pm
I agree, IF Island of Misfit Toys truly is a non-starter. I gotta think that ND’s leadership is considering all options and a conference that cherry picks a few schools along the east coast + TX and OK is a pretty strong option, if at all feasible. If ND and TX get on board with such a plan, consider it done, and we know that JS and his pals in Austin speak often.
Brand new conference, east coast and middle America coverage, ability to define mission and membership, what’s not to like?
Course we would have to sway schools from the ACC/SEC and the BE and B12 but if TX and OU go all-in, it’s possible. Best option to me, followed by ACC.
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By Whiskeyjack September 19, 2011 - 11:09 pm
Agreed on all account. Great article, Matt.
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By Brad L. September 20, 2011 - 4:12 pm
Ah, Whiskey. You are all over the internet supporting this. For what its worth, I totally agree, too. The ACC is the only choice.
-Rhode
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By The Biscuit September 19, 2011 - 11:25 pm
Imagine a conference with 2 divisions (Mid and EastCoast) as follows:
Mid: ND, TX, OK, BYU, Mizzou, Baylor, Central Michigan
EastCoast: WVU, Cincy, Wake Forest (ganked from ACC), Vanderbilt (ganked from SEC), Louisville, UCONN, Rutgers
Granted, all conjecture, but all you need to do is steal 1-2 teams from other conferences and it’s on…and clearly, everyone’s on the table.
This gives ND huge matchups with TX and OK and allows for continuation of many traditional matchups (USC, UM, Navy), along with cross-sectional games with East Coast games. Truly national.
Plus, we set up the show with TX, so it’s done the way we want.
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By Brad September 20, 2011 - 6:39 am
I don’t think OK will happen. The blood has gotten so bad between OK and TX that I think OK is already gone.
There certainly is a possibility for something like that though. Especially with TX not wanting to give up its television network, and no conference wanting them to keep it. While being a conference with ND and TX may not benefit a lot of those schools as far as revenue goes, in this day and age it does provide them with some stability, which is its own benefit.
I would imagine it would be more like:
TX, TCU, Mizzou, Kansas, Kansas St., Houston, SMU, Texas Tech (if they don’t go PAC) or Baylor
and in the East
ND, WVU, UConn, Rutgers, Louisville, South Florida, Cincy, and somebody like U of Central Florida.
I don’t know if thats better for ND than being in the ACC, where we would have natural rivals like Boston College, Pittsburgh, Florida St., Miami, and Ga. Tech. Plus it would guarantee more exposure for ND on the East Coast, where the vast majority of its fans are.
I don’t want to see ND lose independence, but in a 4 conference, 16 team era, we could lose relevance if we don’t make the jump.
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By trey September 20, 2011 - 8:55 am
Wherever TX goes, Tech probably goes too. UT has shown that it values TT’s success as vital to it’s own success and the deal to keep the XII together was partially UT defending Tech.
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By Matt Q. (DMQ) September 20, 2011 - 7:45 am
It’s a very nice scenario, but most of these moves, for the vast majority of the programs, revolve around TV money and access to whatever the next iteration of the BCS happens to be. Without affiliation first, none of the programs will get to participate in negotiations for new TV contracts or the new BCS. I don’t think any of those programs you mentioned aside from ND, BYU, and TX really have the swag to let it all hang out like that.
Aside from that, Football drives everything, and your Mid division is insanely more powerful than your East Coast.
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By trey September 20, 2011 - 8:52 am
Y’all are both leaving out Okie St. There’s a law up there that says OK and OSU MUST remain in the same conference, so wherever OU goes, Okie ST.goes as well.
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By waydomer September 20, 2011 - 9:30 am
The divisions in your proposal are too off-balanced to be credible. ND, TX and OK in one division and the top dog in the other being WVU
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By Erik '04 September 20, 2011 - 9:53 am
Please explain why Central Michigan would want to be in a division with ND, TX, OK, BYU, Mizzou, Baylor. They would go “oh-for” every single year.
