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Post by pcbb7777 on Jun 26, 2019 10:58:10 GMT -5
The American’s new media rights deal will pay its members almost $7 million per year, starting in the 2020-21 academic year. The previous deal paid about $2 million. The Big East is in the middle of a deal with Fox that pays members more than $4 million annually. Not that I give a hoot, but why would Ucant switch leagues at this point in light of those payout figures? Secondly if the BE payout is presently $4mil, why are the schools interested in an 11-way split instead of the current 10-way split? What the immediate gain under the current contract? IIRC, it will not be an 11 way split. The deal with Fox allows for payout increases in the instance of adding up to 2 schools. The payout will stay the same for all current schools while UConn will then receive an additional, equal share.
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Post by connfriar on Jun 26, 2019 12:13:25 GMT -5
UConn Board of Trustees unanimously votes to accept the invitation...
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Post by pcbb7777 on Jun 26, 2019 12:29:57 GMT -5
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pcdad
Friar Fanatic
Posts: 3,701
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Post by pcdad on Jun 26, 2019 12:44:33 GMT -5
Grant of Rights agreement? pc1971 to the rescue for clarity or just a simple search engine inquiry?
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Post by connfriar on Jun 26, 2019 12:52:00 GMT -5
I believe it means that the Big East will not retain broadcast rights to UConn's games if the Huskies leave before the termination of any master Big East broadcast deal...
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Cteve
Blue Chipper
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Post by Cteve on Jun 26, 2019 13:47:23 GMT -5
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Post by dex on Jun 26, 2019 15:02:11 GMT -5
3.5 million lousy friggin bucks
Kreskin The Great has nuttin on me when it comes to predicting
Thump Change and all the Publisher here can say is ; DEAL WITH IT
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Post by dex on Jun 26, 2019 15:07:15 GMT -5
By Kevin McNamara Journal Sports Writer
Posted at 12:51 PM
When the Big East’s leaders gather for a press conference in New York City Thursday to welcome the University of Connecticut back to the fold, watch for plenty of smiles on the faces of the school presidents who embraced this move.
Commissioner Val Ackerman will rejoice and the same goes for the athletic directors and promotion types who can see another sold out arena when the Huskies come to town.
At first glimpse, this is a big deal for a Big East that could use another consistent Top 25 program to run alongside Villanova.
At second glimpse, however, things get much cloudier.
Say you’re Ed Cooley at Providence or Seton Hall’s Kevin Willard. Over the last six years, Connecticut recruited many of the same New England/New York/New Jersey prospects that you did. Some, if not many, rejected the Huskies because they played out of the American Athletic Conference. The American is a good basketball league, as good as the Big East in some years. But with schools like Tulsa, Tulane and Central Florida, plenty of Eastern kids take a pass. They’d like Mom and Dad to watch them play in person, after all.
This disconnect badly damaged UConn basketball. It cost coach Kevin Ollie his job, hurt attendance and led to losing records in the last three seasons, something that hasn’t happened in Storrs in more than 30 years.
With UConn stuck in nowhere’s land, once struggling Big East programs like Providence and Seton Hall have thrived. Both have made repeated NCAA Tournament appearances, the Friars an unprecedented five straight seasons (2014-18). Is there a direct connection between this success and UConn’s fall?
“They had one foot in the grave,” said one Big East insider. “Now we’re saving them.”
Now UConn is back where it belongs, back in a Big East that doesn’t look like the conference it left in 2013 but one that’s all about basketball. It’s a league that’s shown it’s capable of showing up schools that care most about football but could always use a little more star power.
So, good for the Big East. Good for Dan Hurley, the ex-Rhody coach who will have to endure late night flights home from SMU and Memphis for only one more season.
But what about Providence, Seton Hall and St. John’s? You just helped the conference but you also hurt yourself.
With the blessing of your presidents and AD’s, you just woke a sleeping giant. Hurley is upgrading from a Cadillac to a Rolls-Royce in terms of recruiting targets. His first full class of recruits includes three Top 100 talents. Now he’ll target top 50, top 25 kids and see his text messages returned.
Since the Big East reconstituted itself in 2013, Commissioner Ackerman has praised the “like-minded” and “basketball-centric” group of schools under her watch. It’s what’s made the conference work. Well forget that. UConn may be basketball-centric but a large state school in the hills of New England has nothing in common with Georgetown or Xavier.
And don’t forget that unlike the current Big East programs, UConn has found itself in hot water with the NCAA twice in the last decade. That’s not the way Hurley operates but the history is troubling.
Don’t listen when you hear Big East people say this isn’t about money. Expansion is always about money and after getting steamrolled for years by former football partners Boston College, Pittsburgh and Syracuse, everyone should know the score. UConn will pay an entry fee to the Big East (reports are $2.5 million), but that’s usually deducted from future earnings. More importantly, TV partner Fox Sports certainly pushed for this. Word is the addition of UConn can trigger a clause in the Big East’s deal with Fox and re-open talks on a contract that has six years to run. This will mean a bump from the current $4 million or so per school TV payout; perhaps an additional $2 million per school.
