Expansion Talk - Kansas

When Turner Gill took over the reigns of the Kansas Football program in December of 2009 he listed his priorities: Recruit, beat Missouri, win the Big 12 North, win the Big 12 and by doing so, the Jayhawks would be playing for the National Champsionship. Now before Gill has the opportunity to be on the sidelines of Memorial Stadium in Lawrence, the timeline to acheive those priorities has been accelerated.

National reports have Nebraska joining the Big Ten as early as Friday resulting in an impolosion of the Big 12 Conference. Most of the schools in the Big 12 South will be engulfed by the Pac 10 along with Colorado. That leaves some of the universities in the Big 12 North to fend for themselves. Kansas will be among them.

Gill became a Jayhawk after a successful playing career at Nebraska. He took the job at Kansas after building a bad Buffalo team and turning them into a conference champion. He had earned the right to do the same thing at a BCS conference school. Kansas gave him that chance, now those priorities he set forth seven months ago may not occur.

Kansas isn't the only school in jeopardy of becomming a nomad on the college landscape. Kansas State, Iowa State are also looking for a new home, and the possibilities available aren't enticing. The Big East is one rumored home, but how will Olympic Sports at the midwest schools be able to travel to such remote locations as Storrs, CT. In football once these teams are done playing one another, their closest opponent will be Cincinnati.

Another home could be the Mountain West. Perhaps a bit more geographically-friendly to these schools, but now these one-time BCS conference schools become a mid-major. And the basketball programs of these institutions lose credibility as they would be only a few years removed from playing for the title of the nation's best league.

Now these "left-overs" fromt he Big 12 will be searching for a conference that best suits them. They will be looking for a chance to prove themselves, much like Turner Gill has been doing for the last few years.

College Football Week 5

North Carolina had little to cheer about this past Saturday. A disappointing home loss to the hands of previous ACC disappointment, Virginia 16-3. Butch Davis' team is looking more like his Cleveland Browns than his Miami Hurricane.

Ball State was the darling of football a year ago by spending most of the season undefeated under the leadership of Brady Hoke. Hoke left for the perfect weather of San Diego to head up the Aztec program turning the Cardinal program over to offensive coordinator Stan Parrish. Parrish took over looking for his first win in over 25 games as a head coach. He is still looking for that one win five games into the 2009 campaign. Much can be said for continuity, but the only continuity the MAC program has right now is tied to the head coach and not a successful program.

The NCAA has looked for ways to shorten the time of football games. This year the Big Ten average has been 3:09, an improvement since 3:16 less than five years ago. But if they are truly serious about speeding up the game, please don't take unnecessary time to review plays that are called correctly and confirmed by the fan at home watching in real time.

Iowa's winning point differential against BCS-conference teams-18. Against non-BCS conference teams-2.

Sittin in the Principal's Office

On the last day of March, I thought it was time to bring back one of our more popular posts, "Sittin' in the Principal's Office." For a background on the meaning of this, go to our first post with this title. Otherwise, off we go...

I am now one who uses Twitter (www.twitter.com/mengelbert). I signed up to have a better understanding of the popular social networks. I have yet to sign up for Facebook, and this blog is my only other attempt. Twitter does have a place in the social network world. It started out by asking people, "What are you doing?" Those who I have begun to follow have used it to promote ideas and projects they are working on as well as to keep fans informed on how they are living their lives. As much fun as I've had following the life of Al Roker, why should I care that he had 3 1/2 hours of sleep after returning from covering the floods of North Dakota. And Bob Costas telling me that he is disappointed in Alex Rodriguez' use of steroids isn't front page news. But what Twitter and many of these other on-line forms of communication--email included--does take the place of is interpersonal communication. The days of one on one, face to face interaction is being replaced by those who coward behind a keyboard. (Look for the NCAA to make rules regarding Twitter.)

Oklahoma women's basketball center Courtney Paris stated that if she doesn't win the national championship she will pay back her scholarship. The intention is nice, but as long as she earns her degree and represents her University well, she has done everything that should be asked for in returns for a college education. She's made the final four, so drop this story. Let her play basketball and compete hard every minute she is in the game. That is enough for me.

March came in like a Lamb and is going out like a Lion.