Big 12 Expansion - Looking at Numbers

[CascadeClone]

Big 16

WV
Army
Navy
Cincinnati
UCF
USF
Memphis
Houston

Iowa State
Kansas
Kansas State
Texas Tech
TCU
Baylor
BYU
Air Force

This actually isn't bad as the worst case (no B1G, no PAC12) scenario.

Going to a much bigger 16 team conference, having a proper eastern division, some schools with growth potential like UCF, the service academies all together. At least there is a marketable vision there. More than just adding Cincy and Houston and hoping for the best. You're still looking at something like $20M per team AT BEST though.

I think you could debate a couple choices, like Army and Navy, vs one of the Louisiana or Georgia schools, you might get more viewers out of that, idk. But overall, this is something that has more hope than despair. At least until ESPN and the other 4 conferences bend us over and remove our P5 status...

 

[Cloneon]

Worst case scenario: do anything you can to retain power conference status for playoffs. Then make your own brand.
The way most people talk here, it makes me regret selling my Sears stock cause that brand should've been retained forever. Trust me, 8-4 records, even among 'supposedly' elite teams, will be unacceptable for their egos AND their 'brand'.

 

[Daserop]

This actually isn't bad as the worst case (no B1G, no PAC12) scenario.

Going to a much bigger 16 team conference, having a proper eastern division, some schools with growth potential like UCF, the service academies all together. At least there is a marketable vision there. More than just adding Cincy and Houston and hoping for the best. You're still looking at something like $20M per team AT BEST though.

I think you could debate a couple choices, like Army and Navy, vs one of the Louisiana or Georgia schools, you might get more viewers out of that, idk. But overall, this is something that has more hope than despair. At least until ESPN and the other 4 conferences bend us over and remove our P5 status...

I brought in the service academies based on other people's posts about how they pull in viewership for their games.

Yep. The additional schools bring in a mix on good media markets (Orlando, Tampa Bay, Houston, Memphis). They bring some higher level of academics (mainly service academies). They they bring in okay viewership.

 

[AppleCornCy]

Not trying to say anything good or bad about Memphis as a choice, but what kind of size do people think of when they imagine the Memphis metropolitan area? I used to think it was a really big city until I learned that metro areas like Cincinnati and Kansas City are about as populous as the Memphis and Omaha metro areas combined. The Orlando metro area is twice the size of Memphis. Tampa-St Pete is a half million on top of that.

 

[Dandy]

Big 16

WV
Army
Navy
Cincinnati
UCF
USF
Memphis
Houston

Iowa State
Kansas
Kansas State
Texas Tech
TCU
Baylor
BYU
Air Force

Geographically I'd swap Houston and ISU.

 

[2122]

What the SEC is doing is bad for college football and college sports as a whole. Time for university leaders across the nation to step forward. Perhaps all non-SEC schools should consider forming their own NCAA sans SEC schools, with their own playoffs. Nip this SEC power-grab in the bud. That'll force the SEC, not wanting to go-it-alone, to cave. After the SEC caves, some sort of mass realignment to occur that is a) centered around conferences based on reasonable regionality/geography as in the past and b) on leagues limited to 12 or so teams, not 14 to 20. Conferences/leagues spanning the nation or totally dominating is bad bad bad.

 

[BCClone]

Geographically I'd swap Houston and ISU.

I would hate that swap as a fan.

 

[Dandy]

I would hate that swap as a fan.

I agree but Houston should probably be with the other Texas schools.

 

[HouClone]

What the SEC is doing is bad for college football and college sports as a whole. Time for university leaders across the nation to step forward. Perhaps all non-SEC schools should consider forming their own NCAA sans SEC schools, with their own playoffs. Nip this SEC power-grab in the bud. That'll force the SEC, not wanting to go-it-alone, to cave. After the SEC caves, some sort of mass realignment to occur that is a) centered around conferences based on reasonable regionality/geography as in the past and b) on leagues limited to 12 or so teams, not 14 to 20. Conferences/leagues spanning the nation or totally dominating is bad bad bad.

The problem will be ESPN. They essentially steer what goes on in college football. They have the ACC locked up as well as the AAC and some other smaller conferences. These conferences won't go away from what ESPN tells them which is to follow along with the SEC.

 

[ILikeBacon]

I certainly haven't read every post in every thread on this topic, so SIAP. Talking about live game attendance and cable viewer eyeballs really doesn't look at the entire picture. The entire picture includes the fan base of each of the competing teams in each game and for that matter the fan base of the entire conference collectively. We're Iowa State fans first but also fans of the Big 12 (or most of the Big 12, anyway.....).

