RE: A Future UC Schedule

From: Shinkle, Randy
Date: 06 Nov 2003 - 03:44 PM EST

A followup ....

Here's a quote from Andy Katz at ESPN:

"The exit fee for teams leaving Conference USA has been altered. No longer are the schools fully responsible for the decrease in a television contract. The original exit penalties included a clause that teams leaving would be responsible for the difference in dollars of a negotiated television contract. Conference USA's television contract will drop considerably, to the tens of millions of dollars, once the teams leave for the Big East. ESPN has the right to re-negotiate with a conference once its league membership changes. Instead, the departed schools must agree to schedule the remaining teams."

So, we should expect to see some C-USA teams on the schedule in the future, just as Dayton is on the schedule now as fallout from the merger of the Great Midwest and Metro when C-USA was formed. It's interesting that, assuming Charlotte and Saint Louis do in fact leave for the A-10, the number of departing C-USA schools equals the number remaining:

Leaving:

Charlotte
Cincinnati
DePaul
Louisville
Marquette
Saint Louis
South Florida

Staying:

East Carolina
Houston
Memphis
Southern Miss
TCU
Tulane
UAB

This should make the scheduling agreement fairly easy to achieve. I wonder how many games are involved, over how much time. Maybe it's something like everyone leaving has to play everyone staying at least twice (home and away) within 7 years. That would average out to 2 games per team each season. Since UC will likely have Memphis on the schedule every year, that would add another game every year but one.

This leads me to believe the new Big East schedule will have to stay at 16 games. Otherwise, the incoming schools will not have much flexibility in their non-conference schedules. There is also some concern over the difficulty of the new Big East and the need for some non-conference "cupcake" games. I know Jim Boeheim has stated a *strong* preference for a 16 game schedule.

I can see their point. You could have a team that would finish 8th in the conference at 8-8 and make the NCAA tournament (say, for example, Providence), but instead finish 8-10 (losing a second game to both Notre Dame and Syracuse, in the proposal below) and just miss it. You know, just coming up with this example shows how tough this conference is going to be. Some very good teams are going to struggle to finish above .500 in the new Big East, and some Top 25 teams are going to have to work hard just to survive the first 2 rounds of the conference tournament.

Man, it sure would be nice to get this started next year.

Randy '78

-----Original Message-----
From: Shinkle, Randy
Sent: Wednesday, November 05, 2003 5:12 PM
To: Bearcat Forum (E-mail)
Subject: [UC Basketball] A Future UC Schedule

It appears the new Big East will likely have everyone play
each other in basketball every year, which I strongly prefer.
Assuming that's true, what might UC's schedule look like in
2 years? Well, let's take a look ....

We'll start by determining "travel partners" in the new Big
East. This is an important step (IMO) because it helps
control travel costs. For example, in some cases a team
could fly into a major airport on Friday, bus to a nearby
school for a Saturday game, return to the major city for a
cultural activity on Sunday, play a Monday night game
(perhaps a "Big Monday" national telecast), and then fly home
from the same airport. This allows the school to purchase
round-trip tickets with Saturday stay-overs.

Some of the travel pairings are fairly obvious, due to
rivalries and/or the proximity of the schools, such as:

Cincinnati & Louisville (fly into either, bus to/from the other)
DePaul & Marquette (ditto)
Pittsburgh & West Virginia (fly into Pittsburgh, bus
to/from Morgantown)
Connecticut & Providence (fly into Providence, bus to/from Storrs)

The rest isn't quite as obvious, with 5 schools fairly close
between New York City and Washington, and the final 3 being
"outliers" to varying degrees. Here's where other
considerations may enter the picture, such as Notre Dame and
Syracuse being the only private schools in the new Big East
with 1A football teams. Several possibilities exist, so for
sake of argument let's pick this one:

Georgetown & Villanova (again, fly into either, bus
to/from the other)
St. John's & Seton Hall (fly into any of the NY metro airports)
Notre Dame & Syracuse (all air travel)
Rutgers & South Florida (ditto, but what can you do with
South Florida?)

If the conference schedule is the popular 16 games, then you
play your travel partner twice and everyone else once.
However, to balance the number of home and away games, you
have to pick one of the other travel pairs to play one at
home and one on the road, so proximity becomes a factor
again. With this in mind, consider these 4 "quads" for
scheduling purposes:

Cincinnati & Louisville / DePaul & Marquette
Pittsburgh & West Virginia / Georgetown & Villanova
Connecticut & Providence / Notre Dame & Syracuse
St. John's & Seton Hall / Rutgers & South Florida

There are several points in support of this breakdown:
- Bus travel is possible within the quads in several cases.
- Notre Dame is grouped with 2 schools (Connecticut and
Syracuse) that they have expressed a particular preference
for competing against in various sports.
- UC is grouped with their familiar C-USA rivals, and
some other natural rivalries (e.g., Rutgers and Seton Hall)
are preserved as well.
- The schedule is such that Rutgers and South Florida
aren't more overwhelmed than necessary.
- Each quad happens to contain 2 football schools and 2
non-football schools, which "integrates" the league in a way
many seem to prefer.

But the biggest point is that this becomes the basis for an
18 game schedule, which I also strongly prefer. The TV folks
will have multiple games between UC, Louisville and
Marquette, and between UConn, Notre Dame and Syracuse, to
choose from, and every possible matchup will be available for
those years when, say, DePaul or Seton Hall look to be
especially strong.

OK, so now let's look at UC's potential 16 game conference schedule:

Home: Louisville, DePaul, Pittsburgh, West Virginia,
Notre Dame, Syracuse, St. John's, Seton Hall
Away: Louisville, Marquette, Georgetown, Villanova,
Connecticut, Providence, Rutgers, South Florida

If it's an 18 game schedule, add Marquette at home and DePaul
on the road. Clearly, there's a *lot* to like here. Now
let's add some non-conference games:

Home: Memphis, Dayton, 4 "guarantee" games
Away: Xavier, Wake Forest, a neutral court game or
"exempt" tournament

The following year, all the home and away games switch.
Memphis and Xavier would remain on the schedule every year,
but the others may not. This calls for 15 home games, one
short of what UC has scheduled the last few years, but maybe
that's OK given the strength of this schedule. The only way
I can see this improving is if Kentucky and/or Ohio State
could be added somehow.

The bad news is, UC will easily be able to raise their ticket
prices and UCATS fees. But I doubt you'll hear much complaining.

Randy '78

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