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Football Outsiders

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13 Feb 2012

CUSA and MWC Will Merge

According to CBS' Brett McMurphy, the two leagues are dissolving to form a 18- to 24-team conference that will start in 2013-2014.

Posted by: Rivers McCown on 13 Feb 2012

16 comments, Last at 19 Feb 2012, 6:24pm by Aaron Brooks Good Twin

Comments

1
by Theo :: Mon, 02/13/2012 - 6:08pm

If all this expansion, transferring and merging in the end leads to one big college football league; I'm all for it.
I could see it happen that college football ends up in soccer style leagues with a relegation and promotion system.
But then again, since when has that system proven to be successful.

2
by tuluse :: Mon, 02/13/2012 - 6:11pm

It would be really cool because colleges wouldn't have to worry about political borders in forming their leagues. So it would just be so abstract and crazy.

Getting relegated to the Big 10's 2nd division? Maybe move to the Big East where it will easier to get promoted.

Just decouple it from academia, and it would be enormously fun to watch.

3
by BroncosGuyAgain :: Mon, 02/13/2012 - 6:44pm

College football (well, D-1 anyway) was decoupled from academia a long time ago.

4
by justanothersteve :: Mon, 02/13/2012 - 7:14pm

Hey c'mon. They're all student-athletes. Some even attend class.

5
by Aaron Brooks Go... :: Mon, 02/13/2012 - 7:32pm

You can make a defensible argument that without college athletics, the poor would never have been allowed to attend.

6
by poboy :: Mon, 02/13/2012 - 8:44pm

I don't buy it. What's the defensible argument?

7
by Alexander :: Mon, 02/13/2012 - 10:28pm

Poor people generally get bad grades both before and in college?

8
by BroncosGuyAgain :: Mon, 02/13/2012 - 10:52pm

The federal government has long-standing BEOG and SEOG programs (both since re-named). Most schools also have need-based assistance programs. None of these programs evaluate students with a tape measure. The number of students who attend college through need-based assistance programs dwarfs the number of students who could only attend college via athletic scholarship. Without college athletics, the only people who would be otherwise deprived of enrollment are those who are poor, stupid, and unathletic.

13
by Kevin from Philly :: Tue, 02/14/2012 - 12:57pm

Thank God I wasn't poor.

16
by Aaron Brooks Go... :: Sun, 02/19/2012 - 6:24pm

Pell got started in 1965. I'm talking an effect that started in the 19th century.

9
by Pied :: Mon, 02/13/2012 - 11:59pm

Why not just make public college free? It was free in California in the 1960's, when my father went. It's free in many countries around the world.

10
by RickD :: Tue, 02/14/2012 - 1:50am

It's important for universities to build up their endowments so the alumni have money to play with on the stock market.

At least, that seems to be the purpose of the Harvard endowment.

11
by Mr Shush :: Tue, 02/14/2012 - 6:52am

Because if your goal is the sort of level of attendance widely seen as desirable, the cost of provision would be astronomical. See for example the UK, where massive expansion of higher education provision has led (with some lag) to vast fee rises, to be paid primarily by means of government loans to students.

12
by Dean :: Tue, 02/14/2012 - 9:52am

There's no such thing as free.

14
by Whatev :: Tue, 02/14/2012 - 1:04pm

It was way easier to make college free back when only people who actually had the talent and motivation for academics wanted to attend (well, and the wastrel sons of the upper class, but their parents could afford it). Now that we're in a shitty signalling equilibrium where you have to have an undergraduate degree to work in the goddamn mailroom, the enrollment numbers are much too high to just have the public foot the bill straight up.

15
by Other Dean (not verified) :: Tue, 02/14/2012 - 11:24pm

Speaking as someone who grew up in San Diego, it's too bad what the BCS has done to the Mountain West conference. If you have Boise State, TCU, Utah, BYU, SDSU, and maybe someone like Houston in the same conference, you have a chance for a pretty decent football league.