So, I think that in the next round of media negotiations for football, MBB and WBB, the conference needs to look beyond live, real time eyeballs and into archiving. Whatever conference we wind up in should negotiate with its media partner the creation of a [insert conference name here] web site that not only streams games in real time (in addition to the over-the-air, cable, and satellite distribution systems) but also makes them available in an archive of all games in that conference covered by that network and can be acquired from other networks.

If I were a cord cutter and didn't get the games on TV, or if I lived in Alaska or the UK or Antarctica, I could watch Cyclone games in real time if I were awake or on the archive whenever it was convenient to me. Games I enjoyed I could watch over and over. Games would be streamed with their commercials, or subscribers could pay a premium rate to watch without commercials, as with MLB-TV.

Such an add-on to the base media rights agreement wouldn't cost a lot extra to the provider but would expand the viewer base to worldwide dimensions and make the archives quite compelling to advertisers.

I would jump at the opportunity to subscribe to such a service at the premium rate, not just to watch ISU games but also many other conference games, and I think the overall demand would be significant. Wouldn't matter where the viewers were or what time zone they were in. How much additional revenue could ISU and other conference members gain from this?

I initially just liked your post and kept moving, but then thought, "This is too good to just like and scroll past."

Excellent post - I appreciate the unique approach and original thought, and I just really love the idea. I tend to watch ISU FB games on very minimal delay (maybe live or up to 3 or 4 hours behind live), but I often DVR ~8 or 9 other games (usually most other Big XII games and a few highly competitive games from other conferences) and watch them over the rest of the weekend or even into Monday/Tuesday of the next week.

I think many would love a program like you've suggested.

 

[Win5002]

CW and Blum pod mentioned Houston, UCF, Cincinnati, and BYU a handful of times. CW also said he had heard about a service academy (unclear if he meant from a real source or just chatter) and Blum also floated Memphis. But I found it interesting that they revolved the conversation around those four options, which I have previously thought to be the best for the conference if the 8 end up sticking together.

If this is accurate, then:
*The league will likely split the Texas schools 2 & 2 across divisions (for recruiting);
*TCU and Houston won't be in the same division (for recruiting).

So I would expect the Big 12 West to include BYU, Kansas, K-State, Oklahoma State, TCU, and Texas Tech. The Big 12 East gets Iowa State, Baylor, Houston, Cincinnati, West Virginia, and UCF. Play the 5 in your division + 1 protected crossover (K-State for us) + 3 of the remaining 5 in the opposite division every year.

Whatever size the league is, leagues won't have to have divisions or pods much longer. The conferences will remove that requirement so instead of that think of 3 to 4 locked in rivals and a rotation around the rest of the league

Also, the rotation doesn't need to be even. Some teams could play 4 out of 6 yrs, some 3 out of 6 some 2 out of 6 years. This could be the case especially for bigger leagues like 16 to 20 teams.

 

[CloneJD]

I think we would add just two and keep the round robin thing going. Otherwise we wojld dilute things even further.

 

[BCClone]

I think we would add just two and keep the round robin thing going. Otherwise we wojld dilute things even further.

We could get two that shouldn’t be a drop from what we have already. We also don’t want to potentially elevate teams if we think things could go crazy in a couple years. Basically creating competition for ourselves.

 

[OregonCyclone]

I initially just liked your post and kept moving, but then thought, "This is too good to just like and scroll past."

Excellent post - I appreciate the unique approach and original thought, and I just really love the idea. I tend to watch ISU FB games on very minimal delay (maybe live or up to 3 or 4 hours behind live), but I often DVR ~8 or 9 other games (usually most other Big XII games and a few highly competitive games from other conferences) and watch them over the rest of the weekend or even into Monday/Tuesday of the next week.

I think many would love a program like you've suggested.

Thank you, Bacon. I have wondered about this for years, dating back to the Big 12's initial discussions about a conference network that never happened. Here on the West Coast, the Pac-12 Network frequently runs 1-hour condensed replays of games involving conference teams (including non-conference games) from not only the previous season but often from up to 20 or 30 years before. They have acquired the rights to games originated by ESPN, Fox, and ABC as well as their own network, with the original announcers. The B1G Network does this too. But I don't think those games are archived for on-demand streamed viewing by subscribers.

