All Entries Tagged With: "Missouri football"

Notre Dame Football Needs A Conference

The latest Big Ten expansion rumor has the conference extending feelers to Notre Dame, Nebraska, and Missouri. If Notre Dame were to decline, Rutgers might receive an invitation.

This conflicts, of course what Big Ten officials said last month, indicating that they would be taking their time to reach decisions, leaving the impression that could be several months.

Everyone, including the Big Ten and the presidents of the schools, is denying that any contacts have been made. So one has to assume the latest buzz is a trial balloon to see how the idea flies with a certain group of fans.

That, of course, would be the Notre Dame fans, with a national fan base unrivaled by any school in any sport. They value their independence, and selling them on the idea of a conference affiliation is going to take a little time for fans still living in the past. One has to believe the Notre Dame administration recognizes that tradition can only take one so far.

Despite its national following, Notre Dame no longer has the appeal it once had for the average fan. Sure, the Irish consistently have a tough national schedule and a list of traditional foes. But over the last two decades, Notre Dame has been little more than an also-ran in college football. Yes, the Irish have been invited to a few BCS games. But expectations were low, and they usually met them.

That could change if Notre Dame were to join a conference, providing more of an incentive for fans of other schools to watch the Irish on TV, competing for something tangible, rather than sentimental reasons.

Imagine how much meaningful a Notre Dame-Michigan game would be if the teams were playing a conference game. Purdue and Michigan State are annual foes, but those games could garner major TV ratings’ gains if the games meant anything to anyone besides Notre Dame, Purdue and Michigan State fans.

Notre Dame could actually become relevant again by giving up its independence.

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Louisville Football Needs Bigger Big East

By Paul Sykes

Watch your back.

The Big Ten Conference is officially looking to expand again, with the aim of increasing its ranks to 12 schools. The reasons are obvious: An annual conference football championship game and more green for its already bloated coffers.

Missouri, Pittsburgh, Syracuse and Rutgers are the schools most often mentioned as possibilities. Louisville has been included in the field by the Chicago Tribune. Even Cincinnati, with the most fickle fans in the nation, has been floated as a candidate.

Notre Dame is not in the picture this time, having consistently resisted conference overtures. The superiority complex doesn’t help either, nor does the fact that the football program is losing its luster. The Knute Rockne tradition can only get you so far when losing has become a habit.

Great for Louisville to be mentioned among the possible candidates. But the odds of it happening are remote. U of L has it good right now in the strongest basketball conference in the country. On the football side, Big East teams have demonstrated they can hold their own and they have the poll recognition to prove it.

Can you imagine the good old boys at land grant schools like Michigan and Ohio State acknowledging U of L or Cincinnati as equals and welcoming a municipal university into their ranks? Without getting into the academic debate, the best argument for Louisville would be basketball where U of L is consistently ranked as the most profitable program in the nation. The expansion of Papa John’s would be a definite plus.

Perhaps the best thing about the Big Ten’s action is that it may force the Big East to finally become proactive in expanding the number of conference football teams in the conference. The scheduling issues have been ignored too long and are a threat to financial stability.

Schools like East Carolina, Memphis and Central Florida are viable candidates because they take their football seriously. Their fan bases are not insignificant and they would strongly support BCS-level football.

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