Chicago Trib: Xavier, Butler, Creighton should be official Wed or Thurs

[Litehouse]

With all these "maybes" associated with each school (SLU, Dayton, Richmond, VCU) I'm convinced than ever that we should stick with 10 for a few years.

[The Process]

The vociferous Flyers fans may be repugnant, but they come out in force and support the hell out of that program.

Judging from those St. Patrick's Day pictures, they'll come out in force and support just about anything, so long as they can drink and riot.

I also wonder whether Fox would be thrilled with three relatively-close in location programs (Butler/X/Dayton) being back together in the Big East, especially if they're handing out big TV contracts as part of this.  How much overlap is there between the Indy/Dayton/Cincy markets, anyways, both in terms of recruiting and TV-wise?

[Benny B]

Judging from those St. Patrick's Day pictures, they'll come out in force and support just about anything, so long as they can drink and riot.

I also wonder whether Fox would be thrilled with three relatively-close in location programs (Butler/X/Dayton) being back together in the Big East, especially if they're handing out big TV contracts as part of this.  How much overlap is there between the Indy/Dayton/Cincy markets, anyways, both in terms of recruiting and TV-wise?

From Nielsen:

Rank / DMA / TV Homes
21  St Louis       1,243,490
26  Indianapolis  1,089,700
34  Milwaukee       902,190
35  Cincinnati        897,890
57  Richmond        553,390
63  Dayton           498,270
75  Omaha           414,060

Though, two important points:

1) Creighton's fan base extends beyond their local market.  If you added the Lincoln DMA (276,790), you'd have a combined DMA that would rank #48, just ahead of Louisville.

2) TV market coverage is more important to conferences starting their own (or who eventually want to start their own) TV network.  It is also important to conferences whose TV partner needs to gain leverage with more cable/satellite providers.  Since FS1 is already available on most providers and has sufficient programming to compete for viewership demand nationwide, FS1 isn't concerned about whether the Big East is going to "lock up" the Cincinnati and Indianapolis markets... it's more concerned about having original programming that viewers will want to watch.

[The Process]

Fair, but what about my other point?  Shouldn't X and Butler be opposed to having a third Big East program nearby from a recruiting perspective?  Is there enough overlap to be concerned?

[Benny B]

Fair, but what about my other point?  Shouldn't X and Butler be opposed to having a third Big East program nearby from a recruiting perspective?  Is there enough overlap to be concerned?

Xavier and Butler are recruiting against the likes of IU, UK, OSU and UC already... not sure that they have any concern with Dayton.

Additionally, X, Butler and Dayton are currently in the same conference, and no one seemed to be complaining about recruiting overlap as it was.

[The Process]

Additionally, X, Butler and Dayton are currently in the same conference, and no one seemed to be complaining about recruiting overlap as it was.

Probably because they know it's a mid-major conference and they want to get to a better conference, such as the Big East.  At a high-major level, I wonder if things might be different with overlap.

[MDMU04]

With all these "maybes" associated with each school (SLU, Dayton, Richmond, VCU) I'm convinced than ever that we should stick with 10 for a few years.

Hell, I say we should keep it at 10 forever but float the expansion rumors right around tournament time every just to screw with the Dayton board.

Seriously, that 2014 thread on the UD board is hilarious. They have a 1200+ post thread without trolls from other schools egging on their existential meltdown.

I thought this board had the all time meltdown award with the everlasting smu thread last year, but we're not even on the same planet as those people.