In other words, you got what I recommended earlier
I agree that big downside to this proposal is from Buffalo’s perspective.
However, there have been rumors that Buffalo may be looking at AAC. That would involve a lot more travel than this. The same would be true for any other conference they might want to join. C-USA? Sun Belt? MAC, even with this configuration, is a lot better from travel expense perspective. Where they are located there are no good options.
Perhaps Ohio Turnpike Commission could be persuaded to advertise on Buffalo sports network. There would be a lot of buses from Buffalo on the Ohio turnpike for any games they play.
Buffalo to UMass is about the same as Buffalo to OU. So yes, a closer game than some of the other MAC trips, but wouldn’t even be a very short trip for them, let alone the rest of the MAC
Agree - I would like UMASS as well, but ONLY ALL SPORTS.
W&M - great state school, BUT way too small.
Maybe a Delaware or a Fordham FCS upgrade?
Fordham - would bring in NYC Market and decent size school, but it would be the only private school so that does not fit well. They did play 2 FBS teams this year so they know what to expect.
Temple - won’t happen as their exit fee would be too much for them.
UCONN - great, but they would never leave the BIGEAST.
URI - a bit small AND would need major FB upgrades, solid hoops
JMU - would be great - just approved FBS upgrade past week I believe
Listening to the Ohio band at the Battle of the Bricks, I realized that when WKU joins the conference, not only will we have two teams in different Bowling Greens, we’ll have two teams with the same fight song - WKU and Ohio. Weird!
E.A. Diddle Arena…will instantly be one of better bball arenas…
Something Millett could be transformed into.
Hope WKU joins …and shakes things up…Chunk can get his first out of (err in conferece) FBS win, maybe.
Ugh…addition of these two might attract some other coaching candidates…as well, and hope Chunk moves on in fear he can’t get his predictable 6-2, 5-3 MAC record.
So, which president(s) of which school(s) is/are holding out? Buffalo? The Michigan contingent? Akron and Kent who have to play 4 major money games to continue to exist? If there are schools that don’t want in, remove them and replace them with WKU/MTSU. Back to a 12 team league.
Sitting and doing nothing is NOT AN OPTION in this age of college sports.
Guessing it’s about the money (or lack thereof when split w two additional members), plus there are rumors of MTSU’s hesitation due to the MAC being mainly outside their recruiting footprint. The MAC may just want to add WKU by themselves if they are willing although that sets up uneven divisions. WKU brings more to the table IMO with their slightly closer proximity and good hoops history and nice arena.
If that’s true about poor old MTSU, TDB. Can’t recruit out of Tenn? Look at our most recent two deep. Six from Kentucky. Two from Tenn. Three from Iowa. Seven from Indiana. Seven from Illinois. Three from Georgia. Two from North Carolina. Two from Michigan. Two from Missouri.
A great percentage of our players are from somewhere other than Ohio.
Is our “footprint” much larger because we work harder or because MTSU doesn’t have a great deal of admirers outside of Tenn?
Looks like MTSU recruits largely out of the south - GA/AL/FL/SC. I think it’s reasonable for them be worried about the footprint changing from the south to the Midwest.
As for the MAC, adding two schools reduces each school’s cut of NCAA and CFP money so unless ESPN is willing to give us a large bump it might not make financial sense. Plus C-USA has added teams, so it’s not like we could kill C-USA by taking MTSU/C-USA which would have been a big benefit.
If the deal goes through, at this point I’m confident that due diligence has been done and it makes sense to the ADs and presidents, but I’m fine if it doesn’t happen.
MTSU is like someone who needs to go somewhere but the car available to them isn’t nice enough so they decide to walk.
Do they have options? They prefer to be independent? They would rather play in the new CUSA?
From a tweet this morning from The Athletic’s Brett McMurphy, it does indeed look like MTSU is the hang up - over money. There are a lot of responses to this on the Athletic site. Interestingly, Liberty fans seem to be doing what they do best - spreading propaganda. They seem desperate to stop the exodus of WKU to the MAC - saying the MAC is bankrupt, about to expel a few teams, the only conference with half empty stadiums, etc. The WKU fans seem to be more pissed at MTSU for hanging the move up. They’re not overjoyed at moving to the MAC but view it as the best option for both schools. It would seem ESPN ought to be able to arbitrate this.
If you subscribe to The Athletic, the conversation is on Chris Vaninni’s Group of Five mailbag as a result of a question I asked yesterday.
If MTSU cant afford it then it probably suggests the MACs tv deal from ESPN isnt getting much better. As I understand it now the CUSA tv deal is almost a zero- so you will think the extra money could offset the exit fees
