unique is reckless capitulation to the norm. The “homogenization” of Notre Dame football
carries great risk. saucy/others have proven that they will “dip their toes” and sell out. It will be a dark day if they dive all in and ND football’s iconic tradition of football independence is fully lost.
PS On a good note we have gotten to the playoffs and a NC game in this new era. So, the PTB will not be able to sell it as necessary to pursue NCs.
and Texas. Population in the Midwest is stagnant. In the long run, I don't see that nailing our colors to that mast would be in our interest.
It would swallow much of ND’s identity. Not to mention the conference is bigoted.
The ACC is the perfect partial conference for ND. 5 games in the heart of recruiting land + national games + Stanford,USC,Navy.
Believe 5 games is too many.
I think a whole bunch over on the homer board(s) think that 5 is just fine and would support saucy Jack if he went all in with the ACC.
about Nebraska who? I just wish we could renegotiate our ACC commitment to 4 games annual average. Five is causing our schedules in some years to be terribly weak and it interferes with our independent scheduling. Just my 2 cents.
ACC football hasn’t held up its end of the bargain with FSU, Miami and VT all sucking hind tit since we started our arrangement.
...in response to some things he said on an abcsports.com piece (12/10/2002) with respect to ND. The first is irrelevant to the current thread (West Virginia fans were miffed that the Gator Bowl picked ND instead of WVU, and Bowden, as an alum of WVU, was pushing the idea that the pick was unfair).
The second thing he said was that ND should be in a conference. I actually got a polite response back. Anyway, the following distilled my thoughts on the matter, and I think I still believe them. (I may have posted this here some years ago.)
_______________________________________________________________________
Why hasn't Notre Dame football joined a conference?
This isn't a simple issue. There are many factors explaining it, some of which are clearly pecuniary, but others are historical or related to traditional opponents on ND's schedule.
The "natural" conference for Notre Dame is the Big Ten. The other Big Ten schools in Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Wisconsin, etc., surround South Bend, and ND traditionally plays more teams from the Big Ten than from any other single conference (although this year, it was 3 Big Ten teams and three Big East teams).
Back in the golden years (pre-WW II) Notre Dame tried on multiple occasions to join the Big Ten but was rejected every time. The reasons aren't absolutely clear (a Catholic school joining secular colleges?), but when ND went knocking, the door stayed shut.
Now, in more recent times, the Big Ten made overtures to ND, but by that time Notre Dame was accustomed to its position as a national independent. During the 30's and 40's Notre Dame's athletic department carried on Rockne's effort to arrange a national schedule, playing (among others) Stanford and USC in the West, Army and Navy in the East, Oklahoma in the south, as well as the more proximate Big Ten schools in the Midwest.
As a result of this history, Notre Dame's football "conference," for many years, has been national, not regional, in scope. This goes hand in hand, to some extent, with Notre Dame's gradual development into the leading Catholic university in the country, a factor that transcends regional boundaries. This might not be directly relevant to football scheduling, except for the fact that it has generated a nationwide fan base (for example, see Steve Rushin's article in SI at the end of November, "Planet Notre Dame"), the so-called "subway alumni."
This is probably annoying to many fans from other schools, but it's not a unique concept. In the NFL, we've heard for years about "America's Team," although it's not always clear who that is! Back when the Celtics ruled the NBA, they drew more fans at away games than most other teams did (this was repeated by the Lakers and Bulls in more recent years). The "up" teams get more favorable press, more analysis, sell more merchandise, and so forth. Is this "unfair"? Of course not.
Some who call for ND to join a football conference seem to assume that being an independent is a "lack" of something, which can be fulfilled by joining a conference. But here's what Notre Dame already has: a national schedule, allowing its fans in various parts of the country to see it play; traditional scheduling relationships with a number of teams that would suffer if ND joined a conference; a strength of schedule that would probably suffer if it joined a conference; a national fan base that contributes to relatively stronger TV ratings in national broadcasts; the option to go to bowl games and retain all of the associated fees, without having to take only 1/10, 1/11, 1/12, or whatever it would be in a given conference; and a strong, if intangible, sense of tradition that is built largely on its national-scope, independent status.