Money is certainly a major issue for a UConn athletic program that is bleeding in the American, mainly due to football losses. Athletics reportedly ran a $41 million deficit during 2018 that is ultimately subsidized by one of the largest school/student fee payments in the country.
This wasn’t the plan back in the late 1990′s when UConn went all-in on the football front. The state helped build the $90 million Rentschler Field in Hartford and on-campus Taj Mahals were constructed for nearly $50 million to meet the football program’s practice, office and locker room needs.
Now those buildings will house a team headed for Independent status whose big rival looks to be Massachusetts, not Cincinnati or Clemson.
One piece of this deal that can’t be overlooked is the UConn women’s team. The UConn women are a Brand, with a capital B. ESPN regularly placed a few of its high-profile non-league games (Notre Dame, Baylor, ect.) in prime time. Those will now be a coup for Fox. Geno Auriemma, by the way, never lost (120-0) a conference game in the American.
Geno’s take a few days ago on a return to more familiar territory was a good one. “It’s like saying you’re moving back to your hometown, but the block that you lived on and half the city is gone,” he said. “It’s not the same.”
Geno’s team hasn’t changed much but the UConn men’s team isn’t the same. Jim Calhoun and the national championship-level success is yesterday’s news. The Huskies have won one game in the NCAA’s and had one player (Daniel Hamilton) drafted by the NBA in the last five years.
But now they’ve been given a new life, courtesy of the Big East schools they once regularly trounced. Get ready Providence and Seton Hall fans. If a vision of Hurley and his Huskies cutting down the nets at the Garden turns your stomach, you’d better stock up on the Maalox.
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Post by TheInfoMan on Jun 26, 2019 16:48:47 GMT -5
3.5 million lousy friggin bucks Kreskin The Great has nuttin on me when it comes to predicting Thump Change and all the Publisher here can say is ; DEAL WITH ITIf they get $4mil out of the Fox contract, and $3.5mil is required for buy-in, they come out ahead. My memo apparently did not reach the BE office: I wanted PAIN and a Pound of Flesh from Storrs. Instead the league was bought off by 30-pieces of silver. Shoulda crushed the snake's head when we had our chance. As the Projo article pointed out: “They had one foot in the grave,” said one Big East insider. “Now we’re saving them.”
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Cteve
Blue Chipper
Posts: 1,617
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Post by Cteve on Jun 26, 2019 17:05:49 GMT -5
He offered no proof and Val won't say anything about it Thurs. either. Fox will pay whatever uconn has coming to them over the remainder of the original deal. Nothing more to the membership.
I bet the BE "insider" is Sonar.
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thefriarman
Administrator
Global Moderator
Posts: 5,769
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Post by thefriarman on Jun 26, 2019 19:35:41 GMT -5
All UCONN league home games should be played in Hartford and not a Gampel....they don't deserve that type of home court advantage.
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Post by pembroke04 on Jun 27, 2019 6:42:27 GMT -5
You sound like a UConn fan Dex. He is acting like a spurned lover. Dex, this Cooley Michigan thing really has your panties in a twist doesn't it? I would suggest letting it go, life is too short. J, I believed that Cooley was happy and I thought he would be content, working to realize his stated goal of a national championship. While I understand the potential reasons behind his actions, it’s still notable and puts his situation into realistic perspective. Also, I’m a fan of the move the add UCONN, and I get that we need to look at our situation objectively, and I hate to say it, but life after Cooley needs to be planned for. Also, I think Conn said it first, but we need to get over our inferiority complex.
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Post by dex on Jun 27, 2019 8:38:22 GMT -5
UConn officially accepts Big East invite
STORRS, Conn. — The University of Connecticut Board of Trustees on Wednesday accepted an invitation to move its basketball and most other athletic teams from the American Athletic Conference.
University President Susan Herbst signed a contract with the Big East that includes a $3.5 million entry fee, and the teams are expected to begin play in the conference in the 2020-21 academic year.
“While we all appreciate the AAC...the board must make a decision that is best for the athletic program,” said Tom Ritter, the interim chairman of the Board of Trustees. “At this time, I support accepting the Big East invitation as a better overall fit and, in my opinion, best for our program and student athletes.”
The move is designed to energize the school’s fan base by renewing some old rivalries. It also means an end to costly road trips to states such as Texas, Oklahoma and Florida for conference games. UConn is currently dealing with a deficit in its athletic division of more than $40 million.
The school hasn’t indicated what it plans to do with its football program, a sport not offered by the Big East. But as part of the contract with the Big East, UConn has agreed not to seek football membership at this time in any Power Five conference and to pay a $30 million exit fee if it leaves the Big East during its first six years of membership. The fee would eventually drop to $15 and later $10 million.
— The Associated Press
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Post by wtm97 on Jun 27, 2019 8:42:16 GMT -5
“Aresco was said to be blindsided by UConn’s departure and not pleased with how it played out — fuming, I wrote. His office called me to point out that Aresco has always handled such scenarios with a certain levelheadedness, and on Wednesday that office said Aresco wouldn’t comment until UConn’s move was announced by the Big East. To hear him speak from the heart about UConn leaving, if he’s willing to do so, would be fascinating.”