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By The Biscuit September 20, 2011 - 5:04 pm
It’s just an example. Not every team can be a top program. And small schools will make the leap, then lose. For money.
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By Erik '04 September 20, 2011 - 5:30 pm
Gotcha. Except for when BK was there, Central has struggled even in the MAC, so maybe they’ll say “well we can’t even do well in the MAC, so we might as well get kicked around somewhere else where at least the money is good.”
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By sagcat September 19, 2011 - 11:37 pm
I have been utterly terrified that my fellow ND family would take the stubborn route this time and ride independence to our demise. I can’t tell you how heartened I am to see people coming around and realizing that conference affiliation 1) won’t make ND stop being ND, and 2) will allow us to use our current position of power to best situate ourselves when all of this is said and done.
I think switching the debate to ACC vs. Big Ten is the proper conversation to be having.
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By Nate September 20, 2011 - 12:54 am
No.
DMQ is 100% right–this is Plan B. Plan A is and always will be independence. This debate is only about options if that is not possible.
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By Nate September 20, 2011 - 12:56 am
Bra-vo. If I could post a picture of Orson Welles clapping here, I would. I hope Swarbrick gets this sent to him in 10,000 emails. It’s clear that the ACC is the way to go *IF* (and only IF) we are forced. He should contact the ACC to keep a seat warm. They won’t be in a hurry to get Rutgers if they know we are open to the possibility.
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By The Biscuit September 20, 2011 - 1:19 am
1) independence. 2). New conference we start with TX. 3) ACC.
8,678) B1G
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By Jeremy September 20, 2011 - 10:44 am
Agree completely. Almost anything is better long-term than the Big 10(+2).
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By Nate September 20, 2011 - 4:07 pm
I’d agree if I thought your #2 was possible. I don’t think it is, not with a BCS berth, anyways.
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By Jeremy September 20, 2011 - 5:35 pm
I don’t know. If ND led one division with Big East castoffs, and Texas led a division with Big 12 castoffs, you could put together a great basketball and football conference. With ND and Tex on opposite sides, all it would take is maybe two more decent football teams, and I think they could get a seat at the BCS table. Have BYU, Kansas, and Baylor on the Texas side, maybe Louisville, UConn, Navy on the ND side. I could see ND taking care of Navy that way – preserve the annual game and join a conference anchored by ND.
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By TLNDMA September 20, 2011 - 4:51 am
From my pech out in the northeast, an ACC of two divisions makes the most sense.
North:
BC
Syracuse
Pitt
Maryland
Uconn or Rutgers
Notre Dame
Va Tech
Virginia
South:
North Car.
NC St.
Ga Tech
Duke
Wake Forest
Clemson
Fla St.
Miami
A big footprint, large TV markets, great non football sports, good academics, smaller schools, all seem to make the ACC the best fit. IF WE MUST?
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By akdomer September 20, 2011 - 2:14 pm
Each of your two divisions has 5 teams that year in ,year out, suck. The big ten has more marquee namesandis a better fit for Olympic sports.
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By Brad September 20, 2011 - 6:43 am
I think plan Z should be the Big Ten. While we have natural rivals in it in UM, MSU, PU, and Penn St., ND is not a good fit in a conference where every school but Northwestern is a 40k plus giant state school. Its not a good fit.
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By kyndfan September 20, 2011 - 7:44 am
Plan A: be a member of the misfit conference in all other sports, keeping fb independence. Just like the current big east set up.
Plan b: join ACC and keep USC game.
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By Matt Q. (DMQ) September 20, 2011 - 7:47 am
The risk there is that if there are 4 16-team conferences, then they almost certainly move to a 9-10 game intra-conference schedule. There’s just not going to be a ton of room to work with in getting those teams to schedule us OOC. The Citadel and Montana, meanwhile, will be booked solid.