Terry, if you were Notre Dame's AD (or President), would you give up many of these things (as you surely would have to) in order to join a conference? Well, as they say, every deal has two parts: price and terms, and I suppose anything can be made attractive enough.
But I think the argument can be made that Notre Dame, by remaining an independent, has remained true to its traditional character-and that that's a good thing.
...he made was this:
"Anytime ND wins it's good for college football and the Big East. Few college fans see the big picture, however." [Emphasis added.]
He also wrote that once Ty has a few years of recruiting under his belt all would be well at ND; the underlying premise, of course, lacked foundation.
And we don't want to.
I have lived in WI for more than 40 years now, and ever since WI football became competitive (after Alvarez came) fans put this question to me as if the answer is obvious. I used to try to explain why ND should not be in the B1G now or ever but I got tired of the whole thing. Now I just say that ND has no reason to associate with any other teams, and if Wisconsin could do the same thing, go it alone as an independent, they would. That usually gets them thinking for a bit and it ends the conversation for me.
There's nothing wrong with that. The overwhelming majority of their students come from WI and MN, and when they graduate they return to WI or MN or maybe venture down to Chicago. The B1G West is perfect for them. ND is a very different school.
That stat alone is why ND should never join a conference. ND is not regional -- every other Division IA team but Stanford and maybe Duke is a regional school with a football team comprised of regional players on their roster.
Lookup any roster for any team from any power 5 conference -- you will be lucky to find 5 players that come from any state not bordering their own state (or same coast in the case of WA that pulls from "neighbor" CA).
Then layer on top of that ND fans have no desire to play the same dumbass schedule every single season. We want a rotation of different teams for 8 or more games each season. We want to play every conference -- not just a single conference.
Control. ND wants to control who we play, when, and under what terms and conditions. Only a weak minded person would ever willingly give control of anything to another person.
Our schedules already suck in comparison to what they could and should be -- largely because we stupidly agreed to 5 ACC games per year when at most we should have agreed to alternating 3 and 4 game schedules.
A few others, mainly private schools, may also fall outside the categorization: BC, Wake, Vanderbilt, Rice, Tulane and possibly BYU.
Charging $70+k / year requires most of these schools to have a genuine national draw. Many wouldn’t be viable at their targeted academic profile if overly reliant on a regional draw.
The academic orientation at Georgia Tech may also move it outside of a regional characterization.
You dont know your head from your ass
Graphic too.
This year's freshman class at UW is just 50% Wisconsin residents.
As they have reciprocal in state tuition. Many of the rest are from the Illinois diaspora and the balance are coasties.
Sorry Across it is as provincial a school as most others. In the Big1? (A conference of fairly regional borgs) I'd put it no better than third behind NW (big gap), UM (slightly smaller gap) then UW. Purdue and Indiana may have arguments here but...... it's Indiana
Wisconsin and Michigan have coasties. Iowa and to a lesser extent, IU, do not
...and was false when I attended IU in the mid-1990s. I can't find a state-by-state breakdown of IU's student body, but according to promotional materials from when IU played in the Pinstripe Bowl in 2015, students from New York and New Jersey alone account for ten percent of IU-Bloomington's enrollment. It's also worth noting that a non-trivial percentage of in-state students are commuters or non-traditional students who aren't part of campus social life, so living on or near campus it feels more geographically diverse than the numbers would suggest. Of course, it doesn't compare to ND's geographical diversity, but Big Ten schools aren't the provincial backwaters you imagine. (None of this is to disagree with the main point that ND shouldn't join the Big Ten).
My own experience from 20 years ago in a decent size Long Island public school I had 4 classmates go to IU that I can remember, one buddy go to Wisconsin and maybe 12 to 15 go to Michigan,
There’s a big Chicago contingent, certainly, but they have a large NY/NJ population, especially in the Greek system and in the business school. Big Ohio contingent there as well.
Nonetheless, all of them are regional schools. I’d bet none have more than 10% from more than a state away except maybe Michigan.
