Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

Little late to get caught up on this thread but I’m glad to see a few of the knee jerk reactions were pretty negative:

big no thanks to both…Washington and Oregon can get fkd though as far as I'm concerned. Neither bring anything to the table at all. And quite frankly I'd be more than happy if Oregon started to die off and was never heard from again and go back to the basement where they belong.

Yeah not only does Oregon not bring anything to the table, they actually take away quite a bit.  They're dangerous and competitive both on the field and in recruiting and they are light years ahead of most programs in weaponizing NIL.  And yet they don't bring net new viewers to the B1G, not in the way USC does.

Along with what @Mdot21 and @utee94 are already saying, I’ll offer a few more reasons:

1. Should the B1G add two more schools from the Pacific Time Zone, that makes four with long, inconvenient travels over the Rockies. Keep in mind UCLA and USC are already fussing about the longer distance travel. Four of them will team up to magnify their grievances about a lot more than just travel – reffing, title IX, student sections, political hot topics, which leads me to my next point…

2. Think about what you know of California, Oregon, and Washington as states. Think about why so many people are leaving the Pacific Coast’s larger cities and think about the headlines you see warning of what’s going on in the large Pacific Coast cities. Now think about whether those mindsets that have influenced San Francisco, LA, Portland, and Seattle into what they now are won’t (in a general sense) come to be voiced through all four of those schools. Adding the flashy LA schools(?), fine; but the B1G should know better than to invite their pastier NW cousins who liken themselves as “outdoorsy” but can’t fish or hunt deer.

3. The Oregon Ducks and especially Washington Huskies have the whiniest, crybaby-est fan bases I’ve ever encountered.

4. Why do academics so persistently come up as a talking point when it comes to conference realignment (except for unsurprisingly the SEC)? (See thread pages 2 & 3.) From the standpoint of college sports (which is what leads us to this forum to begin with) there a more important angles: geography, potential for rivalries, and increased TV money. When the subject of academics comes up it’s always as two different types of excuses for not winning. For example 1) should Vanderbilt blame their academic requirements preventing them from recruiting a roster full of JaMarcus Russells and Marcus Vicks and 2) when Delany’s response to the Florida Gators crushing Ohio State in the 2006 Nat’l Championship was to issue a statement about the B1G’s academics.

4. Why do academics so persistently come up as a talking point when it comes to conference realignment (except for unsurprisingly the SEC)? (See thread pages 2 & 3.) From the standpoint of college sports (which is what leads us to this forum to begin with) there a more important angles: geography, potential for rivalries, and increased TV money. When the subject of academics comes up it’s always as two different types of excuses for not winning. For example 1) should Vanderbilt blame their academic requirements preventing them from recruiting a roster full of JaMarcus Russells and Marcus Vicks and 2) when Delany’s response to the Florida Gators crushing Ohio State in the 2006 Nat’l Championship was to issue a statement about the B1G’s academics.

I bring up Academics and specifically Research dollars, because it's where the money is. (<-- That's a period.)

Athletics brings in 100's of millions of dollars. Research brings in Billions of dollars. (Do you need me to say that again? Research brings in Billions of dollars.) In 2020 the Big Ten Academic Alliance (BTAA) made 11.5 Billion Dollars.  The Big Ten Academic Consortium is the largest research consortium on the planet.  If the athletic prowess gets your institution into the conversation, you better bring something along to make Big Bother (Research) happy as well. 

Concerning Nebraska. I love how we can manipulate stats. Nebraska got their AAU Membership, and higher ranking because they were allowed to include research from their Medical campus. When their Medical campus was removed from data collected their numbers and ranking crashed. While Ohio State's Medical Campus in on their main campus, so those research dollars are allowed to be included in rankings. If Nebraska was allowed to use their medical numbers and Ohio State was forbidden, their positions would almost be swapped.
(Same thing with Virginia Tech, they applied for AAU membership trying to use their medical campus as part of their main campus and got denied. Where UVA has their medical campus right next to the university and get to include those numbers.)

I bring up Academics and specifically Research dollars, because it's where the money is. (<-- That's a period.)

This is why I always question Notre Dame.

Notre Dame fans think I'm nuts when I, an Ohio State Alum, state that Notre Dame doesn't have the academics for the B1G. This is because they are thinking of undergraduate academics/rankings and Notre Dame is a very good and very highly ranked undergraduate school.

That is NOT where the money is. The money is in graduate programs and specifically research. As a graduate/research institution, Notre Dame is barely above the Community College level.

The UGA medical school is in Augusta and also doesn't "count" with respect to the AAU thing.  (They might not make it anyway, dunno.)

Research@UGA – Fast Facts – Office of Research

This claims over half a billion.  The athletic department reported $203 million in operating revenue.

UGA athletics reports big surplus for latest NCAA financial report (onlineathens.com)

Ed Zachery!

it's a walk that Osborne and I are still quite happy about

2. Think about what you know of California, Oregon, and Washington as states. Think about why so many people are leaving the Pacific Coast’s larger cities and think about the headlines you see warning of what’s going on in the large Pacific Coast cities. Now think about whether those mindsets that have influenced San Francisco, LA, Portland, and Seattle into what they now are won’t (in a general sense) come to be voiced through all four of those schools. Adding the flashy LA schools(?), fine; but the B1G should know better than to invite their pastier NW cousins who liken themselves as “outdoorsy” but can’t fish or hunt deer.

This is a great point. The B1G already has states that people are leaving. Why add more? Skip Stanford. They, Cal, UW, WSU, osu, and UO will be irrelevant once the XII grabs UA, ASU, UU and UC.

Add Florida with FSU and Miami. Add the Carolinas with Clemson. Make ND cave.

(Before you bash FSU and Clemson on academics, do a little homework. Each has taken large steps in the past ten years.)