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By kyndfan September 20, 2011 - 8:49 am
I don’t see the big 10 adding 4 more schools. The 4 super conferences is not a forgone conclusion. Pac 12 will be 14-16, as will ACC. SEC will stop at 14 unless they can get texas. There will be a 5th bcs conference. I believe ND will be able to schedule traditional rivals and other bcs teams moving forward.
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By Brad September 20, 2011 - 4:23 pm
Thats true, DMQ, but ten bucks says the second this conference crap is over, we start hearing about how the kids should play 1-2 more games per season, or multi-tiered conference playoffs followed by more, national playoffs.
Its all about the Benjamins.
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By KW September 20, 2011 - 7:49 am
Don’t at all agree with idea of joining ACC. ND will continue to recruit nationally regardless b/c they can afford the massive recruiting budget necessary to do so. Don’t think playing games there or having conf affiliations matters anywhere near as much as spending the money to repeatedly send good recruiters out to visit the kids wherever they live. Alumni presence is going to be strong nationally regardless of where the school is located or what conf associated with.
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By Matt Q. (DMQ) September 20, 2011 - 8:25 am
Mommas always have and always will want to see their kids play sports, both in football, basketball, and non-rev sports. It’s an inalienable fact. Sure, you may still be able to recruit some nationally by joining another conference, but you’ll be less effective, probably far less so.
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By Vairish84 September 20, 2011 - 8:40 am
I have been arguing for the ACC for sometime. Another reason is that the ACC would allow for a barnstorming type of system. If we join the Big 10 and play 9 conference games, you assume 6 will be at home. We will play 1.5 nonconference games at home and 1.5 away each year. Since all the Big 10 schools are in the Midwest, it leaves only the away games for the majority of the alumni to see the team. If you assume that USC and Navy stay on the schedule. It means every other year the team comes east and every other year the team goes west. There is then one other game outside the Midwest footprint every other year. That is not a national footprint. If we join the ACC and keep USC and Navy, we can add a Stanford or Texas to the scehdule and travel the entire country. Sorry to lose UM, MSU and Purdue, but they are going to be under increasing pressure to drop us. UM will buckle. Purdue won’t because we are the only game they get on national television every other year. However, adding a game in Indiana on the road every other year really does not add anything. MSU is a toss-up. They may not, and I would hate to drop the two of them because it was those two schools that stopped Fielding Yost from killing Notre Dame football.
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By Sadwarrior September 20, 2011 - 11:08 am
In my Epiphany I saw Fielding Yost, er Roast that is, burning in hell. He was an evil person.
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By FightingSonOfNotreDame September 20, 2011 - 9:00 am
Agreed, great post!
The bottom line for me is we have to stop handicapping our boys in sept. Whether we stay indy or joing ACC we need a competitive september and I mean competitive as in NOT scheduling murderer’s row for the first 4 games while our competition schedules lightly.
Check it out:
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/sagarin/fbt11.htm
Once again, so far this year we have the 10th hardest schedule! NO ONE ranked higher than us has a harder ranked schedule to start. And most in the top 10 don’t even come close.
Hopefully, if we join the ACC we’ll stop scheduling foolishly.
And no way to the big 10, they hate us, they’ll screw us over for decades to come if we join.
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By Joe Magarac September 20, 2011 - 9:37 am
I posted yesterday in the “sideline forum” that if ND has to join a conference, it should join the Big 10 over the ACC. You and Wetzel have made me reconsider. The idea of having olympic sports flying to North Carolina on a Tuesday for a meet still seems ridiculous to me and is an argument for joining the Big Ten. But part of joining a conference is “fit,” meaning are the other members peer institutions, schools you’re happy to associate with. I would be very happy to associate with North Carolina, Virginia, Duke, Georgia Tech, and even BC. Those schools are top-notch academically and they make a real effort to graduate their athletes (recent unpleasantness at NC excepted). In contrast, the idea of being a “peer” of hillbilly meat markets like tOSU and Nebraska appalls me when I stop and think about it.
