Jesus H. This again? There is no solid plan to blow up our athletic department, as you suggest, because we are in Year 2 of the 3-5 Year B1G Plan. Moving basketball out of the AAC to another conference would completely devalue our football program and end any hope of getting into the B1G or, to a lesser extend, the ACC. PATIENCE. Give Bob Diaco and his staff a few years to turn around football. UCONN has a good amount of cash stockpiled from Big East exit fees to keep afloat while the 3-5 Year B1G Plan is in action. You want to do something about it? Go buy some football tickets. Go to the Spring Game. Get friends to do the same. SUPPORT THE SCHOOL. If we're still in the AAC in 2018-19 and football is muddling through 2-3 win seasons in front of 10K a game, then we can begin to take your suggestion seriously.
Again, here are the reasons why we can NOT go football independent:
1. no bowl tie-in. Do you remember the bowl game following our 9-win 2012 season? You don't because we didn't get to one. And that schedule had a lower tier B1G opponent, BC, and a gazillion MAC teams on it (as you constantly suggest as a scheduling alternative);
2. no schedule. The P5 schools are moving away from scheduling G5/FCS opponents, not towards it. We would be LUCKY to schedule 1 P5 opponent per season if we went Independent. I know that a schedule that includes Tulane, Tulsa and Memphis doesn't appeal to anyone, but the AAC schedule at least gets us Cincinnati, UCF, USF, Houston, etc...good football programs in good recruiting areas.
3. a few extra dollars now vs. a lot of extra dollars later? I'm not willing to destroy our athletic department to make $2-$3M/yr more in basketball next season. What happens if UCONN basketball has some lean years? I know the chances of that aren't likely as long as Ollie is coach but what happens if the Lakers or Thunder or Heat or Cavaliers come HARD after him with a $5M/yr offer to be head coach? And what if our basketball replacement is the Paul Pasqualoni of basketball? Then there goes our extra basketball TV revenue and there goes UCONN athletics as a whole. We are in a B1G plan because $30M/yr is much more enticing (and secure) than having to renegotiate a TV deal every season or two for an extra $2M/yr for basketball alone. B1G membership funds ALL sports. Can you say that about a non-secured short-term basketball TV deal?
4. Bob Diaco hasn't even had 15 minutes to turn things around. Remember all that NATIONAL buzz and hype that came when Manuel named Diaco head coach? Well, the last time I checked, Diaco is STILL here. Let's give him a few seasons to undo the Pasqualoni/Hathaway mess. I know patience is not your strong suit, but for the love of all things Holy, let's wait until we're balls deep into football season before making comments like this. We're not even through SPRING practice, for crying out loud. PATIENCE. Football can't win any games that are still over 4 months away.
5. Recruiting. Along the lines of #2 above, no guaranteed schedule means no guaranteed access to places like PA, OH, FL, and TX. We also will be playing some mid-Atlantic areas that could mine out some gems. Diaco was hired, in part, because he is a relentless recruiter. Let's give him a season or two to find some kids that fit his wish list. Playing a 12 game Independent schedule that consists entirely of MAC teams, FCS opponents, and the like on an inconsistent basis does not help recruiting whatsoever.
6. Athletic Department Stability. We are not UMASS. We are not Temple. We are not Rutgers. We do not want to cut programs, we want to add to them. We want to provide quality competition across our entire athletic department, not just basketball. Again, a basketball contract alone is not sufficient enough to fund soccer, baseball, hockey upgrade, track, field hockey, etc. By going your route and concentrating solely on protecting basketball, we essentially are cutting other sports. P5 conferences do not like that.
7. UCONN Basketball is an Elite program no matter what conference it is in. We just played a full season in the AAC with a perceived weak schedule and still won the National Championship. How does moving basketball out of the conference change the end result? Louisville is leaving. So what? Does that change anything that significantly to move to the Big East?? So we are going to put all of our eggs in the Big East right after they showed the country how weak they were come tourney time? Their perceived best team Nova didn't even make it to the Sweet 16. Do we really want to trust that Creighton, Providence, Nova, DePaul, St John's, etc will provide an upgrade in perception than what we play in the AAC? UCONN is by itself no matter what conference we play in. The name on the front of our OWN jerseys matter more than those who we play.
Please, please, please stop posting these negative threads wanting to kill off football to protect basketball. Again, we are in a 3-5 Year B1G Plan. The writing is on the wall. The clues are all there. Nobody can comment on it because they legally can't. EVERYTHING that comes out of our President's and Athletic Director's mouths about CR are ALL pointed at the B1G. The B1G, the ACC, or any other P5 conference will not give us full share if we offer them a basketball only offer. And if you want to be able to match those inevitable NBA offers for Kevin Ollie in the upcoming years, we need a full revenue share from a P5 conference. Plain and simple.
Instead of starting these threads, how's about starting a thread to come up with ideas how to increase fan support for football? Increase our football season ticket numbers? Integrate basketball with football and get the fanbase to support the SCHOOL and not specific programs? Going to the Spring Game to show support for the new coaching staff and the team? Planning a trip to watch a road game? Or plan a trip to get to Yankee Stadium and show tremendous numbers in NYC again? We need to come up with ideas to support football, not crush it. Without football, our other athletic programs get cut or underfunded. Including basketball. Let's all rally behind football and UCONN instead of trying to rip it apart.