I can’t foresee Buffalo in the same division as NIU ot MTSU. Either school has to be a 10+ hour drive for them, so their AD would likely fight against that. I imagine the current East/West will remain mostly the same with the two new schools joining the West and Toledo probably coming to the East. But who knows. It could very well be a whole new layout, kind of like the Big Ten’s brief Legends/Leaders dartboard map before the East Coast schools joined.
It’s 9 hours from Murfreesboro to Dekalb.
Hey, guys. That’s why the Wright Bros invented the airplane. Or was that the French. Either way, they would almost certainly fly for trips that long.
This took an amount of effort that I’m embarrassed to admit, but I coded an optimization program and it found that this exact alignment produces the least amount of overall travel.
When you spend hours on data collection and coding just to find the exact same answer that you got from looking at a map for 5 seconds and taking a guess:
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Is this by road or as the crow flies?
By road, although I suppose some of these would be flights rather than road trips.
As to the overall topic- it is exciting to consider new teams and I believe WKU and MTSU to be worthy mid-majors
But unless the financials are overwhelming- I dont think this helps Miami
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harder to win the league- when we talk about MAC titles there isnt a disclaimer that says the MAC was a 6 team league until the early 1970s and 9 team in the 1980s and then a 12 team league now. This makes it harder to be champs in all sports
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Bowl bids- most bowls are in the south- my guess is WKU and MTSU go the front of the line for half of our bowl partners and increases our chances of landing in Detroit or Idaho
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TV exposure- this should be a wash but CUSA’s tv deal was so bad that those teams were never on. My guess is that this increases the chance of a MACtion game on a Tuesday being on ESPN plus
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NCAA tournament- my guess is the CUSA lost bid is likely replaced with a 6th SEC team over another mid-major. This makes our chance of ever making the big dance again even smaller
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If UC can make it to a “Power 5” conference, Miami can find a way to compete in a league that includes WKU MTSU.
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On one message board, it was reported UMASS was in the mix. UMASS or MTSU. But UMASS it seems didn’t want to allow football to have more “power” over its basketball. Admins there still want to keep basketball in the A10. Hopeful for a football only home.
UMass in the MAC just feels like the Rutgers of the Big 10. I get the point, and it also gives Buffalo a closer school, but I’d only take them for all sports. I think if you pull UMass and a decent school from Virginia, New York, Pennsylvania, or New England, you can start to establish a pretty decent footprint.
If you get a UMass (basketball included) and a JMU type (maybe William and Mary?), I think 16 teams becomes worth it. You overnight become a top 8 basketball conference (MAC has been sitting around #10 for the last few years) and I think football improves some. It also protects you in case Akron or others decide they can no longer live in the FBS.
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Sounds like it’s a done deal (also, still really happy about being able to embed tweets)
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Western Kentucky and Middle Tennessee are playing each other this Saturday. Both schools are 4-4 this season. Apparently they have a long-standing rivalry which is known as “100 Miles of Hate.” I like that they’re bringing some history to the MAC.
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Looked at WKU athletics and discovered that the AD at WKU is a Miami grad. Also, Marshall AD is also. Makes the WKU AD job maybe just a little easier in this regard.
I re-ran the program with added constraints that the following rivalries had to be kept together:
3 Michigans
Akron/Kent
Toledo/BG
Miami/OU
Miami/Ball St
WKU/MTSU
It gave these results:
North:
NIU
WMU
CMU
EMU
Toledo
BG
Buffalo
South:
WKU
MTSU
Ball St
Miami
Ohio
Akron
Kent
I can’t imagine that Buffalo would sign off on this. I think you could get WMU to agree to the River/Lake split as long as you guarantee them a permanent crossover game with CMU.
When you suck as much as UMass sucks at football, you don’t get to call the shots. All sports or nothing.
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I’d take UofR before W&M. Better sports and their alumni actually care. W&M doesn’t really have a home TV market. They are sandwiched between Richmond and Norfolk/Newport News and as a result, they get tepid coverage from each. But UofR is private, so that would require a bit of a change in conference identity.
UMass can go dump tea. I do not get their obstinance over staying in the A10 for basketball, and its not like they’d be a great addition to the MAC. Let them mope in independency…
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Delaware was JMU’s rival and they’ve talked about going FBS for years. I think the Dukes’s move whets the Blue Hens’ appetite.
According to Action Network’s Brett McMurphy, it looks like CUSA is picking up Liberty and New Mexico State from FBS and Jacksonville State and Sam Houston from FCS. No mention of the UMass/UConn orphaned twins.