shempie Posted July 9, 2003 Share Posted July 9, 2003 http://espn.go.com/ncb/columns/katz_andy/1573781.html Brad sounds frustrated and like all of us wants this solved quickly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jjray Posted July 9, 2003 Share Posted July 9, 2003 Shemp, maybe your eyes are better than mine. I see no quotes from Soderberg in this article ... "Seth Greenberg" (late of CUSA S. Florida) but no Soderberg. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NashvilleBilliken Posted July 9, 2003 Share Posted July 9, 2003 nm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davidnark Posted July 9, 2003 Share Posted July 9, 2003 Try this one: http://espn.go.com/ncb/columns/katz_andy/1578621.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quality Is Job 1 Posted July 10, 2003 Share Posted July 10, 2003 It's very well researched, but its foundation is that the Big East will do to Conference USA what the ACC did to the Big East -- raid the conference of the best football teams as if they were the best thing to come along since sliced bread. I much, much prefer the idea that C-USA and the Big East will work together on something more mutually beneficial to the members of each conference. Katz says that's just a dream, though. I, like Roy, refuse to believe that. The C-USA presidents should be much more persuasive in protecting the interest of all the C-USA teams, and the Big East should be less cutthroat than the ACC, else they're hypocrites. Father Lawrence Biondi and Doug Woolard should be making phone calls daily and really selling Saint Louis University. If not, then the university is not really serious about being a basketball power. I just wish Brad Soderberg had expressed more confidence the way Louisville's and Memphis's coaches did. Sigh! I hope that Saint Louis University is not destined to always be a little brother of college basketball. As it has been said many times, "It's hard to be a Billikens fan." I'm tired of saying that, though, and would rather say: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thetorch Posted July 10, 2003 Share Posted July 10, 2003 I would not expect anything bu8t Katz being a shill for East coast schools. If its not being played within a hundred miles of the atlantic these guys simply don't care and can't beleive that anything that matters happens in the midwest or west. I can see why Soderberg is down, hell he could be in a top 5 conference or the horizon and he has no idea where he is going to end up. L'Ville with Pitino knows thay are going up, these other guys, UAB and Memphis are not being realistic. UAB will end up in the sun belt and Memphis will be lucky if they get included in the big east, they will probably end up in the WAC and calipari will bolt. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quality Is Job 1 Posted July 10, 2003 Share Posted July 10, 2003 Andy Katz writes, "Soderberg wants to know what he can say to a recruit if asked about the program's and conference's fate. But he knows the school doesn't have the answer. There is talk of a potential league involving urban, Catholic-based schools like Saint Louis, Marquette, Dayton, DePaul, Villanova, Georgetown, St. John's, Seton Hall and Providence -- which is appealing to the Billikens if C-USA were to fracture. But such a conference is still nothing more than a dream. Reality says the tough demands on forming any new league, including creating bylaws and getting an automatic berth to the NCAA Tournament, are too great to be considered a real possibility." Here's my response to Katz's "reality": In the last 15 years, the Great Midwest, Conference USA, and the Mountain West all found a way to make the "dream" reality. They have (or had) managed to create bylaws and get an automatic NCAA Tournament berth. I don't see any reason why Saint Louis, Marquette, DePaul, Charlotte, Villanova, Georgetown, Providence, St. John's, and Seton Hall couldn't do the same thing other than the fact that some East Coast elitists don't want to see certain schools from the Midwest have a chance to prosper. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jjray Posted July 10, 2003 Share Posted July 10, 2003 New conferences get formed every few years, that comment about the new b-ball conference being "remote" and "unrealistic" solely due to the hurdle of forming a "new" conference is totally bogus. Also, the possibility he failed to mention, is that if a true merger would to happen between the Big East and CUSA resulting in one football conference and another b-ball conference, then one gets called the Big East and the other CUSA (both keeping their automatic bids). That is at least a possibility. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Basketbill Posted July 10, 2003 Share Posted July 10, 2003 exactly when did Mr. Katz research this, and perhaps what he is really hearing from the BE is what they would like to do, their dreams etc, but they are likely to need to face the reality of the situation. Basketball and Football schools are no longer a good mix. I certainly hope the NY times is more recent and accurate. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davidnark Posted July 10, 2003 Share Posted July 10, 2003 The bylaws thing is a cop out. I draft bylaws all the time. They are no big deal. Even a complicated contract among conference members wouldn't take more than a couple of weeks to finalize. If the only thing holding this thing back is some new bylaws and a conference contract, then I will volunteer my legal services. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheeseman Posted July 10, 2003 Share Posted July 10, 2003 It is fair to wonder why Brad is having so much trouble putting on a happy face - that is what salesmanship is and when you are recruiting you have be a salesman. Maybe the issue really is that Brad's basic nature is to be honest and so he is struggling with his own personal style conflicting with the uncertainity. The fact of the matter is, even if you work for a big multinational corp. that seems very safe, any day something can come up and change your world dramatically. There are no certainities so work on the here and now. It could work in his favor if a kid thinks Brad is being honest to a fault and is willing to be with an honest person regardless of anything rather than a snake oil salesman. Either way, I think Brad does need to have some on from SLU fill him in and advise him how to sugar coat this situation a little better. Katz is taking the BE side for now because the BE is still in their lawsuit against the two teams that left so the league still has to put on positive face for that. Once the BE and CUSA reach some solution, the lawsuit goes away and Katz will be talking about the value of an all sport division and a non-football division situation. As I said in an earlier post - why is Woolard keeping things so close to the vest? Something I have learned in over 30 years of supervising employees is that the uncertain is always the worse they fear and the longer they have this feeling the more crazy they can get so it would be in Woolard's best interest to bring the coaches in to his office and fill them in so they will stop worrying and get back to being positive. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.