Conclusion: if we must join a conference, it should be the ACC.
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By Matt Q. (DMQ) September 20, 2011 - 9:59 am
Even in our current setup, many of our Olympic sports are very detached from the Big East aside from championship tournaments. I think people imagine flying our crew teams and all that gear out to North Carolina and balk, but we don’t even ship our crew team to many Big East locales today.
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By DeepTeaKup September 20, 2011 - 12:14 pm
ND has a crew team? Isn’t that like Switzerland having a navy?
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By Craig September 20, 2011 - 12:18 pm
You know that South Bend is so named because of a bend in the river on which it sits, right? Crew is primarily a river-oriented sport.
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By DeepTeaKup September 20, 2011 - 12:32 pm
Sure, but I associate crew with snooty, elitist east coast schools not snooty elitist midwest schools.
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By akdomer September 20, 2011 - 2:17 pm
UW (Seattle) rocks in crew. Neither snooty nor elitist (except when talking about Wazzou).
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By DJ September 20, 2011 - 1:55 pm
Crew enables you to give out a large amount of athletic grants-in-aid to women, such that many athletic departments use it to complement football in terms of Title IX compliance.
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By Jeremy September 20, 2011 - 2:21 pm
Exactly, and having had a friend on the ND crew team, they have very expensive boats (?) that break very easily, so a lot of money can get spent on the crew team to help Title IX requirements.
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By SDI September 20, 2011 - 10:33 am
I think Swarbrick is smart enough to work something out with the ACC in the same way ND has a relationship with the Big East. Conference affiliation for non football sports and some sort of “partnership” with the ACC that will look and smell somewhat like conference membership but with enough independence for ND to continue scheduling USC and Navy and retain the “independent” label.
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By DeepTeaKup September 20, 2011 - 12:13 pm
Not happening, SDI, if ND joins they are going all in. ND doesn’t offer the ACC anything in terms of BBall or any other sport.
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By kyndfan September 20, 2011 - 1:33 pm
Since when do you speak for the ACC? Or are you just angry because ND has “respectfully declined” the big ten/12 offer time after time.
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By DeepTeaKup September 20, 2011 - 1:59 pm
Right, because nobody else hear offers an authoritative sounding opinion.
See my earlier post on ND and B1G, I agree that ship has sailed, no point on either side revisiting at this point.
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By SDI September 20, 2011 - 6:17 pm
Maybe, maybe not. But the ACC would be stupid to pass up 6 football games a year vs ND, including 3 broadcast nationally on NBC, and maybe a small slice of the NBC contract just because of semantics. There are plenty of things ND could offer that would make them acceptable even if they don’t become a full fledged member of the ACC.
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By trey September 20, 2011 - 11:01 pm
Excuse me, who has been in more national title games in the last 5-10 years? scUM or ND? ND Lax(2), ND WBB(2?), Hockey(1), am I leaving any out?
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By trey September 20, 2011 - 11:03 pm
Also, scUM hasnt been a dominant Basketball team since the “Fab Five” were majoring in Basketweaving in Ann Arbor(‘s a whore)
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By Frank LeBeau September 20, 2011 - 11:57 am
I imagine a new super conference comprised of the best remants of the Big XII, several regional SEC schools and ND.
Imagine ND, TX, OK and Nebraska joining Arkansas, Kentucky and Tennessee with Kansas, K-State, OK-State, TXTech and Missouri. Some of The Best programs in both football and basketball – somewhat regional but spread out also. Call it the Heartland Conference. ND can keep it’s most tradtional games with USC and Navy to retain a coast to coast recruting presence.
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By GLEE September 20, 2011 - 11:58 am
Whatever conference ND may eventually end up in, the answer may be for us to bring along another school into that conference…a school that “fits” the goals, ideals, etc. of the ACC or B-10 BUT doesn’t play football…like a DePaul, Marquette or G’town. The conference would end up with an even number of teams and ND could continue to be an independent in football.
