USA Today Article: After realignment, breakaway talk grows among power conferences...

[CaribouJim]

Something almost all of us have suspected - long article:

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports...split/2097115/

That fact brings out a host of critics, who wonder whether the schools responsible for generating that revenue will eventually want to stop sharing it — not just with Division II and III schools but with the so-called mid-majors, such as Wichita State, which earn NCAA "units" for their conference by playing and winning in the tournament over a rolling six-year span. Each unit is worth roughly $250,000. So Wichita State's Final Four run this season amounts to a windfall for the Missouri Valley Conference, which re-distributes that money equally to its members.

The fear among schools at that level, however, is that they would be excluded if the big-time football schools broke away and started their own basketball tournament. In much the same vein as school presidents approved a football playoff because the money was so overwhelming, a basketball tournament outside the NCAA is one of the last major money-grabs available.

An athletics director at a successful non-BCS basketball school, who requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic, said the major concern at that level is whether CBS and Turner Sports, which carry the men's Division I basketball tournament, will decide they would rather just get the guaranteed ratings with North Carolina, Kentucky and Kansas than risk mid-major programs ending up in the Sweet 16.

"CBS has more or less already said, through the things you hear in this business, 'We don't care if there's 64 or 32 (teams in the tournament), the money is going to be the same,'" the athletics director said. "If the 'Big 5' (conferences) split away, when the next TV deal comes up, why are we (the non-BCS schools) going to be involved in it? It's the one place where the benefits spread to the whole. All the sudden, that's gone. So I can't afford to watch it split away."

[MKE_GoldenEagleFan]

If that happens I will quit watching college sports, not that it will make any difference to those in power, but all of this is ruining what I love about college basketball.

[IWB]

University presidents can't be that stupid, can they? The NCAA Tournament is the greatest event in all of sports. If the power conferences try to ruin the NCAA tourney, will congress finally get involved?

[TheSultan]

This is one of the reasons that I think Ohio State and Oregon got off with relatively light slaps on the wrist during their latest potential scandals. The NCAA is going to treat the major schools with kid gloves until they can figure all of this out. But if those projections are right, and the "Big 5" could get as much money as the NCAA is getting now to run its own little tournament, then you have to wonder what incentive they have to stick with the NCAA...outside of the fact that replicating the organization would be difficult.

[TedBaxter]

If that happens I will quit watching college sports, not that it will make any difference to those in power, but all of this is ruining what I love about college basketball.

I agree and they may not say it publicly, but many fans of the larger schools wouldn't care for it either. I don't really watch professional sports anymore either.

I haven't read the article. Did they touch on the Title IX impact where schools like Marquette would have to drop sports and opportunities with the probable drop in athletic department revenue and the probable loss of jobs in athletic departments around the country?

[wiscwarrior]

If they want politicians involved, the presidents of the "Big 5" conferences could not find a better way to do it than to split from the NCAA. Also, the point about minor sports and their governance cannot be overlooked. The expense involved in governing these programs and sponsoring "National Championships" I would think is significant.

[WindyCityGoldenEagle]

I agree and they may not say it publicly, but many fans of the larger schools wouldn't care for it either. I don't really watch professional sports anymore either.

I haven't read the article. Did they touch on the Title IX impact where schools like Marquette would have to drop sports and opportunities with the probable drop in athletic department revenue and the probable loss of jobs in athletic departments around the country?

Great point Ted---the unintended consequences are often overlooked. There would certainly be a domino effect with a major loss in revenue to the school.

[unclejohn]

Would they do something this stupid and destructive? Of course they would. Look what football has done to conferences so far. The ACC used to be a conference of teams in states close together on the East Coast. Now it stretches from upper New York to Southern Florida. Missouri, Kansas, and Nebraska were in the same conference and played each other for over 100 years. Now they are in three different conferences that are each spread over ridiculous distances, and they find themselves playing schools they have little in common with. The Big Ten stayed at ten teams for over 100 years, and they were all Midwestern universities with traditional rivalries. Now it stretched to the East Coas and includes New Jersey and Maryland. Imagine the excitement of the traditional rivalry between Iowa and Rutgers!

I have said for a long time that this was coming. The folks in charge of the big schools do not want more money, they want ALL the money, and they feel entitled to it. And frankly, they are likely to get it. The typical sports fan doesn't give a rip about smaller state schools, much less about schools like Marquette. Hell, the fans of Alabama can't even spell the names of states outside the SEC. If you look at the big names in football over the years, they really haven't changed much since the 1950's. Give or take a few teams, if you just looked at the names of the teams involved in the big games in the last week of the season, they would be pretty much the same.

And whether we like it or not, the same is pretty much true of basketball as well. Not to the same extent, but pretty close. Go look at the NCAA Final Four going back fifty or sixty years. Yes, Marquette and Loyola and UTEP and a few others make appearances, but far more often, you see UCLA, North Carolina, Kentucky, Kansas, and a handful of other huge state schools dominating. If the big schools all got up and split from the NCAA to form their own basketball tournament, it would be tragic for the casual fan and for fans of teams like Marquette, and it would be a far less interesting tournament. But take a look at the second week of the tournament in most years. There will be sixteen teams, and at least a dozen of them will be large state universities with football teams. A tournament with just those teams might be worth less money, but it would not have to be split as many ways. And football is where the big money is anyway.

Would Congress get involved? Not bloody likely. Of course, one has to wonder why Congress cares about things like a football playoff as opposed to things that actually affect the country. As most of you have no doubt noticed, Congress is having a tough time lately agreeing on whether or not the sun rises in the East every morning. But while there may be a lot of anger on the part of smaller schools and their fans, the big schools would love it. Take a look at Wisconsin. If almost all the money generated by college sports in the state went to the state's largest state university, would that be fair? No. Would people be upset? Yes. But more people would be perfectly happy with the result. The same is true in most states. The big state schools have the biggest and most powerful constituencies.

The force behind all of this is the one major constant in American life. Greed.

[kneelb4zerg]

Well, there are a lot of powerful politicians that went to schools w/o football (cf. Georgetown). And the gridlock in Washington will not necessarily be there in perpetuity.

[TulsaWarrior]

A major part of the attraction of the the NCAA Basketball Tournament is the fact that the little guy gets a place at the table. The Florida Gulf Coast, Butler, George Mason and Wichita playing and beating the big state schools draws viewers. Losing the underdog aspect cannot be underrated.