ESPN sources reporting Maryland ACCEPTS big ten invite. Rutgers voting tomorrow

Donate To GopherHole

John Galt said:
I realize it will be hard for you to understand this, but some of us remember when it was a 10 team conference in the midwest and we had natural rivalries with most of the schools. Times change, and it made sense to add Penn St. and Nebraska. Both of these schools border on the periphery of the midwest and can add value to the conference. Nebraska has a natural rivalry with Iowa, and Penn St. had natural rivalries with Ohio St. and Michigan. Maryland and Rutgers ruin the B1G brand, add marginal (at best) teams and academic universities, and are as foreign to the midwest as pretty much any place in America. As others have said, if you're going to expand, add Kansas, Pitt, or even Syracuse. The addition of these schools is a terrible decision.
Click to expand...


Are you serious??? Both Rutgers and Maryland are AAU members. They are elite academic institutions. Maryland was rated as one of the Top 20 universities in the country by US News and World Report in their rankings. Degrade their sports programs if you like, but before "we" start calling other programs marginal in their success, "we" might better take a look in the mirror.
 

US News and World Report rankings are garbage, but both schools are internationally prestigious and do a tremendous amount of research. They're much better fits academically than Notre Dame, which focuses on undergraduate education.

We're just in a different world today than when the conferences were formed. It would be an adventure to play Rutgers 100 years ago. Today they drive down to MSP and hop a charter flight to Newark. It's easier to get to Rutgers and Maryland from Minneapolis than Purdue or Indiana.
 

NateDawgUM said:
US News and World Report rankings are garbage, but both schools are internationally prestigious and do a tremendous amount of research. They're much better fits academically than Notre Dame, which focuses on undergraduate education.
Click to expand...

I agree about US News Rankings as well, just throwing it out there. The fact that they are AAU members is enough to show they are not "marginal" schools as was mentioned.
 

NateDawgUM said:
US News and World Report rankings are garbage, but both schools are internationally prestigious and do a tremendous amount of research. They're much better fits academically than Notre Dame, which focuses on undergraduate education.

We're just in a different world today than when the conferences were formed. It would be an adventure to play Rutgers 100 years ago. Today they drive down to MSP and hop a charter flight to Newark. It's easier to get to Rutgers and Maryland from Minneapolis than Purdue or Indiana.
Click to expand...

U2Gopher said:
I agree about US News Rankings as well, just throwing it out there. The fact that they are AAU members is enough to show they are not "marginal" schools as was mentioned.
Click to expand...

Yeah, you can say what you want about the rankings (I don't put much stock in them either) but to say that Maryland and Rutgers are at best marginal would be to say the same about the University of Minnesota, which I don't think anyone on here would. I will disagree that with you U2 that they are elite academic institutions, but they are in the next tier right along with us (and most of the Big Ten).
 


These rankings are more important as far as research is concerned: http://mup.asu.edu/research2011.pdf

B1G in the top tier (1-25):
Michigan
Wisconsin
Minnesota
Northwestern
Ohio State
Illinois
Penn State
Purdue
Michigan State
Maryland

In the 2nd tier (26-50):
Iowa
Rutgers
Indiana

Nebraska falls into the 2nd tier of public universities.
 

Gopher07 said:
Jim Delany is on a rampage to destroy Notre Dame's new affiliation, I'm sure of it.
Click to expand...

If he followed up Maryland and Rutgers with... Syracuse and Boston College. Consider it done.

Also consider the Hockey Conference upgraded a tad...

Edit: Snag with the AAU thing, but this is really about money anyway. AAU status is marginal, just like athletic prestige.
 

NateDawgUM said:
US News and World Report rankings are garbage, but both schools are internationally prestigious and do a tremendous amount of research. They're much better fits academically than Notre Dame, which focuses on undergraduate education.

We're just in a different world today than when the conferences were formed. It would be an adventure to play Rutgers 100 years ago. Today they drive down to MSP and hop a charter flight to Newark. It's easier to get to Rutgers and Maryland from Minneapolis than Purdue or Indiana.
Click to expand...

It might be easy for the team to hop on a charter plane to Newark (who's to say they can't do the same to the airport at Bloomington or W Lafayette??) but it sure isn't easier for me. I cannot make the drive to New Brunswick or DC very easily (or cheaply) in one day. Neither can the equipment truck. Or the marching band.

And all that to see a team I could really care less about. And I'm sure that's how many people felt about Penn St when they were added in 93 (I was only 8 so I had no opinion...) and how some people in Ohio/Michigan feel about Nebraska. At least they were rewarded with a truly historic program with a great fanbase and similar culture of people.
 

RailBaronYarr said:
It might be easy for the team to hop on a charter plane to Newark (who's to say they can't do the same to the airport at Bloomington or W Lafayette??) but it sure isn't easier for me. I cannot make the drive to New Brunswick or DC very easily (or cheaply) in one day. Neither can the equipment truck. Or the marching band.

And all that to see a team I could really care less about. And I'm sure that's how many people felt about Penn St when they were added in 93 (I was only 8 so I had no opinion...) and how some people in Ohio/Michigan feel about Nebraska. At least they were rewarded with a truly historic program with a great fanbase and similar culture of people.
Click to expand...

