http://www.richmond.com/sports/college/football/article_8000f80c-ebbe-5d...
Right now our concentration is on, especially for this week and this game and where we are, doing really, really well in this FCS league and trying to win a national championship. We've come out with statements in the past and said if an opportunity were to present itself in FBS, then we'd certainly look at it and take it to our board to evaluate. We continue to monitor the landscape. It's not just monitor. It's actual dialogue. We talk to people and thought leaders across the country all the time to get some lay of the land, an idea of where things are going to go. Our goal is to be educated and informed, and to get some sense for what we think these other leagues might be dealing with longer term and what life is like for them."
I could see JMU making that leap especially once they get a look at how Coastal Carolina does in the near future.
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If it were me, I'd wait and let the latest round of realignments settle down a bit first. Between having so many teams switch around between 2010-2015, and the shift from 6 BCS conferences to 5 Power conferences, it just seems like there isn't much room for anyone to move up and not be cannon fodder.
But then again, I'm just a fan, and don't know the business side of it.
I'm sure conferences will fall all over themselves to land the lucrative Harrisonburg tv market.
Someone took Myrtle Beach, Boone NC, Statesboro GA, Mobile AL among others.
As opposed to that lucrative blacksburg market? The valley has a lot of positives and is a short jump from NOVA. It will happen sooner or later.
The ACC took the Blacksburg market because Gov. Warner made them.
Northern Virginia has more VT alumni than JMU alumni.
They got the Blacksburg market, but also a good bit of Virginia. I think there's a chart that shows the regional dominance of NCAA football programs, and VT is well-represented in the region.
I'm not too worried about JMU.
VT needs to worry more about VT.
Think about it though... when you take a Virginia school, you don't just get the locale where the school is. You get where those students and their families actually live, which always includes Hampton Roads, Richmond, DC/NoVa, and Roanoke.
The problem is people in those locales aren't JMU fans. They're VT fans. Or they are fans of whichever B1G school they attended.
Heh. I have a large contingent of friends and acquaintances in Hampton Roads that are JMU fans due to their alumni status. And I would put money on there being many more alumni of non-football CAA schools that would pull for JMU simply because of their disdain for us and LOLUVA.
If JMU left the CAA to join the FBS, they'd be no more representative of those schools than UVa or VT.
Do you really see William and Mary alumni pulling for JMU?
This one won't pull for JMU. This one pulls for JMU to be safely evacuated right before JMU sinks back into Hell.
I did say "non-football."
True. I didn't notice that.
But do "non-football" fans really have a big impact on football? We forget that those people really don't really care about it all that much.
I've got a sister-in-law who graduated from VT, and she really couldn't care less about football. She'll pull for VT if she happens to be in the room when a game is on, but other than that, she has no awareness of VT sports at all.
Unimaginable, right?
She has a VT hat, but only because I bought it for her.
The non-football CAA schools are UNC-Wilmington, Hofstra and Northeastern. I doubt their fan bases are going to cheer for JMU.
You know, I keep forgetting that VCU and George Mason left the conference.
I can't imagine VCU and George Mason fans rooting for JMU.
And that doesn't matter in the least. It matters that they watch sports channels at all. meaning whichever G5 Conference goes after them gets to add value when they negotiate with ESPN.
Being from the Valley (Augusta County to be exact), I have never seen anybody there that was a straight up JMU football fan. Everyone there is either VT or UVA. They just aren't treated as seriously. With ODU and Liberty having made the jump or about to make the jump, respectively, I don't know how much room a state like Virginia has for FBS football.
This poses an interesting debate if you're a FBS conference looking to add an FCS member. JMU conducted a study to determine what would happen if they stepped up, and Liberty has not shied away from news surrounding their desire to move up. Who do you take?
Liberty is throwing money at everything related to that school. From sports to academics, to online school to new medical school.
Yup. They are loaded. I live in Lynchburg and hearing about all their projects is crazy. But their on field product is so weird. This season they have wins against Montana and Georgia State bus losses to Gardner Webb and Monmouth (two teams picked to finish last in Big South).
It's like they're us last year.
remember early in the season where someone compared a BYU tailgate to a Utah tailgate?
Sunbelt could use a 12th
They're getting Coastal Carolina. Solid solid solid add for the FunBelt IMO.
Oh right. All I know about them is their baseball team and unis are sweet
I could see them becoming an ACC member one day. Not sure if their academics are up to snuff, though.
worse than UL?
By most metrics, as far as I can find.
I don't see them as a member of the ACC. What would they bring?
Louisville brought pretty good NCAA football and basketball programs, and a region that wasn't already in the ACC footprint.
They have a very successful baseball program. Of course, them being an ACC member would be a long way off after some serious growth in basketball and football. But just speaking in terms of location and current sport success I believe they would make a great addition.
I'm not knocking them, I'm just saying that the ACC is trying to get Notre Dame, not JMU.
American could use the two VA schools...or CUSA.
I love how athletic directors and administrators at smaller schools (and naive fans) are so enthusiastic about padding their resumes on the backs of student fees...which at JMU are already >80% of athletic revenues.
And where does much of that come from? Ultimately a big chunk is from the taxpayers who indirectly foot the bill through subsidized and defaulted student loans.
understandable, FCS
They've been planning a move for years after their national title. Stadium expansion was part one, growing student base part two. They even started an engineering program. But where to go? Is the AAC or Sunbelt worth it? Maybe they wait for an ACC invite.
They could -- but how often is a P5 conference going to invite an FCS program right in?
I had a fleeting thought a few years back about this whole jump to FBS deal.
We've all seen individual schools jump up a level all the time. But are there any rules preventing an entire conference from moving up to FBS if everyone was in agreement to make the necessary upgrades?
Yes. Can't jump without an invite from a conference. That's a current rule.
So, say, the CAA or Big South as a unit couldn't declare itself as transitioning to FBS and creating a 12th conference? All the member schools would have to join other conferences and then break away to re-form their own if they wanted to bring the conference up?
Seems inefficient. But then, NCAA.
That's correct. The NCAA wants to control their product. If those schools wanted to create their own conference they wouldn't get an automatic bid in basketball and would have to set up bowl tie-ins from scracth.
Like the Sun Belt in 2001, I suppose? I mean, that was their first year sponsoring football and they sent their champ to a bowl.Bowl games are set up outside of the NCAA's jurisdiction, correct? (for however much truth is in that statement)
Regarding basketball, there's no split between FBS and FCS, so a CAA or Big South reclassifying to FBS would already keep their basketball automatic bid it had.
UConn got that golden ticket thanks to their basketball team. They were in the Big East for sports other than football. That's the list. Villanova could have had a similar path but saw the Big East was a sinking ship and decided not to appease their 25 football fans. Boise State's still waiting for their invite to a big boy conference.
They'll be waiting a while...
I keep seeing people throwing these schools out there that supposedly the ACC would be inviting, like ODU, ECU, JMU... I don't think some of you understand the metrics involved on what makes a school attractive to a conference. Those schools would add nothing to the ACC. Nothing. The AAC is as high profile an invite that they will get for a long while.
Exactly.
You said it better than I did.
We're delving into the minds at JMU. They may not want to jump up into a small pond. They have an opportunity to do so as they build their brand, just like NDSU, other schools like Montana may not want to jump cause those small ponds don't cash in. Sunbelt had added quite a few schools, but the conference as a whole doesn't cash in vs a Mountain West