The Greek system at IU has become a draw
Contrast this with nd which has CA, Ny, NJ and Florida in their top 7 or 8
Call it the Billy Joel demographic. Of course it is not as national as ND but it is a fine school with breadth and depth and some niches (real estate, banking, dairy science) that are among the top ranked.
that the Mifflin block party is a lot of fun and they definitely have their share of coeds with questionable moral standards, which is a definite plus.
...bull semen.
From Two Bulls, Nine Million Dairy Cows
I’m surprised that Across has heard of it.
As in Schreiber. And a couple other giants. Most people on this board ate Schreiber products today. Or yesterday.
I'm thinking of businesses with present/prior ND connections - Sargento in Plymouth and Gehl Foods in Germantown.
When the Gehl family sold the business to private equity in 2015, they gave each employee $10,000 - 5 to 401(k) and 5 in cash. Katherine (ND 1988) was the President at that time. Gehl was a pioneer in the non-refrigerated dairy industry, aka nacho cheese.
When you throw in Stayer from Johnsonville Sausage and the Miller family history, ND has beer, cheese and brats covered.
Socialist who didn't get into any f the Ivies, UM or Northwester demographic.
Whatever you want to call it it is noticeable,but not sizable.
I agree that it is a great school ( my godson is a proud grad and my brother a season ticket holder), but it's a regional school.
A NY transplant to Madison.
we don't have to and you do
in a conference, just generally speaking.
power conference teams this decade? Then tell him you're glad ND's bye week fell on this Saturday so you can focus all your attention on the thrilling annual Wisconsin/Illinois matchup.
Example: Last 20 seasons, ACC - 5, Big Ten - 2. (Using AP)
There are other ways to measure the conference strength, of course, but this was the easiest to grab.
The ACC has had a grand total of 2 good teams. One of which is on a recent and unprecedented uptick. The other is probably the prizewinner of the biggest cesspool in college football and one of the NCs you cite is rightfully ours. It is beyond cavil that the ACC is the dregs if the major football conferences
Historically, it’s never been a power football conference. Since getting FSU and Miami, they have had the potential to be on par with the Big 12 and PAC-12, but they lack the depth of the Big 10 and the SEC. We shouldn’t play more than four games per year against them.
Practically speaking, to prop up our other sports, it would be 3.
cycling through the dregs like IU and Rutgers, and were in the Big Ten in everything else, including basketball, would that be better? Your answer still might be "Yes" but that's a question to ponder.
As
1. the schools are better fit in terms of size and mission
2. The recruiting footprint is far better for football
3. The Acc is a far better home for just about every sport
4. Whatever argument ACross has is likely solved with a H&H with Wisconsin
5.
they have to get the image/likeness stuff figured out, but realistically I see it moving more towards the NFL model for playoffs, etc.
I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of schools break from the NCAA and form their own superconference/league. All you really need is the top 20-30 programs and you can set it up however you want.
There are a ton of schools right now in the NCAA that are living off of the top 10-15%. I've actually been to a lot of non-Notre Dame games in the past year and it's amazing how some places are just ghost towns and likely have the same or even smaller attendance as a good D 2 school.
If it’s a quasi Ivy League tier school conference. BI mentioned this the other week.
Spitballing...
East: Duke, UNC, Wake, UVA, Vanderbilt, Army, Navy, Georgia Tech
West: Stanford, Northwestern, Rice, Cal, USC, UCLA, ND, Air Force
As this is set up, 7 games you play in your group every year, 2 in other group that rotates home and away and then 3 out of conference.
I’m happy to switch out a few of these schools if need be. Tulane, Florida, or even BC could be alternates or added. You can add Hopkins for lacrosse. Perhaps add a few other schools that do not have Div 1 football, but do for other sports, like Georgetown, Nova, or William and Mary. I’m sure there are a few western schools that fit this as well.
If you really wanted to push it you could consider Texas, Wisconsin, or I guess Michigan (I like not including them as a kind of FU, but that’s me).
I’m sure there are different ways to set this up.
From a football perspective this collection of teams sucks balls. I have little use for most of them.
Perhaps swapping out G Tech for Florida would improve the football a bit and take out an ACC team. Unfortunately the ACC has more top rated schools than any other conference.
As I mentioned, I’m all for considering a Wisconsin or Texas as well.