Every conference's network partner records the games they televise. Why would a conference want to limit viewing to real-time or DVRs? Put these games in an archive so they could be viewed by subscribers on demand at any time, anywhere in the world. This adds a whole new tier of viewers and revenues at little additional cost to the conference or media partner. Think of the great games from Iowa State's past you'd love to watch again, at your convenience, like against OSU in 2011 or Oklahoma in 2017.

Yeah, I know there's YouTube, but this archive could be much more comprehensive and user-friendly, and probably better video quality..

 

[HawaiiClone]

We could get two that shouldn’t be a drop from what we have already. We also don’t want to potentially elevate teams if we think things could go crazy in a couple years. Basically creating competition for ourselves.

Do we really want to shy away from competition from teams that are currently weaker than us? We can step up to the challenge and remain stronger than them.

 

[2speedy1]

We all hope that Iowa State and the other Big 12 refugees find a home in a power conference. That’s what would be best for our universities and athletics programs. If that doesn’t happen however and we end up staying in the Big 12, the conference will almost certainly add members.

I decided to compare some numbers for the Big 12 schools (including Texas and Oklahoma for reference), the AAC schools, and some Mountain West schools and Independents that have been mentioned over the years as expansion candidates. Specifically, I compared average football attendance from 2015-2019, US News and World Report university rankings, and rankings of the TV markets where the universities are located.

Average Attendance (2015-2019)
Texas 94,943 (8)
Oklahoma 85,745 (13)
BYU 57,078 (28)
Iowa State 56,562 (30)
West Virginia 56,484 (31)
Texas Tech 55,821 (33)
Oklahoma State 55,326 (36)
Kansas State 50,975 (38)
Baylor 44,536 (48)
TCU 44,353 (49)
East Carolina 38,031 (58)
Memphis 37,229 (59)
UCF 36,010 (61)
San Diego State 33,407 (65)
USF 33,172 (66)
Cincinnati 33,124 (67)
Boise State 32,830 (68)
Navy 32,459 (69)
Houston 32,174 (70)
Army 31,450 (71)
Temple 31,326 (72)
Fresno State 29,643 (74)
Air Force 27,910 (76)
Colorado State 27,484 (77)
Kansas 26,610 (80)
UConn 22,899 (85)
SMU 21,543 (89)
Tulane 20,174 (94)
Tulsa 18,631 (104)

The remaining Big 12 schools other than Kansas are remarkably similar in attendance and superior to every Group of 5 school other than BYU if you consider them G5. UCF’s numbers are getting into Big 12 range, as they averaged 44k fans in 2018 and 2019, which was in the range of TCU and Baylor.

University Rankings
Navy #6, Liberal Arts Colleges
Army #15, Liberal Arts Colleges
Air Force #28, Liberal Arts Colleges
Tulane #41
Texas #42
UConn #63
SMU #66
Baylor #76
TCU #80
BYU #80
USF #103
Temple #103
Iowa State #118
Kansas #124
Oklahoma #133
Cincinnati #143
San Diego State #143
Tulsa #143
Colorado State #153
UCF #160
Kansas State #170
Houston #176
Oklahoma State #187
Fresno State #196
Texas Tech #217
East Carolina #217
West Virginia #241
Memphis #258
Boise State #298-389 range

The rankings have a lot of ties. I didn’t realize just how awful the Big 12 is academically. Half of the remaining schools are ranked #170 or below. The AAC is actually a superior league academically, which is pretty sad. Looking at these numbers you can see why Boise State can’t get into the Pac-12 and West Virginia will never be offered by the Big Ten.

TV Markets
Army (1)
Temple (4)
SMU (5)
TCU (5)
Houston (8)
USF (13)
Colorado State (16)
UCF (17)
West Virginia (26)
San Diego State (27)
Navy (28)
BYU (30)
UConn (32)
Kansas (34)
Cincinnati (36)
Texas (38)
Oklahoma (44)
Oklahoma State (44)
Tulane (50)
Memphis (51)
Fresno State (55)
Tulsa (61)
Iowa State (68)
Air Force (82)
Baylor (83)
Boise State (101)
East Carolina (102)
Kansas State (142)
Texas Tech (145)

These numbers have to be taken with a giant grain of salt for a variety of reasons, but they do give a little bit of insight. First, it’s easy to see that the Big 12 is a small market league. The AAC actually has larger markets overall, albeit fewer fans within their markets for the most part, as the attendance numbers reveal. Second, while schools like East Carolina and Boise State may have nice attendance numbers for G5 schools, the size of their markets makes it difficult to believe they would be realistic candidates for Big 12 expansion.

