Is it fair that Notre Dame is independent?

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The SEC and ACC will continue to pander to Notre Dame to make sure they don’t join the Big Ten (which would cause some of their members to follow ND).

Once Notre Dame has sucked all the blood out of the ACC, and it is fully-destroyed, the Big 12 will agree to a similar deal that ND had with the ACC.
 

Goldmember said:
The SEC and ACC will continue to pander to Notre Dame to make sure they don’t join the Big Ten (which would cause some of their members to follow ND).

Once Notre Dame has sucked all the blood out of the ACC, and it is fully-destroyed, the Big 12 will agree to a similar deal that ND had with the ACC.
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To be honest, I don’t think the B1G is going to kiss Notre Dame‘s ass. I’m sure they want them to join the B1G. But, they’ll have to join on the terms of any other school.
 


Goldmember said:
The SEC and ACC will continue to pander to Notre Dame to make sure they don’t join the Big Ten (which would cause some of their members to follow ND).

Once Notre Dame has sucked all the blood out of the ACC, and it is fully-destroyed, the Big 12 will agree to a similar deal that ND had with the ACC.
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You really think Notre Dame based on their academic standing is in any way going to be associated with quite frankly the majority of other institutions in the Big 12?

They also need a respectable conference for all their other sports, which is the big reason they are currently associated with the ACC. Though, I suppose a return to the current Big East would be plausible if (or when) the ACC implodes a la the PAC 2.
 

I've always thought the "they wouldn't be this good if they had to run the power conference gauntlet" was cheap circular logic used by people who claimed a 12-0 midmajor wasn't very good to try to explain away them beating a top team in a bowl game. Easy to say and impossible to disprove. Sure, they probably wouldn't go 12-0, but it was pretty rich to claim that a team who never once slipped up in a full season against D1 competition and proved they can beat a top tier team cant run with the big dogs.
 

From the $ prospective it would be interesting to add up all of the $ the numerous BIG teams made during bowl season. I was under the impression that BIG teams kept half of the money they each made with the other 50% going into the BIG pot to be split 17 ways. I could be wrong. 12 teams made bowls from the BIG. so lots of $ floating around to be split 18 ways.
 

nitramnaed said:
I agree. I’m not really sure what the advantage is for the B1G to go into the Florida panhandle.
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A wild idea would be USF (South Florida) instead of FSU. Not only is it the opposite acronym but USF just joined the AAU in 2024, is located in a top 15 media market (Tampa Bay), and plays in a NFL stadium.

I know they don't have the football history or massive fan base of FSU, but they would surely accept an offer and would probably be an example of "if you build it, they will come"

A Florida expansion for the Big Ten might be USF and Miami, both in the AAU. Checks the TV market boxes.
 



fmlizard said:
A wild idea would be USF (South Florida) instead of FSU. Not only is it the opposite acronym but USF just joined the AAU in 2024, is located in a top 15 media market (Tampa Bay), and plays in a NFL stadium.

I know they don't have the football history or massive fan base of FSU, but they would surely accept an offer and would probably be an example of "if you build it, they will come"

A Florida expansion for the Big Ten might be USF and Miami, both in the AAU. Checks the TV market boxes.
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Florida state or Miami is a target
I doubt both


I don’t think 19 is the move. It’s 20 or 24.

If it’s 24 it’s 6 of - the issue will be if the big ten goes to 24 they’ll probably be competing with the SEC for some of these schools:

Notre Dame - not AAU
Texas A&M - If they’re pissed enough about Texas
Florida state - not AAU
Miami - private
Georgia Tech - Atlanta
North Carolina - flagship
Virginia - flagship
Arizona State - one of the largest universities in the world
Colorado - flagship
Utah - flagship

Distant 11th would be Kansas or someone else I haven’t mentioned



If they add 2. A 20 team schedule is really nice with 9 games.
You go 4 groups of 5. Play your whole group and an entire other group.
You rotate groups every year. So you play everyone home and home in 6 years. You have 4 you play every year.

