The Official 2011 NCAA College Football Thread

**Telionis** · 01-05-2012, 08:07 PM

Originally Posted by stealthee

And the ACC is only MARGINALLY better than the current Big East at best. To think otherwise is just ludicrous.

If you're talking about football strength, then yes I agree entirely. We might have a marginal lead top to bottom, but both conferences are notably inferior to the SEC and Big12, and somewhat inferior to the B1G. This is however, entirely immaterial.

In terms of stability and revenue, the ACC is 100x better off than the Big East. We have the biggest buyout (maybe 2nd), we have 14 teams, with several others begging to join, and even if everything went to shit, we could afford to lose all our prospects and two of our current teams and still maintain a 12-team league with a televised championship game. We have a much better TV deal than the Big East, and that will surely improve in the future (especially when tied in with bball). We're much stronger in non-revenue sports, much stronger academically, with Cuse and Pitt (probably UConn) we'll regain the Basketball crown, and we enjoy much greater parity and tradition than the Big East. The last ten years has seen some mediocrity, but football is cyclical, surely Clemson, FSU, Miami, Syracuse and GT won't remain "meh" 8-4 teams forever. FSU and Clemson are already showing strong signs of resurgence (look at their recruiting over the last two years, it rivals the top SEC teams).

Think about this: when was the last time that Notre Dame has won a BCS bowl? When was the last time they were in the national title hunt? Sh-t, when was their last really good season (2011 wasn't bad, but wasn't old school ND)? All totally irrelevant, they're still the single most sought after team in the land. Tradition + TV deals + fan base = money >>> real-time football strength. Boise State has undoubtedly been a better team the last five years, but what conference would take Boise State over ND? For the same reasons, even if the Big East was much stronger than the ACC in football today, there is no question as to which one is the superior choice for a team expecting to stay there for 100 years.

I'm sure WVU's board agrees, while the Big 12 seems extremely unstable as well, it is undoubtedly in better shape than the Big East. It is hard to fault WVU for jumping ship. Even though USF, Cinci and Louisville are also great teams and will be utterly f-cked when WVU does. I'm sure they'll be as mad at WVU as WVU was at VT/Miami/BC, but WVU would have been stupid to go down with a sinking ship.
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Do not take my criticism of the Big East to imply that I hate it. I do like the ACC better (not a fan of bball only schools mixed in), but the Big East was a great league (and certainly underrated during the late 1990s). Just like MWC, they had a damn good shot at becoming a seriously powerful conference, but things just didn't work out, and now they're taking on water while their big boys are jumping ship. It's sad for both conferences, but it'd be foolish for TCU and WVU not to save themselves.

**JasonY** · 01-05-2012, 08:10 PM

WVU should have left the pedal to the metal and gone for the century mark!

Jason

**stealthee** · 01-05-2012, 08:23 PM

Originally Posted by JasonY

WVU should have left the pedal to the metal and gone for the century mark!

Jason

That would have been epic.

**BigTyla** · 01-06-2012, 09:54 AM

Dyer has been granted a release for conditional transfer by AU. Good riddance.

**HilbillyHomeboy** · 01-06-2012, 10:00 AM

We will play in the B12 next year. If you'd like to lose some money on that bet, I'm more than willing to take it from you.

Yes, we did fight to keep the league together. Unfortunately our commissioner is brain dead and failed to keep a balance between basketball and football. No one gave a shit until we flipped 'em the bird and said we're out. Now, all of the sudden, they add teams(most of which do little for the league, especially when you factor what is departing. TCU isn't stupid, they saw the writing on the wall).

Recruiting class rank is often extremely misleading. Big recruits can turn into busts; overlooked guys can become superstars. Case in point, Tyran Mathieu, LSU is the only school to offer him. Dude is ridiculous. WV never has 5 star recruits, we don't even get many 4 star guys, yet we perennially field a pretty damn good team.

Haha, Jason, I'm with you. I fully believed we would beat Clemson, but I certainly didn't think it would be to the tune of 70 points, 6 TD passes, etc. That's the offense we expected to see all year. Great way to ride into the B12. The guys appear to have fully bought in to the system, and we should be extremely competitive with the big dogs next year.

Jeremy

**HilbillyHomeboy** · 01-06-2012, 10:01 AM

Originally Posted by BigTyla

Dyer has been granted a release for conditional transfer by AU. Good riddance.

Has it ever come to light what he did?

Jeremy

**BigTyla** · 01-06-2012, 10:15 AM

Originally Posted by HilbillyHomeboy

Has it ever come to light what he did?

Jeremy

Nope, and it probably never will.

I do have a distant connection to a teammate though, and rumor has it that he failed a drug test but the coaches didn't tell him. Instead, they followed him back to his residence, went into his room, and found him smoking pot. Add to that reports of attitude problems this year and I can see why Chizik suspended him indefinitely if this is all true. Homeboy needs to recognize that we can do just fine without him. Hell, we'll be at least 5-deep at RB next season without him. McCalebb (aka FAH or Fast as Hell), Mason, Blakely, Grant, and Robinson (on our 2012 commit list) are all 4-star athletes who will be playing for us next year. Since he likely would have had to sit out half the year, I can see why he wants to leave. Bye bye!