Butler to the MVFC?

[Lehigh Football Nation]

Butler will be getting a lot of money, win or lose, this weekend from its basketball program. Might the Bulldogs think about stepping up their football team from non-scholarship to the scholarship ranks?

Not only has their basketball team broken records this year, their football team had their best season in recent memory and finally won a postseason game. Could it be a sign they are ready to move to the next level of football (meaning scholarship FCS)?

Since the Horizon does not sponsor football, they could join the Missouri Valley in football as a football-only member easily.

[DetroitFlyer]

Butler will be getting a lot of money, win or lose, this weekend from its basketball program. Might the Bulldogs think about stepping up their football team from non-scholarship to the scholarship ranks?

Not only has their basketball team broken records this year, their football team had their best season in recent memory and finally won a postseason game. Could it be a sign they are ready to move to the next level of football (meaning FCS)?

Since the Horizon does not sponsor football, they could join the Missouri Valley in football as a football-only member easily.


Butler is already FCS. That is really all there is, you cannot move "up" or "down" in FCS.... Butler is happy in the PFL and is a founding member of the PFL. I think they will be there a long, long time. I sure hope that Butler wins the NC this year. It would be great on so many levels. The additional influx of funds might help to move the renovation of the Butler Bowl along a bit more quickly.... It would just cool if Butler wins the NCAA the same year that Dayton wins the NIT.

[Lehigh Football Nation]

I sure hope that Butler wins the NC this year. It would be great on so many levels. The additional influx of funds might help to move the renovation of the Butler Bowl along a bit more quickly.

And it's not an April Fool.... DF and I agree on something! :p

[Redbird Ray]

I only want Butler in the MV(F)C if they bring their basketball also. If the MVFC had to pick up some Pioneer squads for expansion, Butler and Drake (lots of great football history) would be cool. But I tend to think that if the MVFC ever expands (in its current state), they will look toward the Dakotas, and maybe try to steal back EIU.

[MplsBison]

I'd rather have Butler than Indiana State! xwhistlex

[ngineer]

Where does the Maid go??






;)

[Saint3333]

That is really all there is, you cannot move "up" or "down" in FCS.... .

I'd say the MVC would be a step up. It would be like leaving the MAC for the Big Ten in the FBS.

[Cocky]

I'd say the MVC would be a step up. It would be like leaving the MAC for the Big Ten in the FBS.

No in Basketball. The Horizon is the better league. Football would be a step up.

[MplsBison]

No in Basketball. The Horizon is the better league. Football would be a step up.

Missouri Valley is a full step up from the Horizon in MBB. Try looking at the rankings other than this year xcoffeex

[ValleyChamp]

The Horizon is the better league.

Absolutely not true. Not even close.

[Lehigh Football Nation]

The thing is, though, Butler could actually do it because of the NCAA tournament money. They will be getting a truckload of money for their athletic department, win or lose on Monday. They could use some of that money to go scholarship in football. The only question I have is would they be welcomed into the MVC? Perhaps yes... because of their basketball success.

[crunifan]

The MVC is a MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH better basketball conference than the Horizon. You know NOTHING about college basketball if you think that.

As good as Butler is this year, the Horizon League was the 14th rated conference by RPI. The MVC was 9th. Also, this is a down year for the MVC, in past year we have been has high as 5th.

The MVC is with the Mountain West, Conference USA, and the Atlantic 10 as the best non-Big 6 conferences for basketball. The MVC has more Sweet Sixteen teams than any non-Big Six conference in the last ten years. Comparing us to the Horizon League is insane.

[DFW HOYA]

There's not a tougher conference for a first round matchup than the Valley. They always give 110%.

[DJOM]

Butler is not leaving the PFL. Personally, I hope they take some of the money and improve the Butler Bowl---get stadium seating on the visitor side. That being said, Let's GO BUTLER....Beat Duke. By the way, the University of Dayton beat the University of Northern Carolina for the NIT title. The University of Dayton is also a proud member of the PFL.