If they add 6 a 24 game schedule is a little more complicated. At 24 or 28 I think they expanded beyond a 9 game schedule.
24 is really nice for an 11 game conference schedule.
28 is really nice for a 12-13 game schedule.

If the new playoff model has set number of bids by league…you don’t really need non conference games anymore.
 
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Some guy said:
Florida state or Miami is a target
I doubt both


I don’t think 19 is the move. It’s 20 or 24.

If it’s 24 it’s 6 of - the issue will be if the big ten goes to 24 they’ll probably be competing with the SEC for some of these schools:

Notre Dame - not AAU
Texas A&M - If they’re pissed enough about Texas
Florida state - not AAU
Miami - private
Georgia Tech - Atlanta
North Carolina - flagship
Virginia - flagship
Arizona State - one of the largest universities in the world
Colorado - flagship
Utah - flagship

Distant 11th would be Kansas or someone else I haven’t mentioned



If they add 2. A 20 team schedule is really nice with 9 games.
You go 4 groups of 5. Play your whole group and an entire other group.
You rotate groups every year. So you play everyone home and home in 6 years. You have 4 you play every year.

If they add 6 a 24 game schedule is a little more complicated. At 24 or 28 I think they expanded beyond a 9 game schedule.
24 is really nice for an 11 game conference schedule.
28 is really nice for a 12-13 game schedule.

If the new playoff model has set number of bids by league…you don’t really need non conference games anymore.
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Bolded: or (dare I say) conf championship games anymore? NFL divisions don't
 

28 teams works really nicely with 11 conf games and 3 "locked in" (at least for a period) opponents, leaving 8 remaining conf games to play the remaining 24 teams which you can do in 3 seasons.

Or you could do 28 with 12 conf games and 2 "locked in", play the remaining 25 teams each twice in 5 years with the remaining 10 conf games/year.

Is Iowa the only one who wanted (and got) 3 permanent rivalries in the current schedule format? Guessing they'd give up Wisconsin before Nebraska if they could only have two.
 



GopherGrit said:
28 teams works really nicely with 11 conf games and 3 "locked in" (at least for a period) opponents, leaving 8 remaining conf games to play the remaining 24 teams which you can do in 3 seasons.

Or you could do 28 with 12 conf games and 2 "locked in", play the remaining 25 teams each twice in 5 years with the remaining 10 conf games/year.

Is Iowa the only one who wanted (and got) 3 permanent rivalries in the current schedule format? Guessing they'd give up Wisconsin before Nebraska if they could only have two.
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I think once they get to 20+ they do groupings to create round robins

The big ten doesn’t want their 7th best team in the playoff instead of the 4th because of scheduling.
It worked out for the big ten this year…I think you could argue that Tennessee was the 5-7th best team in the SEC this year but due to their schedule got the 3rd SEC bid. That’s good for TN but bad for the conference when Tennessee gets run.

If you get into four groupings (of 5 at 20, 6 at 24, 7 at 28) then build a schedule where you play all your group plus all of another group (takes 9 games with 20, 11 with 24, 13 with 28) you can funnel your best teams towards having the best seasons. You can also maintain rivalries by having them in same groups. You can also play everyone in the league home and home in 6 years.



Conferences eventually did away with divisions so that they quit having their 3rd-5th best team in the championship instead of the 2nd best.
Eventually they’re going to make the same calculations and do away with unbalanced scheduling so their best teams are the ones in the playoff instead of the best records.
 

Some guy said:
I think once they get to 20+ they do groupings to create round robins

The big ten doesn’t want their 7th best team in the playoff instead of the 4th because of scheduling.
It worked out for the big ten this year…I think you could argue that Tennessee was the 5-7th best team in the SEC this year but due to their schedule got the 3rd SEC bid. That’s good for TN but bad for the conference when Tennessee gets run.

If you get into four groupings (of 5 at 20, 6 at 24, 7 at 28) then build a schedule where you play all your group plus all of another group (takes 9 games with 20, 11 with 24, 13 with 28) you can funnel your best teams towards having the best seasons. You can also maintain rivalries by having them in same groups. You can also play everyone in the league home and home in 6 years.



