The Rest of College Football

[froot loops]

The point is with Northwestern is Chicago has alumni from every Big Ten member. Nobody has to travel to Evanston, MSU at Northwestern has an automatic 10 to 20 thousand State fans. I'm sure it's the same with the other schools.

[lineygoblue]

When Michigan goes to NW the place is sold out.

M fans scoop up all the extras.

Last time I was there, the stadium was full, (or it appeared to me that it was) and I'd say 75% of the crowd was Michigan fans.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Northwestern University is in Evanston. My birth place. It is a great college town full of good places to eat and drink and 30 minutes by EL to downtown Chicago if you are so inclined. I've been to multiple NWU/M games. They are a boat load of fun for a lot of reasons.

West Lafayette? When I was at M, 66-70, my HS sweetheart was attending Purdue. I went there to watch football for one reason and it wasn't to watch football. We lasted through my Sophomore year.

Subsequently I've been to a few Purdue/M games. One of those games was watching Rich Rod's M team get run out of the stadium by some converted running back, or something like that. It was freaking embarrassing. Moreover, there is NOTHING, and I mean NOTHING appealing about West Lafayette. It does have a downtown, but there was nothing there that I wanted to be a part of.

I can fully understand the football ticket sale problem. Purdue football will only survive on the coat tails of the Big Ten and it has been that way for as long as I can remember with the exception of Bob Griese's years there and a few exciting football teams that Tiller put on the field with his version of the spread. He was fun. Nothing else was or is now.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Alumni disengagement is something they need to be a lot more worried about. Purdue's a big school and I'm assuming a ton of alumni live in either Indy or Chicago. It's an easy drive from both.

[Wild Hoss]

JMO, but I wonder when/if they next major upheaval in D1 will be the culling of schools like Purdue from the major conferences.

I think at some point, that discussion starts to happen when external growth hits the wall, which has to be close. Then conferences will be looking internally, and thinking about increasing profits by separating revenue generators from revenue consumers.

The BIG would last to hop on that, but, years from now, if it becomes an issue of competitiveness vis-a-vis other leagues, it could be discussed seriously.

[froot loops]

No major conference wants to lop off their easy wins within conference.

[Jeff Buchanan]

I wish it was about league competition. It's not. It's about the money.

Show me the money. Hoss is right. It's coming but the higher ups will resist on principle for as long as the press laps that up and makes them appear to have integrity.

But behind closed doors, the greedy bastards will take over in the decision making process and culling the revenue losers process will be implanted on the basis of some BS principles that will sound grand and nice.

[WM Wolverine]

I doubt there is any chance any team gets kicked out of a P5 conference. You'd have to do something quite a bit worse than SMU and already be a school that was lucky to belong in their conference.

[Mike]

Baylor comes to mind. It would be hilarious if one day Baylor was shown the door to whatever stupid ass conference they're in.

[Dr. Strangelove]

That almost happened to Baylor in 1994-1995. But they have powerful friends around Texas.

[WM Wolverine]

Southwest, Big Eight merger would be like the top half C-USA joining the American conference... There wasn't an obvious 12th team and Baylor's political friends got them the 12th spot.

[iam416]

At the time, Houston or TCU were both probably better picks than Baylor - by a comfortable margin. But neither of those schools has Ann Richards as an alum, who was Governor at the time.

[Hannibal]

JMO, but I wonder when/if they next major upheaval in D1 will be the culling of schools like Purdue from the major conferences.

Which would be hilarious, given that the major conferences have just finished a round of adding teams like Utah, West Virginia, and Rutgers.

[Mike]

I could see the South Floridas of the world getting dumped at some point but not any Big Ten schools.

[Wild Hoss]

That almost happened to Baylor in 1994-1995. But they have powerful friends around Texas.

One could make a case that it almost happened in 2010, to say nothing of it actually having occurred in 1994. Texas' plan for an exodus to the PAC was 100% about cutting the Big 12 North loose.

Now, we can say "Well that's Texas" (The same Texas that many BIG fans want to see added to their league) but who knows what the future holds. West Virginny is in the Big 12, Maryland is in the BIG, Utah in the PAC 12, and the five major conferences are halfway split from D1, and we have a playoff...and all that's happened in the last four years.

I don't think we can make too many assumptions, except that the dollar is driving the bus.