Theres been alot of talk about why we should or should not add Nova... also talk about a split. This will hopefully give some insight into the politics of the BE
The BE is comprised of 16 members (soon to be 17) but there are "founding members" and then the others. The BE recognizes Georgetown, Providence, Nova, ST Johns, Seton Hall, Syracuse, Rutgers, Pitt, and Uconn. If your doing the counting, Yes there are 5 basketball schools and 4 football. Now the questions is why is that important.
I didnt understand it fully at first but we have an excellent BE resource at USFnation.com by the name of Bullpride and he pointed out that the Name and Rights are owned by the original members.
I'll paste his comments below and maybe this will help people understand:
One thing everyone needs to remember is that people throw around this word 'split' a bit to loosely. The big issues that no one is realizing when they throw around the word 'split' is as follows:
1. The NCAA requires a new conference to be formed for like 3 years as a provisional conference before allowing for bowl tie-ins, and tourney tie-ins. They could waive but that would take some effort.
2. The BCS auto-bid, AND monetary payments, are tied directly to the Big East Conference. If the football schools were to leave theoretically the BCS bid and the direct deposit from BCS stays. The BCS is much more difficult to change, and would require a special vote-- who here would want to beg all the big schools to allow us to keep our auto-bid?
3. The NCAA units...NCAA units is everytime a school (excluding football) makes a post-season NCAA Tourney the NCAA awards that conference a 'unit' and places a monetary value on it. As a team advances the unit value increases and the NCAA awards more. NCAA units are calculated based on a 5 or 7 year average so the big 7 couldn't automatically split out and start 'earning' units. They can be transfered conference to conference, but earning is averaged over a 7 year period. For a conference and schools like the BE schools who do amazingly well in men's and women's hoops, and ok in baseball and great in lacrosse this is important since all are positive earners.
4. The new television contract would be tied to the BE, and not the new conference.
5. The Big East name and rights are actually owned by the remaining original members. I believe I read the Big East recognizes Gtown, Providence, Nova, Sjohn, Seton Hall, Syracuse, RU, Pitt, and Uconn. Notice something strange? Yes, the non-football schools hold a majority, however if Nova moved up in football it would flip.
I also understand that many do not like the idea of 9 conference games but we are negotiating a new tv contract. at present we have 9 teams and can offer them 36 conference games, whereas with 10 teams we can offer them 45. 25% more games is worth money, so I seriously doubt that the addition will dilute the revenue, and the ability to flip a founding member into voting with football would allow the football programs to run the conference...for example, telling Depaul, Seton Hall and Providence to look for a new conference, or to add a new team if we wish.
If this is already known, I apologize but there seems to be several posts that have shown a lack of knowledge of the internal workings of the BE and when I saw Bullprides post, I really felt that maybe it would shed new light on the direction and reasoning behind the moves being made.
The BE is comprised of 16 members (soon to be 17) but there are "founding members" and then the others. The BE recognizes Georgetown, Providence, Nova, ST Johns, Seton Hall, Syracuse, Rutgers, Pitt, and Uconn. If your doing the counting, Yes there are 5 basketball schools and 4 football. Now the questions is why is that important.
I didnt understand it fully at first but we have an excellent BE resource at USFnation.com by the name of Bullpride and he pointed out that the Name and Rights are owned by the original members.
I'll paste his comments below and maybe this will help people understand:
One thing everyone needs to remember is that people throw around this word 'split' a bit to loosely. The big issues that no one is realizing when they throw around the word 'split' is as follows:
1. The NCAA requires a new conference to be formed for like 3 years as a provisional conference before allowing for bowl tie-ins, and tourney tie-ins. They could waive but that would take some effort.
2. The BCS auto-bid, AND monetary payments, are tied directly to the Big East Conference. If the football schools were to leave theoretically the BCS bid and the direct deposit from BCS stays. The BCS is much more difficult to change, and would require a special vote-- who here would want to beg all the big schools to allow us to keep our auto-bid?
3. The NCAA units...NCAA units is everytime a school (excluding football) makes a post-season NCAA Tourney the NCAA awards that conference a 'unit' and places a monetary value on it. As a team advances the unit value increases and the NCAA awards more. NCAA units are calculated based on a 5 or 7 year average so the big 7 couldn't automatically split out and start 'earning' units. They can be transfered conference to conference, but earning is averaged over a 7 year period. For a conference and schools like the BE schools who do amazingly well in men's and women's hoops, and ok in baseball and great in lacrosse this is important since all are positive earners.
4. The new television contract would be tied to the BE, and not the new conference.
5. The Big East name and rights are actually owned by the remaining original members. I believe I read the Big East recognizes Gtown, Providence, Nova, Sjohn, Seton Hall, Syracuse, RU, Pitt, and Uconn. Notice something strange? Yes, the non-football schools hold a majority, however if Nova moved up in football it would flip.
I also understand that many do not like the idea of 9 conference games but we are negotiating a new tv contract. at present we have 9 teams and can offer them 36 conference games, whereas with 10 teams we can offer them 45. 25% more games is worth money, so I seriously doubt that the addition will dilute the revenue, and the ability to flip a founding member into voting with football would allow the football programs to run the conference...for example, telling Depaul, Seton Hall and Providence to look for a new conference, or to add a new team if we wish.
If this is already known, I apologize but there seems to be several posts that have shown a lack of knowledge of the internal workings of the BE and when I saw Bullprides post, I really felt that maybe it would shed new light on the direction and reasoning behind the moves being made.