Mike Anthony, today’s Hartford Current
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Post by dex on Jun 27, 2019 11:27:01 GMT -5
McGAIR: PC should be leery of Huskies
By BRENDAN McGAIR / bmcgair@pawtuckettimes.com Jun 26, 2019
For the first time since 2013, Ed Cooley and the Providence Friars will no longer be the only New England team in the Big East when UConn comes back to the conference starting in the fall of 2020.
They’re rejoicing from Storrs to Hartford. Cancel those far-flung trips to Houston and SMU.
Inside the Big East’s headquarters, cartwheels are undoubtedly being turned. The conference’s response to welcoming back an old friend is to get inside Madison Square Garden for a Thursday press conference where there figures to be no shortage of backslapping, high fives, and “atta-boys.”
Amidst all the UConn hoopla that is being touted as a major victory for the school’s men’s basketball program, PC Friar hoop heads should be a tad leery. Not along the lines of hiding under the covers because there’s a scary monster lurking under the bed, but close.
The Big East’s former big bad wolf has been extended an invitation to dinner. UConn may have fallen on hard times in recent years, yet let’s set our watches and see just how quickly the luster returns. By reattaching itself to a conference where the vast majority of its basketball fortune was achieved, Connecticut is giving off the aura of a king who’s ready to reclaim its throne after his majesty embarked on a long, and often lonely, journey in the wilderness.
For PC, buckle up and get ready. The New England-based turf war that has seen you enjoy the upper hand over the past several years has the potential of becoming a thing of the past.
Officially, Connecticut has been air-lifted from the deserted island where they were left to wither after the conference reshuffling craziness earlier this decade. Once the merry-go-round in 2012-13 slowed down, Providence College got off and set foot in a Catholic-centric, football-free Big East that’s proven to work very, very well.
When the music stopped playing, the Huskies were told to follow the dusty trail that would lead them to a league that featured zero basketball tradition and plenty of long flights.
Six years later and UConn is now no longer associated with a league where it was seen as a total mismatch right from the moment the American Athletic Conference was born. What was once a bitter pill to swallow no longer has to be digested.
You can’t tell the history of the Big East without mentioning the Huskies, which on the surface makes this a re-marriage made in basketball heaven. From the four NCAA championships, to the countless players who have gone on to play and thrive in the NBA, to the always colorful coach (Jim Calhoun) who has a spot in the Basketball Hall of Fame, UConn from the late 1980s until its most recent NCAA title in 2014 had an aura about it where it almost seemed and felt like they were invincible.
On the flip side, the Friars prior to the Big East’s 10-team rebranding in 2013 felt like an unwanted guest. They could see, but they couldn’t touch.
In recent years, it seems the narrative has flipped. PC’s once lengthy NCAA Tournament drought has since been replaced with a string of five straight invites to the Big Dance. The Friars have found the current Big East arrangement far more to its liking, enjoying the kind of success that was hard to come by when the UConns and Syracuses of the college basketball world were still residing on the same block.
On the other side of the state line that separates Connecticut from Rhode Island, the Huskies had seen its basketball fortune dry up on the court – no NCAA appearances since that aforementioned ’14 championship – and come under fire in the courtroom thanks to the scandalous situation involving former head coach Kevin Ollie.
Coupled with playing games in a league that yielded a collective yawn from an impatient Huskie Nation, it seemed that grand and glorious era of Connecticut basketball would have a hard time ever being resurrected.
For the Huskies, the days of attempting to get jazzed up for Tulane, East Carolina and Tulsa are mercifully over. The power of the Big East is firmly in their corner. In theory, saying “I’m with the Big East” should help hasten coach Dan Hurley’s rebuilding efforts. Now, Hurley and his UConn assistants can make recruiting pitches that include “Hey, we’re going to play our conference tournament at the World’s Most Famous Arena!”
Talk about your valuable trump card.
It was perfectly fine when the Friars and Huskies put feelers out there in an attempt to clear space on the non-league calendar. Geography-wise, a game between schools in neighboring states made all the sense in the world. You reminisce about the good old days. You play a game with the intention of boosting the NET ranking. Once the final horn sounds, you head back to your respective universe.
Thanks to the latest round of conference roller derby, the Friars and Huskies are being forced to eat from the same Big East trough. It’s a whole new ballgame.
Providence no longer has the luxury of being known as the Big East’s lone New England representative. Once again, Ed Cooley has Hurley in his sights. This time, we’re not talking about a once-a-year game like PC vs. URI. The stakes now have some significant Big East bite to them.
Yes, the Friars are in a prime position to match fire with fire with the Huskies, something that wasn’t the case when the two were part of the “old” Big East that saw UConn reside near the top and PC fighting to stay out of the basement. Cooley has proven he can recruit at a high level and should continue to reap the benefits of PC’s state-of-the-art on-campus practice facility.
Still, we’re talking about a national brand, one that’s upped the ante whether the reference is about jockeying for NCAA spots or fighting over the same recruits.
It might be summer outside, yet the news of the Big East and Connecticut staging a reunion feels like a cold front is passing through these parts.
Follow Brendan McGair on Twitter @bwmcgair03
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