We do have a skewed vision as we're on the edge of the conference, geographically, though. It's basically no further (or closer, even) for Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State and Indiana to travel to College Park than it is for them to travel to Minneapolis - and Michigan, MSU, OSU and PSU are closer to New Brunswick as well.
 



Gopher07 said:
We do have a skewed vision as we're on the edge of the conference, geographically, though. It's basically no further (or closer, even) for Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State and Indiana to travel to College Park than it is for them to travel to Minneapolis - and Michigan, MSU, OSU and PSU are closer to New Brunswick as well.
Click to expand...

Nebraska, Iowa, and Wisconsin are all relatively the same distance as us to a Rutgers or Maryland.

And at the end of the day, simply because Michigan or OSU are just as far from Maryland as they are to Minneapolis isn't enough justification to add them. Maryland hasn't been in the Big Ten for over 100 years like MN has.

I guess has anyone heard if Michigan or OSU fans are excited about the additions? That would prove if our 'skewed' view based on our location is true or not.
 

Boston College would bring the Boston/Northeast television market at least as much as Rutgers brings NYC. Nebraska isn't an AAU school either, so if it's about money than BC would draw more eyeballs than North Carolina. And with Maryland on board we don't need Virgina. Adding Georgia Tech destroys the 'contiguous states' nonsense but brings in the $$Atlanta market. If you are going to sell out than really sell out.
 

RailBaronYarr said:
Nebraska, Iowa, and Wisconsin are all relatively the same distance as us to a Rutgers or Maryland.

And at the end of the day, simply because Michigan or OSU are just as far from Maryland as they are to Minneapolis isn't enough justification to add them. Maryland hasn't been in the Big Ten for over 100 years like MN has.

I guess has anyone heard if Michigan or OSU fans are excited about the additions? That would prove if our 'skewed' view based on our location is true or not.
Click to expand...

Michigan and OSU fans don't know we exist :)

But from what I've read, it's the same arguments that are going on here. I, for one, can't do much about it so I'm planning on enjoying the ride. College football is seismically changing. Change with it, or get left behind
 

Maryland is having bigger attendance problems than we are. Their athletic department is probably looking forward to PSU and OSU fans helping to sell out their stadium, much like the NE/WI/IA situation here.
 



Michigan's fight song lyric "Champions of the West" just got even more confusing.
 

The perception from all the fan bases has been pretty negative when it comes to Maryland and Rutgers joining the B1G. You can easily find their opinion on it if you look around and read what these fan bases say. Hell, even Nebraska fas are upset about these two teams joining the B1G.

I think the B1G should have went after and West Virginia since it is closer to B1G teams than Maryland and Rutgers, and we also should have gone after Oklahoma. There we have another knock out name in Oklahoma (Plus it brings in another major rivalry with Nebraska like OSU and UM). and we could have gotten a Wisky, Michigan State type team in West Virgina.
 

Gopher07 said:
Michigan and OSU fans don't know we exist :)

But from what I've read, it's the same arguments that are going on here. I, for one, can't do much about it so I'm planning on enjoying the ride. College football is seismically changing. Change with it, or get left behind
Click to expand...

I guess I'd rather be "left behind" by playing closer, traditional opponents. We may not be able to complain about team talent dilution to the league, but I'm not sure how OSU, Michigan, PSU, and Nebraska feel about adding 2 historically mediocre teams to the possible schedule in place of other more quality opponents year in and out (the likes of Iowa, Purdue on their up years, Wisconsin, even MSU and Northwestern).

I'm just confused who exactly is screaming for this change. Current Big Ten fans can already catch every game on tv if they want to. We don't need to add more teams to help increase the current fan experience - we're only adding teams to increase the media footprint to bring in more money at the expense of fan enjoyment (read any message board and the reaction is overwhelmingly negative). Athletic departments won't suddenly be raking in tons of profits and sending it back to the general fund to lower tuition, they'll use the added moneys to "upgrade facilities and pay coached higher salaries." Will this make the quality of the game any better? No. Will it level the playing field for schools like MN, Indiana, etc (or similar programs in other conferences)? No. The disparity between the haves and have nots will still be the same, they'll just have shinier 3 year old weight facilities than ours (possibly gold plated like at USC???).

Just don't see the point, and why even be in a conference if we don't play a given team for a 4 year stretch? How can any rivalry, relationship, or history be made if a student could spend their entire collegiate experience never playing a member team??
 

MadtownGopher said:
I think they'd do 4 divisions of 4 and rotate the divisional crossover/matchups like the NFL does.

East: Maryland, Rutgers, Penn State, Ohio State
Central: Michigan, Michigan State, Purdue, Indiana
South: Illinois, Northwestern, X, X
West: Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Nebraska

For example.
Click to expand...

I would rather not be in the same division with Bucky and Husker. Anyway....just not happy about ether of these teams. I don't want to turn on BTN and watch the Terps or Scarlet Knights play football.
 

Now the Gophers can seek revenge for the 1977 Hall of Fame Bowl loss to Maryland.
 




if increasing the number of eyeballs is the key to our expansionary m.o., you'd have to think that boston college and texas are next on our list of preferred targets.
 

You must log in or register to reply here.



Top Bottom