Football expansion will be a hot topic when the Big East Conference hold’s its annual spring meetings this month in Ponte Vedra. Big East teams are being encouraged to leave room open on future schedules if the league adds a 10th team. TCU joins the conference in 2012 to become its ninth football team and the league wants to expand to 10.
Villanova, an FCS (I-AA) power has been talked about as the natural addition, but there doesn’t appear to be a lot of passion to add the Wildcats, particularly with the Big East already under fire for being part of the BCS.
To keep its options open, USF is scheduling future football games with the understanding that it may have to back out with buyout penalty.
One of the big motivators to add a so called “name” team is television money. The new Pac 10, which now has 12 teams, announced its launching its own television network and will make $3 billion over the next 12 years in a joint agreement with ESPN and Fox.
According to a Forbes Magazine report, West Virginia topped the Big East in football revenue in 2009 with $29.5 million. USF was fifth ($16.5 million) behind Pittsburgh ($22.5), Rutgers ($19.5), Syracuse ($19.1).
Do you know the dates of the meeting?
ReplyDelete