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Post by stevehorn on Apr 20, 2022 14:47:43 GMT -5
If they are trying to keep things as local as possible, I'd probably put UK-UT-Vandy together with either USC or UGA, and then send the other one to UF-Auburn-Bama. I think they'll want to keep Florida and Georgia together, but I don't think they want a Florida/Georgia/Alabama/Auburn "Pod of Death." Keeping in mind that football is the sport that will primarily drive these decisions. So I think Auburn and Alabama will be separated from Florida and Georgia. From feedback by SEC folks, Alabama will want to be with Tennessee due to the historic rivalry and obviously Auburn. So that sets Alabama-Auburn-Tennessee-Vanderbilt as a virtual lock. Other locks are Florida - Georgia, Texas - OU, and Ole Miss-MSU. |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 20, 2022 14:48:14 GMT -5
U of Minn was one of the few schools in the country to have varsity men's gymnastics, and just dropped the team.
Would think that would be by far the easiest path for them (OU) to go.
Also would assume OU will stay in the Big XII for wrestling, which is a large, competitive conference that has several wrestling teams from schools in various other DI conferences that don't sponsor the sport. Mizzou is there.
Hmm, Oklahoma actually has a really good men's gymnastics program with 12 national titles, including four straight from 2015 to 2018. Also, there are only 13 NCAA men's gymnastics programs. And men's volleyball thinks they have it bad. Anyway, I don't think they would drop men's wrestling either. If they were to drop a men's sport, I think something like tennis or indoor track would be more likely than either gymnastics or wrestling. I would think no chance at wrestling, even though that's probably the literally one sport that Okla St is currently superior at. (Probably was a time not too long ago when men's basketball was as well)
Did not know men's gym was that dominate at OU. In that case, probably not then.
But yes, dropping a men's sport as opposed to adding a women's is going to be their path of least resistance.
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Post by 2Close4Missiles on Apr 20, 2022 14:48:43 GMT -5
It's not set in stone football goes to pods. I've seen a few different mock 9 game setups where each team gets 3 permanent opponents, then 6 schools one year, the other 6 the next. I think this is what ends up happening. It seems the most fair, lets you keep some rivalries intact, and you play every team in conference home and away at least once every 4 years.
So the question would be, would volleyball go to pods if football doesn't?
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Post by Deleted on Apr 20, 2022 14:50:21 GMT -5
If they are trying to keep things as local as possible, I'd probably put UK-UT-Vandy together with either USC or UGA, and then send the other one to UF-Auburn-Bama. I think they'll want to keep Florida and Georgia together, but I don't think they want a Florida/Georgia/Alabama/Auburn "Pod of Death." Keeping in mind that football is the sport that will primarily drive these decisions. So I think Auburn and Alabama will be separated from Florida and Georgia. Could scrap divisions entirely and just put #1 vs #2 (CFP ranking) in the championship game. |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 20, 2022 14:53:43 GMT -5
Not knowing all the politics and rivalries for the SEC - I would expect something like this: Football - 2 divisions East and West. Play everyone in your division and then one game outside the division for an 8 game conference season. Conference Championship game from the division winners. West (Oklahoma, Texas, Texas A&M, Missouri, LSU, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Arkansas). East (Alabama, Auburn, Vandy, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina). I think this would maintain all the main rivalries in the conference. The question will be how the SEC will view Oklahoma and Texas programs? If they view them as good or superior to Auburn/Florida - then this would fly. If they view them as 2nd division type programs, then they will think this is way too lopsided to the East and will come up with a different plan. To me - this is a pretty equal distribution of football programs. Volleyball - 4 pods makes sense to me. Play home and home against the 3 other teams in your pod and then 1 match against the other 12 teams. This is assuming that the SEC will want an 18 game conference season (which is optimal). On a side note - they should try and work out a midseason conference showdown with another conference like the ACC or B12. The Big Ten would be a great choice if they would ever go with an 18 match season. I would go with the following Pods: Texas, Texas A&M, Oklahoma, and Missouri. Ole Miss, Arkansas, Mississippi State, LSU. Vandy, Kentucky, Auburn, and Alabama. Tennessee, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina. The potential edits to this would be swapping Missouri and Arkansas or Kentucky and Tennessee. Basketball would also work best with the 4 pods - only Football is where it wouldn't make scheduling sense. Again, why have pods/divisions at all? What is the thing being solved by doing that?
Divisions came from football, in the first place. The SEC were the ones who invented it, and the conference championship game that corresponded to them, actually. But now you can do a CCG without it being two division winners.
In other sports, there's already an end of season conference tournament or they just go by standings anyway.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 20, 2022 14:55:35 GMT -5
It's not set in stone football goes to pods. I've seen a few different mock 9 game setups where each team gets 3 permanent opponents, then 6 schools one year, the other 6 the next. I think this is what ends up happening. It seems the most fair, lets you keep some rivalries intact, and you play every team in conference home and away at least once every 4 years. So the question would be, would volleyball go to pods if football doesn't? Exactly.
This makes more sense, frankly. Lock in 3. Or you could do lock in 2 and have the 3 be a long-term rotating team, say 6 years at a time.
