The Independent Expansion Groundswell

[Color Me Badd Fan]

Now, not to be incendiary or anything, but if that's true, doesn't it seem just a bit odd to you?

It seems incredibly odd to me. If BYU made this jump without the remaining cream of the WAC crop having signed that agreement, it was an enormous eff-up. If FSU and Nevada were locked in, it would be easy to see BSU staying in the WAC and then TCU jumping into the WAC also. To improve basketball, the WAC would have then invited UNLV and New Mexico (SDSU???). Of course the problem with that WAC is the same problem as the current MWC- only instead of the bottom five teams it would have been the bottom 7 teams or so.

[Jacob]

Benson says WAC has not talked with SDSU and UNLV. Where are you getting your bogus info, Statman?

[statman]

How do we know this? I didn't know it. has somebody reported this?

I agree that if ESPN is driving this train, then they could be working on a new WAC deal, but it doesn't make a lot of sense to build ESPN a better conference by starting with the now 6 remaining WAC teams, it would make a lot more sense to just build a new conference.

Yesterday, both SDSU and UNLV said they were offered and were considering it. I don't recall hearing anything from UNM, but it's been reported by multiple sources that they were offered as well.

[ERCougar]

Karl Benson is blowing up in his teleconference.

http://twitter.com/schadjoe

Wow. In this kind of situation, a verbal contract would be enforceable, no? Would they have recorded the conversation?

[Jacob]

wow. So Benson confirms that Hair did pull the rug out from under BYU.

[statman]

I doubt UNR will be paying $5 mil given they didn't sign the agreement. Rumor was that FSU didn't sign it either.

Thompson said in the MWC presser last night that they both had to pay and that the MWC was going to split the bill with them. At least that is what was reported in both the DN and the SLCT.

[Jacob]

Yesterday, both SDSU and UNLV said they were offered and were considering it. I don't recall hearing anything from UNM, but it's been reported by multiple sources that they were offered as well.

Link? Because benson says they weren't.

[ERCougar]

So FSU and UNR are both around for the 2011-12 seasons because they didn't meet the July 1 deadline. Buys a little time. Maybe makes MWC less attractive for TCU?

[Hot Lunch]

Where is everyone getting this "reported plan" by ESPN to form a conference with the best non-AQ schools? I think with all the bickering that the MWC and the WAC have going on right now, its conceivable that Universities would get together and create a non-AQ super conference. But as long as BYU has vision of the Big-12 dancing in their head you can't trust them. How many more roller coaster rides do we have to go with this expansion soap opera?

It is the master plan of our very own Statman.

[statman]

Benson says WAC has not talked with SDSU and UNLV. Where are you getting your bogus info, Statman?

Where everyone else is - stuff reported on blogs, in the papers and rewsradio yesterday.

At the same time they were discussing the Nevada and FSU offers (and that they were accepting) 1280 and/or 1320 (I flip back and forth between them on my drive home) said that both SDSU and UNLV had confirmed they'd been invited but neither had accepted. No word form UNM, but confirmations that offers had gone out.

And if I just made it up, as you infer (another douchebag in the group), why did Benson get asked about it? Are the sports reporters reading CUF to get their next scoop? It's obviously a story that's been repeated in multiple outlets...

Think before you spout, dipwad...

[ERCougar]

Now Benson doesn't foresee BYU playing any WAC games...
http://twitter.com/schadjoe

[Color Me Badd Fan]

Supposedly Boise State could back out. TCU and any other decent school from the MWC can also leave.

I just don't understand why Boise State and TCU agreed to stay in the same shitty TV contract and then basically give up all of their TV revenue to pay for freaking Fresno State and UNR to join the MWC.

Perhaps the crux of it was this -- UNLV, SDSU and UNM are really not better in football than the bottom dwellers in the WAC. These schools and the WAC bottom dwellers are a ball and chain in football- they're virtually interchangeable. But, UNLV, SDSU and UNM are good basketball schools and significantly better at basketball than the football bottom dwellers in the WAC (with the exception of Utah State).

What makes the most sense to me would be for the cream of the WAC, MWC and C-USA crops to band together. Of course, it probably still wouldn't be good enough to gain BCS AQ status (that would have required a core of Utah, BSU, BYU and TCU and casting off some of the five MWC dingleberrys and adding schools like Fresno State and Nevada).

[statman]

It is the master plan of our very own Statman.

Oxcoug wrote about it here yesterday. So did a couple people on CB.

Some time-sensitive details of the deal apparently expired on Monday or Tuesday, and when it became clear that it wasn't going to happen, schools who had been contacted about it and were pissed it didn't happen started leaking stuff. That's where all the BYU going independent news came from - schools were ticked at BYU for not playing along, and leaked their news.

You guys really need to keep yourselves better informed...

[USUC]

Now Benson doesn't foresee BYU playing any WAC games...
http://twitter.com/schadjoe

Schad said it is his opinion that Benson doesn't foresee BYU playing any WAC games. If Benson came out right and said that it would make BYU look the fool and lose any sort of possibility of it happening... BYU is losing the PR battle in all of this.

[Jarid in Cedar]

Now Benson doesn't foresee BYU playing any WAC games...
http://twitter.com/schadjoe

But the master plan all along was the get into the WCC, so no harm, no foul?