Conferences eventually did away with divisions so that they quit having their 3rd-5th best team in the championship instead of the 2nd best.
Eventually they’re going to make the same calculations and do away with unbalanced scheduling so their best teams are the ones in the playoff instead of the best records.
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I'm down for this.

Minn, Wisc, Iowa, Neb, and Illinois? I only did that last one because of Bert. Need another Western team to go with the four Western, Arizona State would be my choice.

That's four groups of five. Maybe six works even better if you get two more Western teams, ASU and Stanford? Then Illinois and NW can pair up with MN WI IA NE.

Don't know how the eastern timezone schools would group up or who you add. North Carolina and Virginia?

At that point you could almost do "OGs" vs "Non OGs", with UNC, Virginia, Maryland, Rutgers, and Penn State in one group.

Who am I missing? Oh right that only gets you to 22, need two more.
 

GopherGrit said:
I'm down for this.

Minn, Wisc, Iowa, Neb, and Illinois? I only did that last one because of Bert. Need another Western team to go with the four Western, Arizona State would be my choice.

That's four groups of five. Maybe six works even better if you get two more Western teams, ASU and Stanford? Then Illinois and NW can pair up with MN WI IA NE.

Don't know how the eastern timezone schools would group up or who you add. North Carolina and Virginia?

At that point you could almost do "OGs" vs "Non OGs", with UNC, Virginia, Maryland, Rutgers, and Penn State in one group.

Who am I missing? Oh right that only gets you to 22, need two more.
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21, 22, and 23 are awful numbers to schedule it’ll be 20, 24, or 28 eventually


West
USC
Oregon
Washington
UCLA
Notre Dame
(Arizona State)
(Utah)


Midwest
Minnesota
Nebraska
Iowa
Wisconsin
Illinois
(Colorado)
(Texas A&M)

Great Lakes
Purdue
Indiana
Ohio state
Michigan state
Michigan
Northwestern
(Kansas but move Illinois here and put Kansas there)


Atlantic
Penn state
Rutgers
Maryland
2-4 of Virginia-North Carolina-Florida State-Georgia tech


The imbalance between groups doesn’t matter nearly as much because you’re always playing an entire other group. So if your group sucks it’ll simply get beat by another group.


This 28 team league has 400 electoral votes assuming Rutgers gives access to New York, CT, and RI markets




At just 20 teams if the speculated ND and FSU were the additions I think it would go:

ND
USC
UCLA
Oregon
Washington

Nebraska
Minnesota
Iowa
Wisconsin
Illinois

Northwestern
Michigan
Michigan state
Ohio state
Purdue

Indiana
Penn state
Florida state
Rutgers
Maryland

This would also guarantee everyone no more than two west coast road trips in the same season any would also guarantee the west coast teams at least one of their road games was on west coast… which limits them to 3-4 non west coast games per year
 
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Some guy said:
Notre dame probably collects more than 20 million less in media revenue than Purdue does

So they better keep making the playoff and winning games
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My thought exactly. They likely come up short of the last place B1G team overall for media revenue.
 

Gophers7NatTitlesBadgers0 said:
My thought exactly. They likely come up short of the last place B1G team overall for media revenue.
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I do think there is an argument the 12 team hodge podge schedule is easier because you don’t have the “conference” rivalry gauntlet and no conference title game. But I personally think conference title games are stupid if you don’t have divisions or round robins AND in the 12 team playoff 5 of the 12 teams did not play in one. That’s not unique to Notre Dame. Of the bottom 8 teams 5/8 didn’t play in one. Unless you redo the rankings a non championship game HAD to host a home game.

But in the 12 team era that bothers me less because if notre dame didn’t deserve to be there they would’ve gotten beaten by Indiana, the SEC champ, or Penn state
 

Ope3 said:
As long as Notre Dame doesn't get a Bye in the CFP, I think it's completely fair.

That offsets the fact that the they aren't subject to a Conference Championship/13th Game.
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I’m not even sure there’s a disadvantage to playing conference championships anymore unless you get completely blown out.
 


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