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Post by stevehorn on Apr 20, 2022 14:59:08 GMT -5
It's not set in stone football goes to pods. I've seen a few different mock 9 game setups where each team gets 3 permanent opponents, then 6 schools one year, the other 6 the next. I think this is what ends up happening. It seems the most fair, lets you keep some rivalries intact, and you play every team in conference home and away at least once every 4 years. So the question would be, would volleyball go to pods if football doesn't? It is common in many conferences to split into division for football, but no division split in other sports which have more conference games/matches. So conferences are used to different arrangements for different sports. If the SEC decided pods was the best scheduling arrangement for volleyball, I would see them doing this even if it was different than football. |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 20, 2022 15:03:41 GMT -5
The Big East had 16 schools in basketball, and never split int divisions.
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bluepenquin
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Post by bluepenquin on Apr 20, 2022 15:07:42 GMT -5
If you have 16 teams and an 8 game schedule (football). What do you do when you end up with 3 teams 8-0 in conference play. Who goes to the championship game? I think that could happen. Or, 4 teams go 7-1?
For volleyball and other sports - they don't have to go with pods. The advantage of pods would be cutting down on travel. I think it would potentially cut down travel by a sizable amount. Along with this - it would easily fit into an 18 game/match schedule. And it would allow some consistency on rivalries.
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Post by bluepenquin on Apr 20, 2022 15:10:34 GMT -5
It's not set in stone football goes to pods. I've seen a few different mock 9 game setups where each team gets 3 permanent opponents, then 6 schools one year, the other 6 the next. I think this is what ends up happening. It seems the most fair, lets you keep some rivalries intact, and you play every team in conference home and away at least once every 4 years. So the question would be, would volleyball go to pods if football doesn't? 9 games help, but still - with 16 teams there is good chance they end up with a three way tie for first place - or a 2 or 3 way tie for 2nd place. Then what is the fair way to break the tie for the conference championship game? |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 20, 2022 15:11:38 GMT -5
If you have 16 teams and an 8 game schedule (football). What do you do when you end up with 3 teams 8-0 in conference play. Who goes to the championship game? I think that could happen. Or, 4 teams go 7-1? 7-1 is easy: tiebreakers. No team can possibly claim they were robbed, because each of them did not control their own destiny. They each lost a game that they could have won, if they'd played better.
The three 8-0 is the tough one. Would like to know if that is mathematically possible. Keep in mind, it's not quite as elementary as 16 teams 8 games. Because, as was suggested, it could be something like a number of locked in rivalry games and then the remainder rotating through.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 20, 2022 15:12:58 GMT -5
It's not set in stone football goes to pods. I've seen a few different mock 9 game setups where each team gets 3 permanent opponents, then 6 schools one year, the other 6 the next. I think this is what ends up happening. It seems the most fair, lets you keep some rivalries intact, and you play every team in conference home and away at least once every 4 years. So the question would be, would volleyball go to pods if football doesn't? 9 games help, but still - with 16 teams there is good chance they end up with a three way tie for first place - or a 2 or 3 way tie for 2nd place. Then what is the fair way to break the tie for the conference championship game? Have they agreed to go to 9, though?
The "problem" with the SEC is that you have four teams locked into a year game with a team outside the conference: Geogia-Tech, Florida-State, SC-Clemson, and Kentucky-Lville. Those are like defacto +1 conf games.
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Post by stevehorn on Apr 20, 2022 15:27:10 GMT -5
The Big East had 16 schools in basketball, and never split int divisions. I think we have gotten carried away with the pod/division discussion for sports other than football. Most don't split into divisions for sports other than football, but the discussion is still relevant because the larger conferences usually have an unbalanced schedule where they play some schools twice and some schools once. They utilize some grouping or rotating method to develop the schedules. 16 teams in a conference does create another discussion IMO. Do you still play every conference team at least once each year which means you play few teams twice (only 3 schools twice in an 18 game schedule) or do you not play some teams each year so you have more home and home series in a year? |
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Post by stevehorn on Apr 20, 2022 15:31:37 GMT -5
9 games help, but still - with 16 teams there is good chance they end up with a three way tie for first place - or a 2 or 3 way tie for 2nd place. Then what is the fair way to break the tie for the conference championship game? Have they agreed to go to 9, though?
The "problem" with the SEC is that you have four teams locked into a year game with a team outside the conference: Geogia-Tech, Florida-State, SC-Clemson, and Kentucky-Lville. Those are like defacto +1 conf games.
Don't believe there has been any formal announcement on the number of conference games. Doubt there will be any announcements until the expansion year is finalized. If it nine, what is the problem of some schools having a fixed OOC game? Those series have been going on for decades. In fact, there likely will be two more. Texas has an agreement with Texas Tech for a 25 year series of games and I expect OU to make a similar agreement with Oklahoma State. |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 20, 2022 15:33:25 GMT -5
The Big East had 16 schools in basketball, and never split int divisions. I think we have gotten carried away with the pod/division discussion for sports other than football. Most don't split into divisions for sports other than football, but the discussion is still relevant because the larger conferences usually have an unbalanced schedule where they play some schools twice and some schools once. They utilize some grouping or rotating method to develop the schedules. 16 teams in a conference does create another discussion IMO. Do you still play every conference team at least once each year which means you play few teams twice (only 3 schools twice in an 18 game schedule) or do you not play some teams each year so you have more home and home series in a year? Sure, makes sense to do the more home/home and to also try to have a bias to it to minimize travel (miles, costs). But neither requires a formal split into divisions. Especially because, no matter how you do the regular season in basketball, it all just feeds into a big single-elimination bracket conf tournament.
Volleyball could technically do the same thing. I think most(?) lower level conferences have a season-ending tournament. But for some reason the Big Ten doesn't. (It should)
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