I just hate the idea of joining the Big 10 and would like to see a conference that at least on the education quality is close to ND standards.
I rather stay Independent, but the NCAA is trying to force ND’s hand. If they are going to try to force a conference on us I rather it be a group of schools that make sense for ND and they help dictate what schools represent that conference. No group would be perfect.
Gameday is following ND to Ireland next year. The program prints money and draws good ratings, for a variety of conferences. College football is doing well and does better when its one independent team is successful and traveling the country. Who wants to give up their ND game so ND can play Rutgers/Minnesota/Illinois or Duke/Wake/Syracuse?
Screwing with ND’s value is not in the sport’s best interest. I don’t think it’ll happen.
Is that no one gives a shit about the sport of college football. Everyone places school or conference interests above all else. Just look at the realignment that happened. They think if they can knock ND down and help themselves, they will. Without thinking twice.
To the B1G? (I don't know if this was ever confirmed, but it was out there.) It was all about trying to force ND out of the ACC and leaving them with no other choice.
Pot isn't legal nationwide yet.
to serve the changing market. It will be interesting to see if/when/how the collective mindset of the top schools change to the point where they're willing to put together schedules that will lead to more losses than they're used to.
Pretty sure this was written in 2012
the news several years after everyone else.
tournament is always tossed out when the idea of the big football schools (Power 5) forming their own association.
it would really only be the very top.
Basketball is different in that so many of those places lose their best players after one year
He sounds like a whiner to me. He should focus on beer and brats.
They regionalize the university and permanently lock in a set of opponents. I guess it provides some bargaining power with TV networks and bowls and simplifies scheduling for non-revenue sports, but absent those needs, why is it viewed as necessary or even the preferred path?
Maybe having grown up an ND fan I don't appreciate the glory of winning a conference championship, but it seems a lot like winning your division in MLB, which is to say no one really remembers/cares.
The reality is people don't like ND's independence because they're jealous of it. We don't need to be in a conference, and that eats at them.
Over the last 20 years, the significance of conference championships and conference championship games has greatly increased, and the significance of major bowls without NC implications has dramatically decreased. This is bad for ND. I don't think it necessitates ND joining a conference, but it's nevertheless been a bad trend for ND.
My point isn't that conferences are irrelevant to us but rather that they're kind of a silly institution that shouldn't be necessary for a school like ND -- or probably a few others (e.g., Texas, USC, etc.).
But, to your point, the powers-that-be (i.e., people with conference affiliations), have decided conference championships should be a primary consideration for postseason selection, and that's definitely bad for us.
championships hasn't increased. Those teams are just playing a quality opponent at the end of the season which has implications on the playoffs.
for us it's not a big deal, we don't need it.
But for the rest of the sports, in today's world, you can't exist without a conference. I don't think there is a single independent non-football program in the NCAA.
Could someone with more knowledge about this enlighten me (us)?
existence indicts the system and each sheep within it.
And geographically, I think that depends on the context. Sports, yes, it's better than the ACC all around, but it's still less optimal than staying independent, which is better both financially and geographically for ND.
The only way joining the B1G makes sense is if we don't have a choice, and it's a choice between the ACC and the B1G. Then, we should go to the B1G.
Otherwise, Independence is much much better than both the B1G and the ACC.
that for the next 25 years we have to join the ACC if we decide to go full time in a conference for football. I'm sure there is always a way out but there is likely some financial penalty.
that was a big part of his point. Join and get on with it.
They’ll never have to join for football.
to get in the playoffs. Right now there are 4 at-large spots. When they go to 8 teams, you are you going to have the champions of the power 5 conferences, the best non-power 5 conference winner, and 2 at-large spots. Fewer open slots for ND to take.
and 3 open spots. That's a great scenario.
They went from contending for national titles to begging for table scraps from OSU and Michigan.
Florida State and Miami, for instance, were extremely known quantities and national title contenders (Miami won a few) before they ever joined a conference.
Lou said it best...“Those who know Notre Dame, no explanation’s necessary. Those who don’t, no explanation will suffice.”
boot.
