Kit-Cat Wrote:

SO#1 Wrote:Last year, <span style='color:blue'>2004,</span> our first year as a member of the Big East we have a little over <span style='color:blue'>28,000 seasons ticket holder </span>which is very good among our peer group WVU – 29,500, Pitt – 35,000, RU – 12,500, SU – 27,000, and among new members UL – 34,000, UC-13,000 and USF – 16,100. We didn’t embarrass ourselves in our first year as a member of the Big East. We did compete (record 3-3, 7-4) and went to our first bowl and won.

UConn is going to be a MONSTER program.

Do you think a stadium expansion will be in the works to get you guys up to 60,000? It would only make sense sense you are already selling out before you've even made a top 25 appearance.

UConn's growth was really fueled by an established big time relationship with the Big East conference and with the Hartford community.

I don't think UMass has the kind of support potential financially or otherwise to pull of what UConn accomplished. Further, I would think UConn would block UMass from making the upgrade to the Big East with both schools so close.

Actually I think that UConn would fully support UMass upgrading to Division I-A and joining the Big East. UConn wanted to start a rivalry badly with Boston College because it would make geographical sense. UMass would also make geographical sense.

Cat's_Claw Wrote:Actually I think that UConn would fully support UMass upgrading to Division I-A and joining the Big East.  UConn wanted to start a rivalry badly with Boston College because it would make geographical sense.  UMass would also make geographical sense.

I'm not sure about that.

The Big East adding UMass with UConn already in the league is no different than adding Miami Ohio when UC already has that market.

HartfordCT-SpringfieldMA is a regional market. UMass is only 30 miles from UConn. Also UMass does not carry the Boston market like some believe.

UMass is an okay academic school but its clearly out shadowed by the Boston colleges. They've been in the A-10 a progressive conference for a number of years and their basketball still hasn't really taken off aside from the Calipari years.

Hopefully a UConn fan could weigh in on this one.

Kit-Cat Wrote:

Cat's_Claw Wrote:Actually I think that UConn would fully support UMass upgrading to Division I-A and joining the Big East.  UConn wanted to start a rivalry badly with Boston College because it would make geographical sense.  UMass would also make geographical sense.

I'm not sure about that.

The Big East adding UMass with UConn already in the league is no different than adding Miami Ohio when UC already has that market.

HartfordCT-SpringfieldMA is a regional market. UMass is only 30 miles from UConn. Also UMass does not carry the Boston market like some believe.

UMass is an okay academic school but its clearly out shadowed by the Boston colleges. They've been in the A-10 a progressive conference for a number of years and their basketball still hasn't really taken off aside from the Calipari years.

Hopefully a UConn fan could weigh in on this one.

That's a good point. I'm curious what the UConn fans think. I think the difference between UMass/UConn and UC/Miami-OH is that us and Miami share the same state and same market and have been Division I-A programs for a long time. I actually think that Boston College/UMass might be more of a problem then UConn/UMass.

KNIGHTTIME Wrote:some of those teams have a much larger T.V market though...T.V markets are so important these days.&nbsp; Did you wonder why the C-USA t.v package didn't decline?&nbsp; Brought in the markets of Orlando, Dallas, Houston, and El-Paso.

I would say most of the best best football programs in the nation are played in small towns (think SEC and Big 10). You can play in the largest city in America but if people don't care about, they aren't going to watch you and that negates a lot of what a market is worth.

StillJonesing Wrote:

KNIGHTTIME Wrote:some of those teams have a much larger T.V market though...T.V markets are so important these days.&nbsp; Did you wonder why the C-USA t.v package didn't decline?&nbsp; Brought in the markets of Orlando, Dallas, Houston, and El-Paso.

I would say most of the best best football programs in the nation are played in small towns (think SEC and Big 10). You can play in the largest city in America but if people don't care about, they aren't going to watch you and that negates a lot of what a market is worth.

Not only that but New England doesn't generate enough High School talent to support 3 1-As, it really doesn't even support 2 1-As that well as both UConn and BC recruit heavily outside New England.

KNIGHTTIME Wrote:some of those teams have a much larger T.V market though...T.V markets are so important these days. Did you wonder why the C-USA t.v package didn't decline? Brought in the markets of Orlando, Dallas, Houston, and El-Paso.

Also we already had Houston market and Dallas, with TCU, we just kept it.


as far as support:

Also on UMASS attendance they get about 8,000 fans a game and generally rank from 40-50 in D1aa football attendance and have a 17,000 seat stadium. They have gotten as many as 14,000 a game one year.

Delaware is pretty strong and usually around top 5 to 10 and get normally get 20,000's and have a 23,000 seat stadium. They have.

StillJonesing: You might have gotten the UD attendence stats from the NCAA. You need to remember that the NCAA includes I-AA playoff games in their stats. UD makes the playoffs just about every year and the games are announced a week or so beforehand and often students are off when some of the games are played. For that reason no I-AA team sells out playoff games. That is what brings UD's average attendence down to around 20k per game. The regular season games are all sold out and have been for the last 2 years and all sellouts are expected this year. Capacity is around 22k (used to be 23k but fell after renovations several years ago)..

