I agree. That is probably the best play to make some headway against the SEC and BIG. It would give the ACC the upper hand in the western US markets (except LA which is huge).
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Odd question here: is there a way for the ACC to go more global? Letās say take football and join a football only conference in the US. But then take the Olympic sports and grab 8 universities from Europe, 8 from Asia, and 8 from South America and compete in a World University conference?
If TV market expansion is where itās atā¦ maybe that makes up the difference or more? And weāre actually good at some of those sports (soccer, tennis, rowing, swimming).
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Every option you look at to keep the ACC viable is just a bad option. Adding west coast teams is a logistics nightmare and if they were all that valuable the PAC 12 wouldnāt be on the verge of collapse. The valuable teams will get vacuumed up by the B1G.
The ACC is a dead conference struggling to cling to life as it sinks into the quicksand. The sooner people in charge of the individual schools start dealing with reality the better chances for those schools to come out of this still viable.
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Thatās certainly an āoutside the boxā idea. I think the logistics would be a huge problem.
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Youāre probably right. I just worry about not making any move while the BIG makes a land grab. The more PAC schools they add the fewer spots available for ACC schools.
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I think college athletics as a spectator sport isnāt really a thing in most of the world.
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I donāt think adding the Pac 12 necessary saves the ACC, it just seems like the best option of all the bad options. On the logistics, not sure what you mean. The ACC and Pac teams wouldnāt play each other regularly.
But I would agree that UVAās best route is the Big 10.
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I dont think college sports exist in the world the way we know them ā¦ idea is cool for olympic style stuff though
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Nope basically just the US and somewhat Canada. Now being the ones to finally integrate American and Canadian college athletics would certainly be a big swing. Getting Toronto and Montreal in the ACC could move the needle. But even if it worked the BIG would probably just poach the top teams in a few years
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100% Itās not a thing in the UK. You get split off into academy sides and train to be an athlete from the get. There are collegiate teams and programs that are legit and very good, but itās not where the elite athletes funnel into to craft their skill.
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I think merging the ACC and PAC into a Coastal Conference would have worked if the LA schools were still in the PAC and the conferences were able to drop deadweight in the process (looking at you Wake and BC - Iām sorry). Would have had massive media markets, a logical way to set up conference championship games (east coast winner vs west coast winner), and TV content for prime time across all the major time zones.
But with the LA schools moving into the BIG, it just feels way less appealing all around.
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Is one of the many things that make US college sports so good, for student athletes. BUT it definitely makes the US worse for international games like soccer tennis proly rugby etc cause you have to do school as well
You and others would know better than me on that
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Yes, but the crazy part is, at least in rugby, the top players in the UK still get degrees and many have gone on to advanced degrees in addition to being in full time set ups. So they managed to find a way to do both. But thatās not for everyone.
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See I ddint know that. My guess is professional soccer players from Brasil have ever had exactly zero college degrees
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Yea notice I said the UKā¦ itās not the same as you move around the world. Esp. if you move into the southern hemisphere.
Rugby is unique also because the sport did not turn professional until the mid 90ās so it was essentially a rich persons sport up north.
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I would think that the whole idea of adding PAC schools is to force ESPN to renegotiate the TV contract based on the larger conference size and TV market footprint.
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My Son played Rugby in undergraduate school. It is a cool sport and has fascinating unwritten rules.
I enjoyed watching the matches once I started to get some vague understanding of what is going on.
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Rugby is the best sport due to the fact that the referee actually controls the gameā¦ in no other sport have I ever experienced the referee have the respect that a rugby referee has.
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Yes, there are so many unwritten laws, we have to abide by, but at least generally they make sense unlike baseball. The āSirā has the first and last word at all time during a match, and the good ones can control an entire game just by speaking with the players. Theyāre job has shifted in recent years with the introduction of TMO and the side judges now able to flag things that can can be reviewed after the fact.
Back in my day it was 1 ref controlling all 30 of us on their own.
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