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Once the Big East split, there was nothing on god's green earth that could have prevented Creighton from leaving. None. Nothing. That league is the endgame for every non-football school, and the contract they have is massive. MVC could've been a Top 5 league for 10 straight years and Creighton still would've gone.

The only real mistake over the years was not having the foresight to add Butler to the league. Even if they eventually went to the A-10, then BEast, we would've gotten a few higher-profile years off of them. The preference to always be a 10 team league doomed the league, period. Without openings, Butler was allowed to grow outside of our purview.

The A10 is a moving target, for sure. Which is why SLU is indeed in the future conversation. But when we're talking about 10 years ago, their situation there was rock solid. They went there for very clear reasons.

Yes, today, it is not exactly what they signed up for, but it is still a higher profile basketball league playing in NYC, Philly, DC, Pittsburgh, Virginia, New England, North Carolina, and Ohio. Their enrollment includes significant populations from all 50 states. That's something they would not be doing if they were in the Valley.

Even the watered-down A10 over the last 4 years has 20 NCAA bids to the Valley's 6.

yes, the A-10 has been much better. but if you add butler and valpo in and keep creightons last couple its a lot close because you are also subtracting butlers from the A-10. nobody is arguing that the a-10 or big east is currently better. I just disagree and think things would be much different if the valley wasn't so pretentious thinking they are 10 when they are a 5. That was their problem in the mid 00's and is still the problem. They dropped the ball and things will never be the same. But, that's reality. MVC will never be anything better than the 11th best conference ever again. And, that is 1 bid, 2 if lucky territory.

squirrel wrote:The A10 is a moving target, for sure. Which is why SLU is indeed in the future conversation. But when we're talking about 10 years ago, their situation there was rock solid. They went there for very clear reasons.

Yes, today, it is not exactly what they signed up for, but it is still a higher profile basketball league playing in NYC, Philly, DC, Pittsburgh, Virginia, New England, North Carolina, and Ohio. Their enrollment includes significant populations from all 50 states. That's something they would not be doing if they were in the Valley.

Even the watered-down A10 over the last 4 years has 20 NCAA bids to the Valley's 6.

If by 20 you mean 15 then yes.

Hybrid thinking

I actually meant 20 to 8 over the last 5 years

Jsnhbe1Birds wrote:yes, the A-10 has been much better. but if you add butler and valpo in and keep creightons last couple its a lot close because you are also subtracting butlers from the A-10. nobody is arguing that the a-10 or big east is currently better. I just disagree and think things would be much different if the valley wasn't so pretentious thinking they are 10 when they are a 5. That was their problem in the mid 00's and is still the problem. They dropped the ball and things will never be the same. But, that's reality. MVC will never be anything better than the 11th best conference ever again. And, that is 1 bid, 2 if lucky territory.

I agree things would be different with a more forward-thinking group of administrators. I'm simply trying to make it very clear that forward-thinking or not, Dayton and SLU are completely out of this conversation, which is why we went down this rabbit hole.

I enjoy playing the "What if?" game as much as the next guy, but there still has to be sound reasoning behind the big picture thinking. And SLU had very clear and solid reasons for being in the A10 and those were never going to be compromised.

But Valpo also makes a continued potential national profile for the league a lot less likely moving forward.

Yeah, what if. The reality is what we currently see. We can't go back so no use of even giving it another thought. The MVC's only chance to become a top eight conference again is to hope for a couple of teams to pull a Butler/Gonzaga. I don't add Wichita into the mix because they were able to go about it a different way by just throwing money every which direction they needed due to two backers being worth a combined $82-BILLION. They were able to pay an MVC coach $3.5 million per season, good enough to be a top 10 highest paid coach in college basketball. Without the Koch brothers Marshall would have been gone a few seasons ago to a P5 and who knows where Wichita State would be. They might be 19-13 and still in the MVC as the AAC would have grabbed VCU. But, all that is what if.

Jsnhbe1Birds wrote:Yeah, what if. The reality is what we currently see. We can't go back so no use of even giving it another thought. The MVC's only chance to become a top eight conference again is to hope for a couple of teams to pull a Butler/Gonzaga. I don't add Wichita into the mix because they were able to go about it a different way by just throwing money every which direction they needed due to two backers being worth a combined $82-BILLION. They were able to pay an MVC coach $3.5 million per season, good enough to be a top 10 highest paid coach in college basketball. Without the Koch brothers Marshall would have been gone a few seasons ago to a P5 and who knows where Wichita State would be. They might be 19-13 and still in the MVC as the AAC would have grabbed VCU. But, all that is what if.

All the lolz

Jsnhbe1Birds wrote:Yeah, what if. The reality is what we currently see. We can't go back so no use of even giving it another thought. The MVC's only chance to become a top eight conference again is to hope for a couple of teams to pull a Butler/Gonzaga. I don't add Wichita into the mix because they were able to go about it a different way by just throwing money every which direction they needed due to two backers being worth a combined $82-BILLION. They were able to pay an MVC coach $3.5 million per season, good enough to be a top 10 highest paid coach in college basketball. Without the Koch brothers Marshall would have been gone a few seasons ago to a P5 and who knows where Wichita State would be. They might be 19-13 and still in the MVC as the AAC would have grabbed VCU. But, all that is what if.

You do realize it is only one Koch brother that supports this program and he isn't the only one putting in money?

No matter how many times it is patiently explained that the Koch brothers gave the program next to no support for decades and now provide a very small percentage of the athletic department and basketball programs respective budgets, the myth persists that they enjoy a hegemonic role in financing WSU athletics (and particularly basketball).

It is frequently repeated on the ISUr board far more than the other MVC schools. I do not really understand why, but that is what I've noticed.