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By DeepTeaKup September 20, 2011 - 12:10 pm
When I first saw domer’s tweets about joining ACC, I thought he was kidding but reading/thinking about it more, I think it is the only logical choice. ND and the B1G have a hate-hate relationship, and with the B1G moving to a 9, IMO ultimately 10, game in conference schedule ND may start losing games to UM and MSU as a result. Even if ND joins a this point, there are too many lingering feelings on both sides to make it successful in the long run.
Any thoughts of creating a new conference are, IMO, wishful thinking. I don’t see how you poach anyone from the SEC or the existing ACC. The BE leftovers, outside of UConn, have no real appeal and OU is bound for the PAC 12 (dumb, but whatever).
I also don’t see how ND joins one of the new Super4 without joining for FB as well, that is the only appeal they have for the ACC and the B1G would insist on it.
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By shoutboxx September 20, 2011 - 10:25 pm
DTK, this post has swayed me as well. I would have assumed Big 10 would be where we would go, but ACC does make a lot of sense.
I also don’t see us helping create a new conference — too risky, and too against type for us given that we have been independent for so long. I don’t see any SEC schools leaving (money is too good) and ACC schools just agreed to the much higher buyout . . . .
I also agree with you that if we join another conference, it will be all or nothing this time out.
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By The Biscuit September 21, 2011 - 1:19 am
a conference with ND and TX will pull in more than $20mil/year that schools currently get in the ACC. One year break-even for longer term riches isn’t all that risky, so long as there’s a broadcasting partner involved from the start
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By Brandon September 20, 2011 - 12:12 pm
If we’re gonna’ join a southern conference, why not the SEC. They’ve only got 13 teams. It’s not like it makes any less sense to play in Gainesville than it does Boston, and talk about a recruiting base from SC to TX.
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By DeepTeaKup September 20, 2011 - 12:15 pm
As much as I loathe ND football, I would hate to see ND join the SEC. I would lose any remaining respect I had for ND.
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By Brandon September 20, 2011 - 12:51 pm
Why?
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By DeepTeaKup September 20, 2011 - 1:04 pm
It’s a cultural thing, with the SEC using JuCo’s as a pseudo farm system, oversigning, and pay to play. School like ND trying to play on the up and up has no chance.
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By squeeze77 September 20, 2011 - 1:16 pm
Outside of Vanderbilt and Kentucky (yes, UK) the SEC is academically and morally bankrupt.
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By DeepTeaKup September 20, 2011 - 1:23 pm
UK hired John Calipari, need I say more?
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By Brandon September 20, 2011 - 9:01 pm
I just think all of these moral judgment arguments are weak. So, should we not play SC? We’re not scheduling only Ivy league teams or ethical teams. We play to win on Saturday, regardless of the academic rating of the school or its “moral standing.”
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By Joe Magarac September 21, 2011 - 8:28 am
Moral judgments are never weak. Without moral judgments, Notre Dame wouldn’t have survived its first winter.
There’s also an enormous difference between scheduling a home-and-home with, say, Alabama, and joining the SEC. Joining the SEC would send a message that ND considers the SEC schools its peers. But it doesn’t, and they aren’t. ND makes a good-faith effort to ensure that its players graduate with real degrees. The SEC schools make no such effort.
As to USC, historically it really was a peer: private, religious, and dedicated (under seminal coach John McKay) to doing things the right way. They fell away from that (to put it mildly), but it looks like Pat Haden has them back on the straight and narrow.
ND cancelled its series with Miami precisely because Miami had become Thug U. That same sensibility is why ND won’t join or even consider joining the SEC.
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By Jeremy September 20, 2011 - 2:25 pm
But we have a much stronger fan base in Boston than in Gainesville. We don’t want to lose the Northeast when we can still get Florida games with Miami in the ACC. The ACC isn’t a southern only conference the way the SEC is.
