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How do you feel about the A10?


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The MAC?

The MAC has produced a few interesting characters.

Big Ben, Antonio Gates are hall of famers.

 Kenny Golladay puts up big numbers.

I always liked Wally Szczerbiak.

Ron Harper was cool.

The Ice Man was The Man.

As a conference as a whole...I’d rather join the OVC.

 

 

 

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I think the original CUSA was our best conference ever. Although, I still have a soft spot for the early 70’s MVC. 
Getting into the new Beast is the dream, however. Name programs, similar type schools, no major FB programs, even geographical rivalries. Great national TV contract. A true BB only affair. Will it ever happen? I’m not holding my breath. The A10 will have to suffice for present, and we will have to make sure we’re always a top 4 team in it. 

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23 hours ago, Quality Is Job 1 said:

Well, while C-USA was a very good situation (until the ACC raided the Big East and the Big East followed suit by raiding C-USA), the Great Midwest was an even better conference situation.

Cincinnati and Memphis were in both with us.  I was referring to the general time period that included both conferences.  Although, I agree with you that the Great Midwest was the best situation we've had.

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22 hours ago, Kit-Cat said:

I have advocated SLU to the AAC since they added Wichita St. I've thought St. Louis and Dayton would add more depth to AAC basketball to offset the loss of UConn.

I've touted SLU for the MAC because if there was any one school that COULD make a difference outside of P6s for the MAC it SLU w/ UIC combo. The MAC could get better in basketball to where it would make a difference (regular 2 bid 6ed. The Horizon League 10 years ago had Butler, Loyola and Valpo. Now it has IUPUI, IPWF and Robert Morris. MVC has lost Creighton and Wichita St to become a solid 1 bid league. Transfer rules make it easier than ever to build a NCAA tournament team overnight.

Buffalo was a 6 seed in the 2019 tournament out of the MAC so its not like the conference you are in holds back a program's development like it once did.

SLU would make 25 conferences better. Hell I'm touting Duke to the A10 as they would make the A10 better.  The A10 has had the #1 ranked team and final 4 teams proving we won't hold them back. 

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19 hours ago, SLUMedBilliken15 said:

By the way, the MAC is projected to be horrible next year. See the image below from https://www.barttorvik.com/ (A website similar to kenpom.com) For reference, the A10 is shown below...

Switching would 100% ruin our strength of schedule. No thanks!

MAC vs A10.jpg

**** The MAC has 1 team projected to be one spot better than Fordham. The rest of the teams are projected to be worse than Fordham... That's really bad!!

So Fordham to the MAC. They'll clearly make them better. 

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17 minutes ago, slufanskip said:

So Fordham to the MAC. They'll clearly make them better. 

Agree Skip

Which MAC team in that list am I supposed to get excited about playing?

SLU has played Dayton a lot and I love it.  Giving VCU the beat down feels great.  I always look forward to playing the Bonnies.  Playing against a well coached Davidson is a challenge and you know you beat a well coached team.  The Duquesne coach Dambrot gets on my nerves and we need to own them this season.  I would like to see Grant Golden lose to SLU a couple more times in his senior season.  Rhode Island is also a tough out and it was a great feeling beating RI at home last season.  Finally watching Tre Mitchell play for UMass is a treat.

I am not going to have any of those feelings for any of the MAC teams it will feel like some of the cupcakes we play in the non-conference.

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Just now, Clocktoweraccords2004 said:

With schools having massive budget problems coming up, I wouldn’t be surprised if bottom feeder schools drop some athletics 

You do know there is a minimum number of sports a school must participate in to be classified D1 and some conferences require a number of sports to be a member of said conference?

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27 minutes ago, Clocktoweraccords2004 said:

With schools having massive budget problems coming up, I wouldn’t be surprised if bottom feeder schools drop some athletics 

It’s already happened and it’s not bottom feeders. Cincinnati dropped soccer and Bowling Green baseball. 

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On 6/18/2020 at 1:20 PM, Bay Area Billiken said:

I'm confident SLU is not even considering the MAC.  There is no there there.

It's pretty much A10, unless the never ending saga of SLU to the Big East actually happened, which does not even appear to be on the horizon now. 

Assuming SLU is in the A10 for the forseeable future, I think the better option would be to expand the A10 by 2 schools, Loyola Chicago being one, perhaps Belmont in trendy Nashville the other.  If there was to be expansion, however, the A10 power centers would probably demand at least one of the newcomers to be on the Eastern Seaboard.  I would take Loyola Chicago ahead of Belmont, if that was the choice.

The AAC (American) would be the next possibility for any move.  But I am wary of SLU being linked with all those public, FBS football playing schools.  SLU has been there, done that.

This may be a stupid question but why doesn’t SLU have a football program? Too small? Are Jesuit schools not allowed?  It’d probably be tough to compete for awhile with a new program, but I’ve always wondered why we don’t.  Wonder if there’s ever been a significant push for it either.

I can’t help but think how STL would come support the only football ticket in town like they supported the XFL

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36 minutes ago, Fraz42 said:

This may be a stupid question but why doesn’t SLU have a football program? Too small? Are Jesuit schools not allowed?  It’d probably be tough to compete for awhile with a new program, but I’ve always wondered why we don’t.  Wonder if there’s ever been a significant push for it either.

I can’t help but think how STL would come support the only football ticket in town like they supported the XFL

This question has been answered many many many times.

SLU did have a football program.  We originated the forward pass.

