American Athletic Conference

[Rocky Mountain Shock]

For all the Mountain West love, do you realize we will be on TV even less than we are with the Valley?

Being in the Central time zone, away games will start at 8 and 9pm Central.

And we don't recruit out west.

We want to be the furthest west team in a conference, not the furthest east.

Good point about timing. The Mountain West does have its own TV network, though, so we would be on TV probably more often, though the exposure wouldn't necessarily be national on the same level as ESPN. But I would think games like UNLV-WSU or UNM-WSU would have more appeal to ESPN than Bradley-WSU or UNI-WSU, and I'm sure they could make the timing work.

As it is now, we don't play in many areas we heavily recruit: TX and the southeast. DW is from Vegas and Hatch was from AZ so we've been known to go west.

[Ta town]

Mine probably deserves an even worse scolding :)

I was saying it jokingly sorta, just can't think of enough negatives to outweigh the positive of a MWC membership. Again it won't happen but hate to read a post saying why they wouldn't want it to happen.

[wu_shizzle]

Who outside of us diehard fans know that the MWC is one of the best RPI conferences in the country?

Outside of the Southern California market, most western teams live in a media black hole.

[Ta town]

Who outside of us diehard fans know that the MWC is one of the best RPI conferences in the country?

Well the selection committee for one.

[cjp27]

Who has more respect nationally? Bradley, ISUr, ISUb, NIU (other upper division valley teams besides us and Creighton) or UNLV, SDSU, UNM, upper tier teams in the MWC. If the opportunity ever arose, the MWC is so much of a better option, that it should be a no brainer. The west coast games would be a bit of a downer timing wise, but the MWC gets 10 times the national respect than the MVC does. Most media types don't even consider it a mid major.

[wu_shizzle]

Well the selection committee for one.

And watch those MWC teams get screwed with seeding.

[Ta town]

And watch those MWC teams get screwed with seeding.

beats not getting in

[WstateU]

[ShockerPrez]

I dint really care about the time issue. Im concerned with multiple bids and fan bases. I believe the MWC is much better on both.

[rrshock]

MWC would also be better for all the other sports. It isn't only about 14 basketball. Though it is the major driver.

[wu_shizzle]

No doubt the MWC is a much better conference than the Valley. It's laughable to even compare the two.

I guess I see Gonzaga and Memphis as the model for Wichita State. "The" premier team, with the expectation to win conference titles every year.

Maybe we can be the 90's UNLV of the MWC.

[rrshock]

The MWC is a much better option than the MVC every day of the week.

[rrshock]

$50K is the buyout, correct?

[CBB_Fan]

I think we have a few options, but it is obvious what the most likely outcome is. No matter what, we need to finish this year strong and continue playing at a high level next season. If Creighton is still in the Valley, we have to curb stomp them, and if they aren't we have to win the Valley with some distance between us and #2. Our basketball needs to be our ticket, because we don't have the advantages of geography, connections (Catholic schools, eastern schools, privates schools, etc), or football.

If we do that, our first option is rebuilding the Valley. I know, it sucks. This may seem to be Creighton's fault, but really this is something that goes back 20, 30, even 40 years. Let's face it, the Valley is dying a slow death no matter what. It is getting worse by the decade, as quality teams leave and are replaced by lower end candidates and teams fall back into the woodwork. This won't change that a lot, but it might accelerate that. There are a couple decent teams to look into, including ORU, Valparaiso, and Denver. Nevertheless, the commitment to athletic strength and quality of the conference are going to go down.

Option two is to leave the Valley and try to secure a spot elsewhere. This is probably priority number one for fans, but it is harder to do because of all the external forces involved. Ideally, we make into the MWC as a non-football school, which would give us slightly more money and a chance to play in a much stronger conference. The only other viable option (assuming we don't do something silly and pull off a Butler or VCU like run, which might make us more attractive than Creighton/SLU to the C7 schools), would be the A-10. The A10 would require a lot more rebuilding than the Valley, and we likely wouldn't make the trip alone, so I doubt that would happen.

Option three is more extreme. It involves a large number of moving pieces, working to create a stronger conference out of multiple smaller conferences. The logistics and difficulties managing all the egos involved make this almost impossible, but it would be my preferred option outside of going to the MWC. If we cobble together the best MVC and A-10, we could create a conference that is competitive with the MWC, C7, and the soon to be renamed remnants of the Big East. Alternatively, we could try and create a truly nationwide conference with Gonzaga, Saint Mary's, BYU, us, VCU, and various other MVC and A10 schools. Such a conference would need to get a large TV deal to cover travel, but it would be the strongest basketball conference you could create.

I wouldn't bet on anything but staying in the Valley, for now. We need to stay strong to remain attractive, and see what opportunities arise.

[NattyMat]

Option three is more extreme. It involves a large number of moving pieces, working to create a stronger conference out of multiple smaller conferences. The logistics and difficulties managing all the egos involved make this almost impossible, but it would be my preferred option outside of going to the MWC. If we cobble together the best MVC and A-10, we could create a conference that is competitive with the MWC, C7, and the soon to be renamed remnants of the Big East. Alternatively, we could try and create a truly nationwide conference with Gonzaga, Saint Mary's, BYU, us, VCU, and various other MVC and A10 schools. Such a conference would need to get a large TV deal to cover travel, but it would be the strongest basketball conference you could create.

VCU fan here...and this is exactly the type of thing I've been trying to piece together since yesterday when I heard the top half of our conference was gone.

It sounds extreme, but you almost model this after something like the NFL (or maybe MLB is a better example?). 32-team conference, four divisions of 8. Basically have your groups of 8 compete against each other in the non-revenue sports then go on to some playoff against the other divisions to crown the conference champ in those sports...but then for revenue generating sports (football and men's bball), you could maybe have some type of "interleague" type of play...or maybe not. Maybe you just have four teams from each division compete in that conference tournament (for hoops I mean)...which could potentially include a group of teams like UConn, Cincinnati, Temple, Memphis, VCU, Wichita State, Gonzaga, St. Mary's, St. Joseph's, UNLV, San Diego State etc etc. That could be a pretty hot tournament that would truly garner interest from coast to coast.