[Redbird Ray]

Fans on ValleyTalk (MVC board) have been fawning over a MVC expansion with Saint Louis and Butler for quite some time now. If Butler were to pursue scholarship football, I would have to think the MVFC would be their targeted conference. Hopefully they would go all in to the MVC as well.

However, I think Butler is happy coasting through the Horizon each year. As good as they are, I can guarantee you if they had played in the MVC this season (even in a down year), their 27 game winning streak would not exist. Too many tough road venues in the Valley. A Butler/UNI championship game this year would have been epic.

[MplsBison]

The thing is, though, Butler could actually do it because of the NCAA tournament money. They will be getting a truckload of money for their athletic department, win or lose on Monday. They could use some of that money to go scholarship in football. The only question I have is would they be welcomed into the MVC? Perhaps yes... because of their basketball success.

Can someone verify if Butler gets the money or does the Horizon get the money and then distribute to all member schools?

I was thinking the conference gets the money.

[MplsBison]

Fans on ValleyTalk (MVC board) have been fawning over a MVC expansion with Saint Louis and Butler for quite some time now. If Butler were to pursue scholarship football, I would have to think the MVFC would be their targeted conference. Hopefully they would go all in to the MVC as well.

However, I think Butler is happy coasting through the Horizon each year. As good as they are, I can guarantee you if they had played in the MVC this season (even in a down year), their 27 game winning streak would not exist. Too many tough road venues in the Valley. A Butler/UNI championship game this year would have been epic.

Indeed, Butler has it too easy in the Horizon. Same with Gonzaga in the WCC.

I wish there was some sort of drafting system in college bball where the top teams in lower leagues were automatically drafted up into tougher leagues for the next season.

[Lehigh Football Nation]

Can someone verify if Butler gets the money or does the Horizon get the money and then distribute to all member schools?

I was thinking the conference gets the money.

It is my understanding that everyone benefits: the conference, all the member schools and, of course, Butler. But Butler gets the biggest chunk.

[achrist70]

The MVC (Basketball, Volleyball, Track, etc.) is no way connected to the MVFC if Butler wanted to join it they could do it with out having to join the MVC. Although I highly doubt they would want to join either one. They would have a difficult time competing in one of the 4 toughest conferences in FCS football, coming from one of the weakest that plays non-scholarship. As for the MVC while being able to compete for a Basketball title why leave a conference that they dominate the way the do when they are able to get a strong non-conference schedule to boast their strength of schedule.

[MplsBison]

It is my understanding that everyone benefits: the conference, all the member schools and, of course, Butler. But Butler gets the biggest chunk.

Well, do they? Again, I was thinking different, like every member of the Horizon shares equally in Butler's winnings. I guess it comes down to conference by-laws.

[CollegeSportsInfo]

No in Basketball. The Horizon is the better league. Football would be a step up.

The Horizon is indeed a better league FOR Butler. Much like the WCC is for Gonzaga vs. being a BB-only member in the WAC, MWC, etc. Butler will always be in a good situation to win the Horizon. Travel costs are very cheap too for them...hoops spend $1.8 million a year for a budget. MVC would mean more travel.

I for one would love to see Butler and St. Louis even, in the MVC. But I wonder if the state schools would want to give up that type of voting power.

[Lehigh Football Nation]

http://www.ibj.com/butler-coach-stevens-expected-to-get-lucrative-offers/PARAMS/article/19060


The value could be significant, considering the national attention generated by two front-page stories in USA Today and features on CNN, NBC, CBS, ESPN and in The New York Times—all during the last week of March alone. Such intangibles are difficult to measure, but the school’s licensing agency estimates that more than $2.5 million in Butler apparel and memorabilia will be sold surrounding the school’s tournament run.

I think that's small, but that pales in comparison to the hoops money. And on the Holy Cross board (http://s2.excoboard.com/Crossports/33741/2181962), a member over there speculated on the payout:


By playing in 6 games, Butler's run earned the Horizon League about $4.2 Million per year for 6 years beginning next year.