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By Big Red September 20, 2011 - 2:38 pm
Alumni are one concern, but truly if the argument is shifting demographics, the SEC is far more at the heart of the college football world than the ACC.
It’s good to see Independence is still regarded as the Plan A. There are a number of other options, whether it’s adding Texas to the cabal of independents (thereby diminishing the power of conferences), bringing Georgetown (or another Big East basketball-only power) to the ACC as non-football members, or what have you, I still think this is an integral AND valuable part of ND’s identity that will hopefully be preserved.
Also, why the push by the B1G to go to 9 games? I understand this means you get to televise 6 more conference games, but wouldn’t you rather play Midwestern FCS cupcakes than guarantee conference teams another 6 losses? Then again, I don’t understand the mega-conference binge so clearly I’m just missing something here.
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By DeepTeaKup September 20, 2011 - 3:12 pm
B1G is going to 9 games already, even if they stay at 12 teams. Totally agreed on the mega-conference. This is an exercise in stupidity and greed, schools like Ok. will regret this when their travel budget goes through the roof to send non-revenue sports to places like Pullman for mid-week trips. Also, do you ever see Texas developing a hearty rivalry with Cal or Stanford if they only play them once every 6 years?
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By bill polaha September 20, 2011 - 12:45 pm
STAY INDEPENDANT
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By deaconblus September 20, 2011 - 1:05 pm
Selfish of me, but a sked that includes 8-conference games – one of which is an annual matchup with Texas. Allowing for Navy and USC and keeping Michigan, MSU and potentially Nebrasska and PSU — sounds a lot more exciting than BC, Miami, Pitt, and FSU. This assumes we can convince Texas to make the jump the Big Ten with us. So maybe it’s a non-starter.
In addition, our basketball team will actually have a chance at winning the Big Ten from time to time. Being slightly better than middling in the new super-ACC is what we can hope for.
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By Matt Q. (DMQ) September 20, 2011 - 1:18 pm
But that really, again, completely regionalizes us to the fly-over state conference.
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By deaconblus September 20, 2011 - 1:26 pm
We’d be playing in Austin every other year. In SoCal every other year and in Philly, New York or Bal’more every other year. Not perfect, I know. But how often will we make it to Texas or California in the ACC?
Also, it should be clear that the schedule just gets my juices flowing a lot more. Sounds more exciting than ACC’s offering.
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By deaconblus September 20, 2011 - 1:27 pm
And, it’s a complete pipe-dream anyways….
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By Joe Magarac September 20, 2011 - 3:04 pm
I don’t understand where all this “Texas to the Big Ten” talk is coming from. Why in the world would Texas join the Big Ten? Austin is more than 1000 miles south of the nearest Big Ten school. It has nothing in common with any of the Big Ten schools historically or culturally. There is simply no fit whatsoever between Texas and the Big Ten.
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By deaconblus September 20, 2011 - 3:55 pm
Massive grain of salt, but here’s where I read it.
http://northwestern.rivals.com/showmsg.asp?fid=57&tid=162506546&mid=162506546&sid=901&style=2
And, to quibble, I don’t think it’s true that Texas has nothing in common with the Big Ten schools historically or culturally. From a research perspective they have a lot in common. And to quibble even more, Austin is less than 1000 miles away from Nebraska. Oh, and miles are a lot smaller in Texas!
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By trey September 21, 2011 - 11:29 pm
We usually measure distances in hours it takes to drive there
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By shoutboxx September 20, 2011 - 10:33 pm
Also, can you imagine Nebraska’s reaction, given that their move to the Big 10 appears to have been motivated by sheer hatred of Texas? Tom Osborne’s head would literally explode . . .
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By shoutboxx September 20, 2011 - 10:36 pm
Gotta disagree, I think playing FSU and Miami regularly would be more exciting, plus, what about getting to play VA Tech regularly?