Kit-Cat, your geography is off. UConn is in Storrs, which is in the Northeast corner of Connecticut. UMass is in Amherst, which is in the Far West section of Massachusetts. These two schools are not in Hartford and Springfield. UMass could work as a future Big East football team, but only if Syracuse were to leave. The Minutemen would be an emergency replacement.

Otherwise, the Big East football schools have no incentive to help UMass move up (game guarantees and other financial aid). The first two schools to be reviewed for expansion upon the split will be Temple and Central Florida due to reasons explained on other threads. If those two schools are unacceptable, for legitimate reasons, then the Presidents may look elsewhere.

Krocker Krapp Wrote:Kit-Cat, your geography is off. UConn is in Storrs, which is in the Northeast corner of Connecticut. UMass is in Amherst, which is in the Far West section of Massachusetts. These two schools are not in Hartford and Springfield.

Um, methinks he knows that. However, UConn plays its football in Hartford and the supposition is that UMass would do likewise: Building a larger stadium at the closest "major" city.

Rentschler(sp?) stadium was originally intended for both the Huskies and a relocated New England Patriots, if I'm not mistaken. Part of Hartford's attempts to step back onto the big stage. Even though the Pats move fell through they went ahead with the plan for UConn's sake, building the scaled down version we see today. By playing in Hartford they've been able to capture more walk-up sales, though as we've seen that's hardly a concern anyway. Since UMass would similarly need public investment chances are the stadium would be built in nearby Springfield to make it more accessible to general fans. And without recalling for sure, I think that was the recommendation of the consultants study suggesting they not move to 1-A without more support (public and private) and without guaranteed access into a BCS conference.

Krocker Krapp Wrote:Kit-Cat, your geography is off. UConn is in Storrs, which is in the Northeast corner of Connecticut. UMass is in Amherst, which is in the Far West section of Massachusetts. These two schools are not in Hartford and Springfield. UMass could work as a future Big East football team, but only if Syracuse were to leave. The Minutemen would be an emergency replacement.

Its true the two schools aren't quite as close as Hartford and Springfield....

Take a look at the map though:

<a href='http://www.mapquest.com/directions/main.adp?go=1&do=nw&rmm=1&un=m&cl=EN&ct=NA&rsres=1&1a=&1c=Storrs&1s=CT&1z=&2a=&2c=Amherst&2s=MA&2z=' target='_blank'>MapQuest</a>

UConn considers Hartford, and to a lessor extent Springfield as its territory.

The backup for Syracuse leaving is not UMass......it would be Buffalo another 1-A team in Western NY. Buffalo applied to the Big East 5 years ago and almost got in (nudged out by UConn).

we don't need expansion, if we expand too much we will fall apart

Kit-Cat Wrote:

Krocker Krapp Wrote:Kit-Cat, your geography is off. UConn is in Storrs, which is in the Northeast corner of Connecticut. UMass is in Amherst, which is in the Far West section of Massachusetts. These two schools are not in Hartford and Springfield. UMass could work as a future Big East football team, but only if Syracuse were to leave. The Minutemen would be an emergency replacement.

Its true the two schools aren't quite as close as Hartford and Springfield....

Take a look at the map though:

<a href='http://www.mapquest.com/directions/main.adp?go=1&do=nw&rmm=1&un=m&cl=EN&ct=NA&rsres=1&1a=&1c=Storrs&1s=CT&1z=&2a=&2c=Amherst&2s=MA&2z=' target='_blank'>MapQuest</a>

UConn considers Hartford, and to a lessor extent Springfield as its territory.

The backup for Syracuse leaving is not UMass......it would be Buffalo another 1-A team in Western NY. Buffalo applied to the Big East 5 years ago and almost got in (nudged out by UConn).

Buffalo may have applied to the BE and been turned down, as they should have been. But I doubt they were nudged out by Uconn. It was probably a landslide. :laugh:

cuseroc Wrote:It was probably a landslide. :laugh:

Quite a nudge... :eek:

Krocker Krapp Wrote:Kit-Cat, your geography is off. UConn is in Storrs, which is in the Northeast corner of Connecticut. UMass is in Amherst, which is in the Far West section of Massachusetts.

This is true of the campuses, but UConn plays half their bball games in the downtown Hartford Civic Center and plays football in East Hartford (just down the road).

If Buffalo were to become the best replacement/expansion team that the conference could find, then I would have to say the conference is in true trouble.

Jettison the bb schools. Set up a real conference. Perhaps, add 1 or 2, and then see what happens.

when did the Big east announce it was expanding? Did we all miss something?

When did Houston get invited into the Big East? Did we all (except TopCoog) miss the announcement?

mlbUC Wrote:When did Houston get invited into the Big East? Did we all (except TopCoog) miss the announcement?

mlbUC, for a change Coog is asking a legit question and not trolling so don't jump on him just yet. Strange as all that may sound.

brista, trust me, it was not a legit question... he says this on almost every expansion thread.