If the Horizon distributes it shares like the PL distributes NCAA shares - which I think is typical of many conferences - Butler will receive about 25% of that. I'm sure some of it will be allocated to pay Stevens more.

If true, Butler gets an extra $1 million a year - not counting admissions bump from national recognition, merchandising, etc - from the tournament run. Though undoubtedly a good hunk of that will be put back into the basketball programs, there could also be enough to get some sort of scholarship FCS football program off the ground, too. Interesting food for thought.

[DetroitFlyer]

http://www.ibj.com/butler-coach-stevens-expected-to-get-lucrative-offers/PARAMS/article/19060



I think that's small, but that pales in comparison to the hoops money. And on the Holy Cross board (http://s2.excoboard.com/Crossports/33741/2181962), a member over there speculated on the payout:



If true, Butler gets an extra $1 million a year - not counting admissions bump from national recognition, merchandising, etc - from the tournament run. Though undoubtedly a good hunk of that will be put back into the basketball programs, there could also be enough to get some sort of scholarship FCS football program off the ground, too. Interesting food for thought.

Geez, how many times do I have to say this...? Butler, as does EVERY PFL team, already has "some sort of scholarship FCS football program". We provide non-athletic scholarships to our football players. Do you really think that programs like USD sign two and even three star Rivals kids because these players are just dying to pay 100% of their expenses to attend USD? Perhaps Butler puts some of this money into the school's general scholarship fund which would allow Butler to provide additional non-athletic scholarship aid to students that play football.... No way is Butler going to waste this money on joining a different FCS league....

[Retro]

FYI: It's the Horizon league that gets the bulk of the money from their tournament run.. I believe it was 6.6. million for making it to the final four and it was spread out over several years, so it's no instant cash into their athletic program nor any other conference member.. They might clear about half million total after all is said and done over the course of a 5 years. from this..

ALSO, if 2.5 million in school merchandise is sold (probably over-estimated), the school only gets their royalty fee from that, which is probably about 7% of wholesale cost.. After that, the school only benefits from merchandise sold directly from it's own outlets, not every retailer across the country.

[MplsBison]

Geez, how many times do I have to say this...? Butler, as does EVERY PFL team, already has "some sort of scholarship FCS football program". We provide non-athletic scholarships to our football players. Do you really think that programs like USD sign two and even three star Rivals kids because these players are just dying to pay 100% of their expenses to attend USD? Perhaps Butler puts some of this money into the school's general scholarship fund which would allow Butler to provide additional non-athletic scholarship aid to students that play football.... No way is Butler going to waste this money on joining a different FCS league....

Put your money where you mouth is and provide only non-athletic scholarships to your men's bball players.


Then we'll see how well Dayton's bball program does. xrolleyesx

[DetroitFlyer]

Put your money where you mouth is and provide only non-athletic scholarships to your men's bball players.


Then we'll see how well Dayton's bball program does. xrolleyesx



There is no FCS basketball....

[UNIFanSince1983]

There is no FCS basketball....

I think there should be. There are plenty of conferences taking bids in the NCAA tournament that don't deserve it. I am not talking about Dayton either. I think they wouldn't need to expand the tournament if they just instituted an FCS of sorts for basketball. Of course this would never happen.

[PhoenixSupreme]

I think there should be. There are plenty of conferences taking bids in the NCAA tournament that don't deserve it. I am not talking about Dayton either. I think they wouldn't need to expand the tournament if they just instituted an FCS of sorts for basketball. Of course this would never happen.

Maybe they can use this to save the NIT tournament from dying after the NCAA tournament faces its inevitable 96-team upgrade

[MplsBison]

There is no FCS basketball....

Pathetic. Like I thought, all talk.


Oh look at us! We're Dayton! We're so high and mighty we only offer our football players aid that any student enrolled in the university because we have a superior ideology to the rest of FCS!


Oh wait...no no no...we can't apply that same ideology to our bball program. No, that wouldn't work out so nice for us....



And there you have it, the entire PFL facade is debunked as nothing more than 'being cheap'.

Get out of FCS.