It comes down to money.  Really only large public schools can afford to play high level football.  Some A10 teams do play but they are partial scholarship or zero scholarship teams that are still a financial drain.  SLU football is about 1,000th on the list of things I wish SLU could do with their athletic programs.  If you are willing to make oh say a 2 billion dollar investment over the next 15-20 years we could conceivably have a football team that could go 1-11 as an independent while praying for an invite to the MAC or Sun Belt (see UMass).  

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3 minutes ago, thetorch said:

This question has been answered many many many times.

SLU did have a football program.  We originated the forward pass.

It comes down to money.  Really only large public schools can afford to play high level football.  Some A10 teams do play but they are partial scholarship or zero scholarship teams that are still a financial drain.  SLU football is about 1,000th on the list of things I wish SLU could do with their athletic programs.  If you are willing to make oh say a 2 billion dollar investment over the next 15-20 years we could conceivably have a football team that could go 1-11 as an independent while praying for an invite to the MAC or Sun Belt (see UMass).  

I still think it’s awesome that we threw the first forward pass. Back then, an incomplete forward pass was a turnover. Awesome trivia question to impress people.

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9 hours ago, Fraz42 said:

This may be a stupid question but why doesn’t SLU have a football program? Too small? Are Jesuit schools not allowed?  It’d probably be tough to compete for awhile with a new program, but I’ve always wondered why we don’t.  Wonder if there’s ever been a significant push for it either.

I can’t help but think how STL would come support the only football ticket in town like they supported the XFL

it's my opinion but unless you are one of the schools that have major bowl potential year after year which also then has the big tv contract and the bowl income, football is a financial loser.   more scholarships to award than probably all the other men's sports combined, then you have a lot of coaches, the insurance is higher, if you want to at least approach big time, the facilities cost is astronomical, and let's not forget the matching of scholarships for women.   no way our BoT is gonna ever go for all that.   

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1 hour ago, slufanskip said:

How could it not make sense to add Football. I thought all these schools were getting so ridiculously rich off the backs off student athletes that we need to pay them to be fair. 

Because we’d have to find the land to build a brand new stadium, then actually build the brand new stadium, then find enough fans to show up on a regular basis to make building said stadium worth it, then find teams to play (obviously, we couldn’t schedule in conference games with A10). Football is extremely profitable for schools that already have football programs with traditions and fanbases and tv deals (for the most part). Starting from scratch would be an absolute nightmare, that would inevitably fail, and end up costing the school hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars.

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We need to sustain a basketball program and get good at that.  Football is futile.  Look at UConn, Charlotte, UAB, Temple, and many others.  Also, if you add football, Title IX says an equal number of women’s scholarships are needed.

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2 hours ago, slufanskip said:

How could it not make sense to add Football. I thought all these schools were getting so ridiculously rich off the backs off student athletes that we need to pay them to be fair. 

skip you forgot the blue font😄

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24 minutes ago, Reinert310 said:

Because we’d have to find the land to build a brand new stadium, then actually build the brand new stadium, then find enough fans to show up on a regular basis to make building said stadium worth it, then find teams to play (obviously, we couldn’t schedule in conference games with A10). Football is extremely profitable for schools that already have football programs with traditions and fanbases and tv deals (for the most part). Starting from scratch would be an absolute nightmare, that would inevitably fail, and end up costing the school hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars.

you probably arent talking about but 50 programs that make a consistent profit on football in all the land.  

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Successful FB programs have years of tradition backing them up. You don’t create that overnight. Just look at the top 20 or 30 programs, almost every year it’s the same programs. Yes, they are huge revenue producers, but for less successful programs they are large losers. Look at UConn as an example. They tried to take a minor program to a major program. Finally gave up due to losses. 
Let’s say SLU would go with a minor program and play in a minor conference. Does anyone think we’d draw large enough crowds to even break even? Highly doubtful. We tried this with Hockey back in the 70’s and made it as major as it could be at the time, ie we were playing schools considered top tier. Didn’t pay and almost had us dropping to D2 in hoops. 
No, put the $$’s into both men’s and women’s hoops. Make those programs annual winners.

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50 minutes ago, slu72 said:

Successful FB programs have years of tradition backing them up. You don’t create that overnight. Just look at the top 20 or 30 programs, almost every year it’s the same programs. Yes, they are huge revenue producers, but for less successful programs they are large losers. Look at UConn as an example. They tried to take a minor program to a major program. Finally gave up due to losses. 
Let’s say SLU would go with a minor program and play in a minor conference. Does anyone think we’d draw large enough crowds to even break even? Highly doubtful. We tried this with Hockey back in the 70’s and made it as major as it could be at the time, ie we were playing schools considered top tier. Didn’t pay and almost had us dropping to D2 in hoops. 
No, put the $$’s into both men’s and women’s hoops. Make those programs annual winners.

this

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2 hours ago, slu72 said:

Successful FB programs have years of tradition backing them up. You don’t create that overnight. Just look at the top 20 or 30 programs, almost every year it’s the same programs. Yes, they are huge revenue producers, but for less successful programs they are large losers. Look at UConn as an example. They tried to take a minor program to a major program. Finally gave up due to losses. 
Let’s say SLU would go with a minor program and play in a minor conference. Does anyone think we’d draw large enough crowds to even break even? Highly doubtful. We tried this with Hockey back in the 70’s and made it as major as it could be at the time, ie we were playing schools considered top tier. Didn’t pay and almost had us dropping to D2 in hoops. 
No, put the $$’s into both men’s and women’s hoops. Make those programs annual winners.

I don’t disagree with the premise of your post but we dropped hockey because Sid Salomon stopped backing it. Father O’Connell was pushing D2 because he didn’t see the value of sports and more importantly the university was going broke. Huge short term debt in a period of astronomical interest rates. 

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