Well, I was against propping up another program to BCS levels in UConn's backyard, but at this point WTF. The Big East needs bodies ASAP. BCS autobids appear to be going the way of the dodo bird soon. If that happens we need teams with a more geographical fit than Boise and San Diego State.
This is a major bummer if they are WVU's replacement next year. The Big East is negotiating with Boise (or so we assume), maybe this is their leverage. Dobbs ends up in the Big East after all, just for the wrong team.
They are rumored to be the replacement for Louisville and thought they had the Memphis slot sewn up. They attended the MWC-CUSA merger talks but the BE decision was holding them back as well as the MWC CUSA looking at a good chunk of A-10 basketball to go to 24 teams in basketball
will be VERY disappointed if Temple is replacement for WVU this year. Boise or a BCS team. guess BE needs the bodies, but also not looking forward to watching Addazio on other sideline once a year either C'mon ND makeup ur mind
If this comes to fruition, I will laugh in the face of anybody who claims the league gives a rat's ass about football just because they put up some silly billboards in Times Square. And I thought Memphis was ridiculous.....
I think Temple football is on the rise. Al Golden did a good job re building and Adazzio is doig a good job maintaining and improving. A lot of improvements are being made to the facilities and program. Football wise they are doing pretty good and have won some good games and been close with other so called "powerhouse" teams ie. Penn State. They also play at the LIncoln Financial Center. I will also say they had a good year recruiting wise this year in PA. As I said in an earlier post PA is wide open right now with the Penn State and Pitt mess.
Temple is higher on my list than Memphis, primarily for northeastern regionalism / market (Yeah I know, I know, only a tiny fraction of eyeballs in Philly will actually tune in, but still). There's just no great options out there, the best we can do is a drivable road game and probably a better football product than Memphis, so... *shrug*
Whatever. At this point the only thing UConn can control is winning their games. If the conference isn't quite as good as it used to be (I would argue adding Boise and Houston while losing WVU/Pitt/Cuse is a net positive for football though), UConn can still win 10 games and get national recognition. The goal is still the same and the results will largely be the same. The BCS might not even exist by the time realignment finally finishes.
Temple, I'll wait for the official announcements. But if so, yet again, another sign that the conference leadership on top, and down through the universities, is finally understanding. I wrote as recently as last week that I didn't believe that Temple would ever be on board as long as Father Donohue is in charge at Villanova, and it appears that there hasn't been any change at Villanova, yet the reports that Temple may be in, seem legit on the surface. Just have to win games. When the conference members had the wins, and the national champion contenders regularly, and a winner, they did every possible thing to let it fall apart. Now they're doing the right things, but we'll all need to go out and get the wins. Villanova, at some point, is going to regret failing to commit to the upgrade to 1-A, that's been on the table now since 1997.
He's right. The league finally appears to recognize that top priority is to add the best football teams it can from a performance and market standpoint. The unfortunate thing is that the long delay in coming to that realization means we've lost some more attractive programs and the potential new members aren't that exciting.