If one counts only the games in the modern era (1920 on), we're 8-3-1.
they would become a regional school in the long term. They'd be a small private school in Northern Indiana. That becomes a lot more difficult to recruit outside of the Midwest.
Joining the ACC would do greater harm to our football program
because I was about to say that ND would become Northwestern.
Why would ND want to be Northwestern in the football world?
Why would we want to be either?
Why are any of you bringing up thes other schools as relevant to the conversation?
Who said we should join the ACC?
But I don't find casting our lot with the B1G versus the ACC as ideal, because we don't fit into either very well.
In the B1G, geographically it makes sense, but academically we'd stick out like a sore thumb as a private Catholic University. In the ACC, there are more private schools (Duke, Wake, Miami, BC, but they are in the minority to the larger state schools, and we're still 300 miles from Louisville and 400 miles from Pitt, the two closest schools).
That is geographically distant and separate from and culturally anathema to the south.
On who the game is against.
Games against Duke and Wake Forest are in the sun belt, and I don't find them all that interesting/entertaining or all that much better than a trip to West Lafayette.
Games in Syracuse and Chestnut Hill may be worse than anything in the rust belt.
Pitt isn't even on campus.
discernible difference in competition between being in the ACC or Big 10.
Since the ACC agreement, averaging Sagarin's conference rankings for each division as well as his central mean stat (Gives most weight to middle teams in the group and less weight to teams as you go away from the middle in either direction), results are from 2014 to current:
Big10 East: Conf Rank (4.00), Central Mean (77.71)
Big10 West: Conf Rank (7.33), Central Mean (74.91)
ACC Coastal: Conf Rank (6.83), Central Mean (75.08)
ACC Atlantic: Conf Rank (5.17), Central Mean (76.81)
But then you could put them on a trend line, which captures how shitty FSU, Miami and others have become since we signed the deal in 2012 and started playing games in 2014.
2016
ACC Atlantic (2) - 80.4
ACC Coastal (3) - 77.8
B1G W (7) 74.2
B1G E (6) 74.6
2017
ACC Atlantic (2) - 80.6
ACC Coastal (7) - 75.9
B1G W (7) 74.2
B1G E (6) 76.6
2018
ACC Atlantic (6) - 76.3
ACC Coastal (8) - 74.0
B1G W (7) 76.2
B1G E (3) 78.5
2019 (to date)
ACC Atlantic (8) - 73.8
ACC Coastal (9) - 73.3
B1G W (7) 74.6
B1G E (2) 80.8
Just as an example, FSU and Jimbo won the national title in 2013 and made the playoff in 2014, they suck now and are led by Willie Taggart.
This year, both B1G divisions are better than either of the ACC and that trend isn't going to change any time soon.
We cast our lot with a bunch of chumps. The tide switched after the 2016 season. Jimbo left, Lamar Jackson graduated, sending Louisville into a tailspin. Richt left Miami in shambles shortly after.
The ACC was good in the early part of our deal, but they have gone to shit since. I don't see them in a positive trend line at all.
ND is one of the biggest examples of that. We’re only three years removed from being at rock bottom. FSU for all we know is one great coaching hire away from returning to the top; they draw from so much talent and still recruit so well that it’s not inconceivable they’ll bounce back soon. Ditto Miami.
We’ll see how Day does the longer Urban is gone. PJ Fleck will be gone as soon as he gets offered a better job which may be USC at the end of the year.. Dantonio and MSU appear to be back to their usual selves. Check back in two weeks on Harbaugh and Michigan.
... and joining the Pac-12?
Think of the football tradition mixed in with the weather related recruiting advantages. We’d be unstoppable!
It’s time to think outside the box. Father Sorin should have never stopped in South Bend anyway.
Why should we let the weak-willed pull us down to their level?
better bowl opportunities now.
Geez, it’s just the B1G except there’s not even common geography! Mostly crap football but just as much arrogance! We have nothing in common with them, what’s the deal? At least with the B1G we have a sordid historical relationship of dislike and mistrust, along with some great wins (ok, and losses).
At least the ACC has a few private schools and a few solid academic schools. As a bonus, none of its members have ever tried to smother our program in the crib.
And