Conclusion
BYU is clearly the best candidate for Big 12 expansion and it isn’t really close. Arguably, they have a bigger following than any of the remaining Big 12 schools. They have to be a part of any potential Big 12 expansion.

After that it’s a bit tricky. Any team that averages under 30,000 fans is a tough sell, so that leaves East Carolina, Memphis, UCF, San Diego State, USF, Cincinnati, Boise State, Navy, Houston, Army, and Temple.

Army declined an invite from the AAC, so they aren’t joining the Big 12. Boise State and East Carolina have to be eliminated due to market size. I think San Diego State is a tough sell geographically with the other schools. Temple doesn’t have a great football program. I have a hard time seeing Navy being a choice because I think we’ll be looking for full members. That leaves five schools:

Memphis
UCF
USF
Cincinnati
Houston

The best of those is UCF, who has had Big 12 caliber attendance as of late and is a gigantic school in a large TV market that also happens to be a football recruiting hotbed. If we brought in USF along side them, we’d be bringing in another giant university in a even bigger market and firmly establish the Big 12 in the state of Florida.

I don’t like the idea of adding Houston because I don’t really think we get a lot from it, but I could see the Big 12 wanting to stay Texas-centric. Maybe the league feels that with the loss of Texas we would benefit by having another school in the state?

Cincinnati has had a lot of ten win seasons in the last 10+ years. Ohio is a recruiting hotbed and they would provide West Virginia a nearby conference school.

Memphis would be a good basketball addition and they have decent attendance in football. Their market is just ok though.

If we were taking four teams, I would take BYU and UCF for sure. Then I would probably take USF and Cincinnati, but I wouldn’t argue too much against Houston or Memphis instead.

None of those expansion candidates looked good nor brought any value before Texas and OU left, and they still don't. Like I've said before staying in this conference and adding any of the teams here is a death sentence. Adding G5 schools is not going to help us increase or even maintain our current income, not even close.

Unless there is more turmoil in other conferences for us to gain other P5 members the only viable option is to find a new P5/4 home.

 

[BCClone]

Do we really want to shy away from competition from teams that are currently weaker than us? We can step up to the challenge and remain stronger than them.

Not shying away from competition. Being in a power 5 generally elevates your stature from being a G5. Kansas is a good example. One of the worst teams in D1, but probably the first of the 8 to get picked up. Just being careful that we don’t lose our potential selection order if it comes to that.

 

[HawaiiClone]

Not shying away from competition. Being in a power 5 generally elevates your stature from being a G5. Kansas is a good example. One of the worst teams in D1, but probably the first of the 8 to get picked up. Just being careful that we don’t lose our potential selection order if it comes to that.

I don't know if Kansas is necessarily the first to be picked up with their performance on the field, but yes, it does help them being in a P5 conference. But we also are in a P5 conference so we benefit from that, too. We'll just have to wait and see what happens, but I see a lot of effort and a good amount of success from our football program as well as lots of fan support. That will count for something. Maybe not as much as we would like now, but down the road it will.

 

[HawaiiClone]

How do you schedule 4 P5 OOC games against conferences that may only have 1 or 2 non conference opportunities each season when this shakes out, and because of it would prefer buying a win against a G5 10/10 times in that situation?

I said they would play 2 (not 4) non conference P5 games, but yes, if power conferences play more than 8 conference games per season then it gets harder for us to schedule them. However, if they continue playing 8 non conference games, then there is a chance they will want to play a team from the new Big 12. If they don't, then we should invite the best G5 schools to join the conference so that we are guaranteed to at least be able to play them.

One more thing re: power conference teams' non-conference schedules is that Nick Saban said he thinks power conf teams should only play against other power conf teams. So the question is whether the remaining Big 12 teams can fit somewhere into whatever the power conference teams end up wanting for non conference opponents.

 

[cayin]

This actually isn't bad as the worst case (no B1G, no PAC12) scenario.

Going to a much bigger 16 team conference, having a proper eastern division, some schools with growth potential like UCF, the service academies all together. At least there is a marketable vision there. More than just adding Cincy and Houston and hoping for the best. You're still looking at something like $20M per team AT BEST though.

I think you could debate a couple choices, like Army and Navy, vs one of the Louisiana or Georgia schools, you might get more viewers out of that, idk. But overall, this is something that has more hope than despair. At least until ESPN and the other 4 conferences bend us over and remove our P5 status...

In the last round of realignment, someone from the Academies said they have no interest in playing a the P5 level, it is a matter of safety for their players. They can do it for 3 games or so, but to load up on it wouldn't be safe as generally their players are not as big, strong and fast as P5