6/16/2010

strategy and sports

Athletic games themselves involve lots of strategy. But a different kind of case study in decision-making has unfolded for us over the past week or so as we've moved past speculation to action. I think I'm just not a big enough Colorado or Nebraska fan to get why they would see the grass as greener to the west and east. Whatever their ultimate calculus, what's done is done.

So now the most interesting question is viewed from the perspective of the remaining Big 12. What to do?

The safe answer, the likely answer, the easy answer, is to stand pat. Execute on a strategy of making a ten team league successful. That's what I'd recommend as a consultant. I'm about 95% confidant that's what will happen.

But that other one chance in twenty nags at me. I'm a big believer that the flip side of challenge almost always is opportunity. Over the weekend, the Big 12 was in its weakest position as a conference in the history of its existence. Today, however, it's at its strongest point in years, perhaps ever. The Big 12 faced the most direct threats possible to its future from a variety of sources and for whatever mixture of reasons you care to elaborate, ten schools decided to stick together. Furthermore, as the Pac-10 and Big Ten in particular went after Big 12 schools, that gives the Big 12 a window of opportunity to strike in 'self-defense', as a reaction to having lost two universities to the aggressiveness of other conferences. Finally, as the Big 12 lost two teams, but to different conferences, there is a unique opportunity to offer entrance to a pair of schools.

The following options, again, are neither likely nor something the Big 12 can necessarily implement. Rather, they're options that recognize an important part of strategic decision-making: if you never think about the moon, you'll never get there. And you only have a few windows suitable for launch. This is one such window.

I would be quite interested to be able to have a quiet conversation with these schools just to see what they would think.

Scenario 1:

Take the game to the Pac-10. The more I've been thinking about this one, the more it's been nibbling at me. Do you think Arizona and Arizona State might fit better in the big 12? One thing that's always bugged me is how the Big 12 doesn't have its own BCS bowl. The Big Ten and Pac-10 have their 'granddaddy of 'em all' in LA. The SEC has the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans. The Orange Bowl is in Florida. But Big 12 conference champs get sent out to Arizona. It's not that the Fiesta Bowl is a terrible one. It's just that it's nowhere near the (current) Big 12. We can fix that, creating regular conference trips to Arizona in the process. Arizona adds a growing population demographic and a chance to make 'southwest' and 'central' divisions, returning OU and OSU to competing with MU/KU/ISU/KSU. Separately from football, it also allows UA to compete in a stronger basketball conference. Imagine an annual KU/UA conference basketball game. It's also worth noting, for UA/ASU, that the Big 12 has received more national attention and more revenue than the Pac-10. BCS bowl games would get to be played in Arizona.

Scenario 2:

Invite Utah and BYU. The Pac-10 can't do this because they have an odd number. I think we could make the case that coming as a pair to the Big 12 is better than being left in different conferences. And with the loss of Colorado, Utah and BYU maintain a Big 12 presence in the Rockies/interior West. These schools could be added to the Big 12 North and leave the South as is. In addition, don't overlook the Morman connection. BYU gives Baylor a fellow private religious school generally, while specifically a lot of Mormons stuck around Missouri instead of migrating farther west to Utah.

Scenario 3:

Return the favor to the Big Ten. I can't help looking at a map and wondering if it's possible to split the Big Ten in two. Of course it's not really that realistic, but you never know until you ask Illinois and Indiana. A week ago I would have said it would have been impossible for Nebraska to leave the Big 12. But this wouldn't just be to vengefully carve out the mid-section of the conference just below Chicago. Indiana is a basketball program in a football conference. Trading IU basketball would almost make up for NU football on the tradition front. Meanwhile, the most natural rival for Illinois is Missouri. Both IU and IL are essentially the same distance from St. Louis as they are from Chicago. This directly deals with one of the challenges - that some MU fans actually want to move to the Big Ten - by making St. Louis a central city in the Big 12 rather than a border city. The schools would also fit in very nicely with the rest of the Big 12 North, even down to the I-70 corridor running from Topeka to Indianapolis. I would point out ever so subtlely that the state of Indiana owes us a big favor, too, and this is a great time to collect. Do this move and we'll move past your theft of the NCAA headquarters from the city that invested so heavily in making collegiate athletics what we know today.

Scenario 4:

Now I'm getting quite unrealistic. There's an intriguing geographical quirk to the south and east of the Big 12. Northwest Arkansas is actually closely associated with the states of Missouri, Oklahoma, and Texas. Fayetteville is so remote from the rest of the SEC that Arkansas plays some games in Little Rock. Arkansas has history with the Southwest conference where it was a founding member with schools like OU and UT. Meanwhile, Memphis is down the Mississippi River from St. Louis, on the border with Arkansas, and is not currently in a major conference. Memphis doesn't really have much of a football program at the moment, but by pushing the Big 12 through Arkansas and into Tennessee, I don't think it would be that big of an issue - the point would be to bring recruiting space and geographic range, not replace the tradition lost with Nebraska. It would also allow ISU and Baylor to have a comrade near the bottom of the pecking order. In basketball, Memphis would add a high-win school, which helps as RPI is important in basketball (unlike football). An annual KU/Memphis basketball game would be another great conference schedule addition.

Scenario 5:

Feeling out Kentucky and Louisville is my last 'what if' for the night. They fit nicely in the existing Big 12 North/South division, putting basketball state Kentucky with basketball state Kansas. In fact, you already see these teams together from time to time when St. Louis hosts an NCAA tourney round and fans come in from both directions. This would also get Louisville (Big East) and Kentucky (SEC) into the same conference, and what a basketball conference that would be. Unlike Memphis, Louisville and Kentucky do have competitive football programs they would bring, but not good enough they would threaten OU and UT. Plus, I like the town of Louisville, so I'm sure some arrangements can be made for my sake.

Unlikely, sure.

But somebody had to start the conversation that made Boulder look to the Pacific and Nebraska abandon KC. For a brief moment in time, the Big 12 is both strongly unified and able to make bold moves without being the aggressor. There's certainly a lot to be said for the ten team arrangement for both of the major revenue sports, football and basketball. In football, it allows a round robin format and eliminates a conference championship whose primary consequence recently seems to be giving good teams losses. In basketball, it allows annual home and home series while improving the RPI by shedding the two worst programs in the conference.

Still, the Big 12 as ten teams now has no margin of error. There's a part of me that wants to throw a long pass and see what happens. Otherwise, unless there's some breakdown in another major conference, this is the peak of the Big 12. We get more vulnerable over time to a raid from any direction, and the next one will be fatal.

No comments: