"Big East official: Pitt, Syracuse 'likely gone'"

GREENSBORO, N.C. (theACC.com) – The Atlantic Coast Conference Council of Presidents has unanimously voted to accept the University of Pittsburgh and Syracuse University as new members. The invitation followed the submission of letters of application from both universities.

"The ACC is a strong united conference that is only going to get better with the addition of the University of Pittsburgh and Syracuse University," said Duke University President Richard Broadhead, chair of the ACC Council of Presidents. "Both schools are committed to competing at the highest level of academics and athletics. We welcome them as full partners in the ACC."

"The ACC has enjoyed a rich tradition by balancing academics and athletics and the addition of Pitt and Syracuse further strengthens the ACC culture in this regard," said Atlantic Coast Conference Commissioner John Swofford. "Pittsburgh and Syracuse also serve to enhance the ACC's reach into the states of New York and Pennsylvania and geographically bridges our footprint between Maryland and Massachusetts. With the addition of Pitt and Syracuse, the ACC will cover virtually the entire Eastern Seaboard of the United States."

"This is an exciting day for the University of Pittsburgh. We have a long history of competing and collaborating with the distinguished universities that already are members of the Atlantic Coast Conference, and have enormous respect for both their academic strengths and their athletic accomplishments," said University of Pittsburgh Chancellor Mark A. Nordenberg. "In looking to our own future, we could not envision a better conference home for Pitt and are grateful to the Council of Presidents for extending an invitation to join the ACC community."

"We are very excited to be joining the ACC. This is a tremendous opportunity for Syracuse, and with its outstanding academic quality and athletic excellence, the ACC is a perfect fit for us," said Nancy Cantor, Chancellor and President of Syracuse University. "The ACC is home to excellent national research universities with very strong academic quality, and is a group that Syracuse will contribute to significantly and benefit from considerably. As a comprehensive, all-sports conference, the ACC provides Syracuse tremendous opportunities for quality competition and growth in all sports, while also renewing some of our historic rivalries. This move will also bolster our continued efforts to look outward, engage, and extend Syracuse's reach to key areas of the country, including the southeast, as we grow and expand our national connections to alumni, partners and the students of the future. We are pleased that Syracuse adds a New York City dimension to the ACC, a region in which we have built strong identity and affinity, and we look forward to bringing ACC games to the Big Apple. Overall, for Syracuse, this opportunity provides long-term conference stability in what is an uncertain, evolving, and rapidly shifting national landscape."

"This is a very significant day for all of our student-athletes, coaches and staff at the University of Pittsburgh," said Steve Pederson, University of Pittsburgh Director of Athletics. "The strength and quality of the ACC is highly regarded by everyone at Pitt. When we set high expectations for our student-athletes in their academic, athletic and personal goals, it is important to provide every opportunity and resource to enable that success. Joining the ACC and the outstanding institutions in this conference will give every Pitt student-athlete the chance to achieve their highest aspirations."

Daryl Gross, Syracuse University Director of Athletics said, "Today is a day that we will remember for years to come. We are truly excited that academically and athletically we will be a member of the ACC, one of the nation's premier collegiate athletic conferences. As New York's College Team, we plan to compete at the highest level across all of our sports and help to enhance this great conference."

http://www.theacc.com/genrel/091811aaa.html

The only questions in my mind are does Virginia Tech stay and/or when do teams 15 and 16 come.

At the heart of these thesisses is the ACC is looking to expand to 16 teams, and only took two teams right now to make the final two spots more desirable and appealing to bigger fish.

This is from Andrew Jones of FOXSportsSouth.com:

But why would Penn State leave the Big Ten and its mega TV deal and network so its games will air in Mayberry and like towns in the South? It wouldn't in the ACC's current form. But that obviously would change with these additions. The ACC would have a massive footprint in the northeast and toward Chicago. But let's be honest, Notre Dame still is national, so what it can do to enhance a TV package would have ACC mouths watering.

And keep in mind, Penn State wanted into the ACC in the late 1980s, and legendary coach Joe Paterno once preferred a union of other northeastern schools, even envisioning an ACC stretching the entire Atlantic coast. That day has basically arrived.

This is a really interesting idea, that would have seemed much more plausible had all this shaking and moving happened closer to '81 when Paterno tried to create an "Eastern Conference".

A bit of backstory. When conferences won the right (based on an antitrust case against the NCAA) to negotiate their own television contracts, Penn State resigned itself to dissolving its independent football status and joining a conference.

Paterno, then Penn State's athletic director, proposed the Eastern Conference, which he hoped would include such schools as Pitt, Syracuse, Maryland, Boston College, Temple and Rutgers. In 1981, when he pitched his idea, several Big East-member schools didn't want to give up their fledgling basketball conference.

It's obvious Paterno still believes it's in Penn State's best interest to be playing with schools in the east. He was a proponent of the Big Ten expanding to include Rutgers and Syracuse. However, there's a huge difference between the Big Ten adding these schools, and Penn State leaving the Big Ten for a new conference with them. Who knows what kind of influence JoePa has in the decision making process now, but it's intriguing nonetheless.

This is from Dan Wetzel of Yahoo! Sports:

"Obviously they are the most attractive option out there," one ACC athletic director told Yahoo! Sports on Monday, noting he had no knowledge of any discussions between the school and the league. Speaking generally, however, he added: "every league would want Notre Dame and we're no different."

...

Notre Dame is currently a member of the Big East in all sports except football, a sweetheart arrangement. It also enjoys a scheduling deal in football, where league teams often play the Irish even in November, when getting game dates is increasingly difficult. Since current Big East teams play just seven-league games, they are almost always available – South Florida and Pitt are on the docket this season.

If Big East football ceases to exist – or merges into a 12-or-16-team group with the remaining Big 12 schools – then that scheduling flexibility is gone. The noose tightens a little bit more.

http://www.foxsportssouth.com/09/18/11/ACC-additions-could-be-only-the-s...
http://www.mcall.com/sports/college/psu/mc-penn-state-column-20110919,0,...
http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/news?slug=dw-wetzel_notre_dame_sho...