But I’m selfish, too; I live in Georgia and love the idea of getting to see us play GA Tech in Atlanta on at least a somewhat regular basis.
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By trey September 20, 2011 - 11:07 pm
No one is listening to me, apparently…UT will go nowhere without Texas Tech. Bank on it.
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By devin September 20, 2011 - 3:38 pm
I can stand to see ND join the ACC for 8-10 years four 16 team “super conferences” won’t last long schools and fans will start bitching about that system the same why they do now and it’ll all fall apart then we can go back to being independent, when the “super conference” begins its era college foot ball
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By devin September 20, 2011 - 3:41 pm
(Didn’t mean to send that just yet) college football will look much like it does now 12-15 years after the super conference era begins
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By Ross September 20, 2011 - 4:31 pm
plan a – independence
plan b – BIG TEN.
The “population drift” is bogus – as with independence, ND will recruit nationally, regardless of its conference.
and because… I have to WATCH these games. Adding OSU, Penn St and Nebraska to UM, MSU & Purdue… yes please.
Adding Syracuse, NC State and Clemson?… blech!
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By trey September 20, 2011 - 11:08 pm
Ill take Miami, NC State, and drop the OOC matchup with BC and replace them with a BYU or TCU, sure.
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By daybreakboys September 20, 2011 - 4:41 pm
This entire thing is retarded. If Notre Dame gives up its independence and SOUL I may give up on college football.
The conferences and the NCAA are already revolting as is.
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By Brad September 21, 2011 - 6:03 am
WOO HOO!
NEWSFLASH!
The PAC-12 just officially said “f**k this, we’re out of here” to all the assholes in the Big-12! Go check si.com or ESPN. This means that they are staying pat at 12 teams, which means nobody else has a reason to go to 16 teams. This is HUGE for ND staying independent.
The SEC will still take Texas A&M, and likely another team, which I would expect to be Fl. St., West Virginia, Louisville, or Clemson. Two of those teams are in the ACC (which must fear that the SEC will poach one of their teams, since they just added Pitt and Syracuse), so even if the ACC (now 14 teams) loses one member to the SEC, they will just pick up a remnant of the Big East like Rutgers and call it a day.
The SEC will probably stop at 14 since it doesn’t look like the PAC is going over 12.
I never thought I’d say it, but the PAC conference may have just saved the day for the idea of Irish independence.
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By The Biscuit September 21, 2011 - 10:08 am
It helps, but the key remains the BE. If they do lose another team thatll hurt. ND needs a strong BE for non FB sports to stay indie
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By Brad September 21, 2011 - 10:36 am
I don’t know how much it really effects them…it depends. People forget that there are still 14 members left in the Big East, because they have a lot of schools that don’t play football. That means that even if the six remaining football schools left, whatever conference remained would have 8 teams, and not play football. (Marquette, Seton Hall, DePaul, Georgetown, Providence, St. John’s, Villanova).
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By GB September 21, 2011 - 8:10 am
There was a recent article in Yahoo or SI that recommended ND go to the ACC,
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By Matt Q. (DMQ) September 21, 2011 - 9:05 am
Yeah. The one I linked to in this very post.
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By GB September 22, 2011 - 12:32 am
Sorry, I didn’t click on the link.
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By WeNeverGraduate September 21, 2011 - 1:56 pm
Great post, DMQ.
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By Matt Q. (DMQ) September 21, 2011 - 10:09 pm
test
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By Brad September 22, 2011 - 11:02 am
Apparently, the Big 12 would have at least some interest in letting the Irish join and keep football independent if the Big East collapses.
http://www.news-sentinel.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110922/SPORTS/110929883/1002
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By ND to the ACC | Her Loyal Sons November 3, 2011 - 9:24 pm
[...] this year, we argued that, should ND be forced to join a conference, the ACC is their best option. And now Notre Dame has the opportunity to get a pretty good idea of what that would feel like, as [...]
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