[DetroitFlyer]

Pathetic. Like I thought, all talk.


Oh look at us! We're Dayton! We're so high and mighty we only offer our football players aid that any student enrolled in the university because we have a superior ideology to the rest of FCS!


Oh wait...no no no...we can't apply that same ideology to our bball program. No, that wouldn't work out so nice for us....



And there you have it, the entire PFL facade is debunked as nothing more than 'being cheap'.

Get out of FCS.

Do you actually have any clue at all as to why FCS football exists?

[DFW HOYA]

No I-AA school should want this in basketball. Owing how I-AA has marginalized so many of these programs, imagine what it would do to these basketball programs.

[MplsBison]

Do you actually have any clue at all as to why FCS football exists?

It exists because the old DII became watered down and those fball programs that wanted to offer a significant number of scholarships to its players to field a high quality team but didn't want to compete financially wit the Texas, Florida and Alabama programs at the top needed a division of their own.

Then the NCAA forced the DIII football programs from DI bball athletic departments into FCS and ruined it.

[MplsBison]

No I-AA school should want this in basketball. Owing how I-AA has marginalized so many of these programs, imagine what it would do to these basketball programs.

It's the same thing as having a DII.

It gives smaller schools a realistic chance to compete for a national championship.


It's great that schools like Siena, East Tennessee St, etc. get to go to the big dance, but they have no realistic chance against Syracuse or UT on a consistent basis.

[CollegeSportsInfo]

I think there should be. There are plenty of conferences taking bids in the NCAA tournament that don't deserve it. I am not talking about Dayton either. I think they wouldn't need to expand the tournament if they just instituted an FCS of sorts for basketball. Of course this would never happen.

You're right about that...if the tourney expands, it's a "work around" of the whole "FCS Basketball" argument made by Huggins.

There was another option that was not explored:

The NCAA could have scrapped the conference tourney autobid in favor of awarding autobids to the regular season champs. They could have then expanded the tournament from 65 to 68.

That would have resulted in 3 more bids for play-in games, but also would protect the bubble teams that are left out because a conference tournament winner steals a bid.

This year, that would have meant conference tournament upset winners NMSU and Houston would have been left out in favor of say, URI (#2 seed, NIT Final 4, but committee claimed URI was 1st team out of NCAAs), & VA Tech (NIT Elite 8, a #1 NIT seed). There would be 3 more bids due to the play-in games, likely given to
Illinois (NIT elite 8, NIT #1 seed), Mississippi (NIT elite 8, #2 seed), Mississippi St. (#1 seed, NIT Sweet 16).

For this year, there were probably around 6 real bubble teams. At 68 teams and no conference tourney autobids, 5 of them would have gotten in. Dayton would likely have been left out though, since they were an NIT 3 seed. And us A10 fans are proud of Dayton's NIT run.

[MplsBison]

You're right about that...if the tourney expands, it's a "work around" of the whole "FCS Basketball" argument made by Huggins.

There was another option that was not explored:

The NCAA could have scrapped the conference tourney autobid in favor of awarding autobids to the regular season champs. They could have then expanded the tournament from 65 to 68.

That would have resulted in 3 more bids for play-in games, but also would protect the bubble teams that are left out because a conference tournament winner steals a bid.

This year, that would have meant conference tournament upset winners NMSU and Houston would have been left out in favor of say, URI (#2 seed, NIT Final 4, but committee claimed URI was 1st team out of NCAAs), & VA Tech (NIT Elite 8, a #1 NIT seed). There would be 3 more bids due to the play-in games, likely given to
Illinois (NIT elite 8, NIT #1 seed), Mississippi (NIT elite 8, #2 seed), Mississippi St. (#1 seed, NIT Sweet 16).

For this year, there were probably around 6 real bubble teams. At 68 teams and no conference tourney autobids, 5 of them would have gotten in. Dayton would likely have been left out though, since they were an NIT 3 seed. And us A10 fans are proud of Dayton's NIT run.

I actually would love to see the regular season winners get the auto-bid.

