!Viva la WAC!
Interesting.
Seems. . . like a gamble, but after having the geography of the Sunbelt thrown in our faces for the entire time we were in the WAC (which worked out ok for us I'd say) I wouldn't want to cast stones.
Still odd. I wonder what's not being said here (with UCA also looking to get out).
Boise exploring the AAC.
In quality terms, that might actually make them darn near a "P6" conference. In practical terms, it would mean very little. Money and access will still be hugely different from the old money conferences.
But imagine trading a UConn quality program for a Boise State quality program. I think if there is an under-rated aspect of conference realignment, it's the addition by subtraction part. Whenever the Sunbelt crows about average computer rankings or whatever, that's almost as much about dropping NMSU and Idaho as it is about adding App State or Georgia Southern (or for a limited sample size, Coastal Carolina).
It's not a thing that happens often (nor should it) but dropping your lowest couple of programs has as much or more impact as adding a good one.
It was their dalliance with the old Big East 10 years that led to a lot of today's head-scratchers. (eg. F_U in CUSA, WVU in Big12, ND in ACC, etc). If not for their wandering eyes, there might still be a WAC football league.
I used to be a fan. I still respect what they've accomplished, but I dont admire them anymore. Their desire for a bigger pond has screwed up a lot for the rest of us.
I wonder about some of those instances in conference realignment where it really looked like a close thing between who was going to be doing the robbing and who was going to get robbed. Obviously, everyone tries to move uphill, so ultimately you have to assume that whether it was obvious or not, the money was on that side. But I wonder what CUSA would have looked like if the WAC we joined had hung together and instead of SMU/Rice/UTEP/Tulsa leaving we'd have been able to steal Houston and one other school (and send UTEP to the western division)? Or when BYU and Utah left the MWC if a stronger WAC isn't able to grab like AF and CSU and leave the rest?
Probably not.