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The following is from the New York Times:
The conflict between the Big East and Atlantic Coast Conferences has been more difficult to follow than a game of three-card monte, and has often been just as unseemly. Who is in and who is out? Who is going where? And which colleges, exactly, are the plaintiffs and which are the defendants in a lawsuit filed to halt the A.C.C.'s expansion?
The answers seem to change almost daily.
Donna E. Shalala, president of the University of Miami, yesterday remained undecided about whether to accept the A.C.C.'s invitation. The presidents of Syracuse and B.C. contacted Shalala and told her that they were "deeply desirous of getting the Big East Conference reconstituted" and asked her to examine a new proposal by the Big East. On Thursday, she made a surprising announcement that she was considering a counterproposal from the Big East.
Meanwhile, Virginia Tech last night received a formal invitation from the A.C.C. and will accept, the university president Charles M. Steger, said in an open letter to the alumni. The A.C.C. unexpectedly invited Virginia Tech into the conference this week after courting Syracuse and Boston College.
But cutting through the confusion, the maneuvering can be summed up very simply: It is about money, and particularly about football money.
"It's ludicrous for anybody to say this isn't about the money," said Mark Ganis, president of SportsCorp Ltd., an industry consulting firm. "It's so inaccurate that it offends the sensibilities. Any thinking person understands this is about big dollars in major collegiate athletic programs. Why say it isn't?"
The biggest dollars are reserved for football.
"Football is what drives the college sports train," said Tim DeSchriver, assistant professor of sports marketing at the University of Massachusetts.
And it is the Bowl Championship Series that drives college football.
The B.C.S., formed in 1998, is an alliance of four major bowls, the Rose, Fiesta, Orange and Sugar, and six conferences, the Big East, A.C.C., Pacific-10, Big Ten, Southeastern and Big 12, intended to produce a season-ending national championship game.
The winners of each of the six conferences qualify for one of the B.C.S. bowl games. There are five other conferences (Western Athletic, Mountain West, Conference USA, Mid-American, Sunbelt) that play Division I-A football. A college from one of those conferences can advance to a B.C.S. bowl by winning one of two at-large bids, but this has never happened.
B.C.S. revenue from the 2002-3 season was $114 million. More than $109 million of that total was distributed to the six member conferences and their universities. The remainder was divided among 13 other conferences.
The A.C.C., which received a B.C.S. payout of more than $16.5 million last year, was founded in 1953 with seven members. Over the years, it has carved out a niche as a basketball conference, one of the best in the country. It has never been able to scale the same heights in football, despite adding Florida State, a perennial football power, in 1992.
By attracting two major football programs to the conference, the A.C.C. would be in a better position to receive an additional $4.7 million, the value of placing a second team — in addition to Florida State — in a B.C.S. bowl game.
And there are other revenue possibilities for the A.C.C. The B.C.S. television contract expires after the 2006 bowl games, and if a weakened Big East is not included in the B.C.S., and no other conference is added to the alliance, the A.C.C. could gain another $4 million or $5 million.
"Losing Miami and Virginia Tech is a big problem for them," DeSchriver said of the Big East.
The A.C.C. can also negotiate a bigger television contract with Miami, the five-time national champion, as a draw. Television revenue was the likely reason the A.C.C. courted Boston College, which would have attracted viewers in New England.
It appears that the A.C.C. may soon be in a position to stage a conference championship game, a goal of an earlier plan to expand to 12 teams by adding Miami, Syracuse and Boston College. Under N.C.A.A. rules, a conference must have at least 12 teams to hold a football championship game. The 2003 Southeastern Conference championship generated $12.4 million in revenue. Adding just two universities would leave the A.C.C. one short, leading to speculation that the conference's recruiting is not over.
The conflict between the Big East and Atlantic Coast Conferences has been more difficult to follow than a game of three-card monte, and has often been just as unseemly. Who is in and who is out? Who is going where? And which colleges, exactly, are the plaintiffs and which are the defendants in a lawsuit filed to halt the A.C.C.'s expansion?
The answers seem to change almost daily.
Donna E. Shalala, president of the University of Miami, yesterday remained undecided about whether to accept the A.C.C.'s invitation. The presidents of Syracuse and B.C. contacted Shalala and told her that they were "deeply desirous of getting the Big East Conference reconstituted" and asked her to examine a new proposal by the Big East. On Thursday, she made a surprising announcement that she was considering a counterproposal from the Big East.
Meanwhile, Virginia Tech last night received a formal invitation from the A.C.C. and will accept, the university president Charles M. Steger, said in an open letter to the alumni. The A.C.C. unexpectedly invited Virginia Tech into the conference this week after courting Syracuse and Boston College.
But cutting through the confusion, the maneuvering can be summed up very simply: It is about money, and particularly about football money.
"It's ludicrous for anybody to say this isn't about the money," said Mark Ganis, president of SportsCorp Ltd., an industry consulting firm. "It's so inaccurate that it offends the sensibilities. Any thinking person understands this is about big dollars in major collegiate athletic programs. Why say it isn't?"
The biggest dollars are reserved for football.
"Football is what drives the college sports train," said Tim DeSchriver, assistant professor of sports marketing at the University of Massachusetts.
And it is the Bowl Championship Series that drives college football.
The B.C.S., formed in 1998, is an alliance of four major bowls, the Rose, Fiesta, Orange and Sugar, and six conferences, the Big East, A.C.C., Pacific-10, Big Ten, Southeastern and Big 12, intended to produce a season-ending national championship game.
The winners of each of the six conferences qualify for one of the B.C.S. bowl games. There are five other conferences (Western Athletic, Mountain West, Conference USA, Mid-American, Sunbelt) that play Division I-A football. A college from one of those conferences can advance to a B.C.S. bowl by winning one of two at-large bids, but this has never happened.
B.C.S. revenue from the 2002-3 season was $114 million. More than $109 million of that total was distributed to the six member conferences and their universities. The remainder was divided among 13 other conferences.
The A.C.C., which received a B.C.S. payout of more than $16.5 million last year, was founded in 1953 with seven members. Over the years, it has carved out a niche as a basketball conference, one of the best in the country. It has never been able to scale the same heights in football, despite adding Florida State, a perennial football power, in 1992.
By attracting two major football programs to the conference, the A.C.C. would be in a better position to receive an additional $4.7 million, the value of placing a second team — in addition to Florida State — in a B.C.S. bowl game.
And there are other revenue possibilities for the A.C.C. The B.C.S. television contract expires after the 2006 bowl games, and if a weakened Big East is not included in the B.C.S., and no other conference is added to the alliance, the A.C.C. could gain another $4 million or $5 million.
"Losing Miami and Virginia Tech is a big problem for them," DeSchriver said of the Big East.
The A.C.C. can also negotiate a bigger television contract with Miami, the five-time national champion, as a draw. Television revenue was the likely reason the A.C.C. courted Boston College, which would have attracted viewers in New England.
It appears that the A.C.C. may soon be in a position to stage a conference championship game, a goal of an earlier plan to expand to 12 teams by adding Miami, Syracuse and Boston College. Under N.C.A.A. rules, a conference must have at least 12 teams to hold a football championship game. The 2003 Southeastern Conference championship generated $12.4 million in revenue. Adding just two universities would leave the A.C.C. one short, leading to speculation that the conference's recruiting is not over.