Then the conference tourny would be the "last chance" for bubble teams to prove they belong in the tournament.


But I can see that conferences were too scared that taking the auto-bid away from the tournament winner would take too much incentive away from watching the tournament and thus they wouldn't be able to make any money on them.

[DetroitFlyer]

It exists because the old DII became watered down and those fball programs that wanted to offer a significant number of scholarships to its players to field a high quality team but didn't want to compete financially wit the Texas, Florida and Alabama programs at the top needed a division of their own.

Then the NCAA forced the DIII football programs from DI bball athletic departments into FCS and ruined it.

As I suspected, you really do not have a clue.... OK, I'll try to be generous here, maybe you have about half of a clue.

[Lehigh Football Nation]

There was another option that was not explored:

The NCAA could have scrapped the conference tourney autobid in favor of awarding autobids to the regular season champs. They could have then expanded the tournament from 65 to 68.

That would have resulted in 3 more bids for play-in games, but also would protect the bubble teams that are left out because a conference tournament winner steals a bid.

A good thought - not made by a lot of other folks. However, the problem exists because the amount of autobids is already straining the 64-team bracket. The Great West will get an autobid for sure when they're eligible - that's 32. Just one more conference gets created - through a Big East split or whatever - and then you have 33, necessitating a 66 team tournament.

It's math that makes this inevitable, not money. The number of conferences will most definitely not shrink. 96 teams is just the inevitable result of the increased number of conferences that will be eligible. Sure you could just add play-in games as new conferences get added to the mix, but then you're changing the game every few years and - oh by the way - screwing the Patriot League-type teams as a result.

[MplsBison]

As I suspected, you really do not have a clue.... OK, I'll try to be generous here, maybe you have about half of a clue.

The fact is that you talk out of both sides of your mouth.

You pretend to be high and mighty when it comes to football aid, but then you give all your bball players the same scholarships that any scholarship bball team gives to its players.


At least be consistent and give scholarships in both sports.

[MplsBison]

A good thought - not made by a lot of other folks. However, the problem exists because the amount of autobids is already straining the 64-team bracket. The Great West will get an autobid for sure when they're eligible - that's 32. Just one more conference gets created - through a Big East split or whatever - and then you have 33, necessitating a 66 team tournament.

It's math that makes this inevitable, not money. The number of conferences will most definitely not shrink. 96 teams is just the inevitable result of the increased number of conferences that will be eligible. Sure you could just add play-in games as new conferences get added to the mix, but then you're changing the game every few years and - oh by the way - screwing the Patriot League-type teams as a result.

What makes you so sure the Great West will get an auto-bid?

UND and USD will be taken by the Summit League.


That leaves Utah Valley (possible Big Sky expansion candidate), Texas - Pan American (could move down if they can't get into the Southland), Chicago State (wants back into the Summit, possible), Houston Baptist (Southland) and New Jersey Tech (NEC or MAAC).

Doesn't look promising.

[UAalum72]

What makes you so sure the Great West will get an auto-bid?

UND and USD will be taken by the Summit League.


That leaves Utah Valley (possible Big Sky expansion candidate), Texas - Pan American (could move down if they can't get into the Southland), Chicago State (wants back into the Summit, possible), Houston Baptist (Southland) and New Jersey Tech (NEC or MAAC).

Doesn't look promising.
He said "when they're eligible".

As long as they have enough schools in good standing, they're in.

Now if requirements change to require eight teams, they'll have a tougher road.

No eligible, willing conference has been denied an autobid in basketball.

[JBB]

I welcome Butler to the MVFC. I dont know why expansion possibilities would be limited to the Dakotas. We already have a lot of Dakota teams. Butler is a better fit for most of the conference. Good fit for the Dakotas too.

[MplsBison]

He said "when they're eligible".

As long as they have enough schools in good standing, they're in.

Now if requirements change to require eight teams, they'll have a tougher road.

No eligible, willing conference has been denied an autobid in basketball.


My point is that the GWC will never have enough teams to get an auto-bid in anything.