It is not all about money. Right? Isn’t that what they always say?
I have been on the west coast this week and not as plugged into the Terps and the ACC as usual. I did hear/read rumors on Wednesday that something was up with the Big Ten conference and Maryland.
Is it time to abandon the Atlantic Coast Conference? I read that the sports payout is $35 million per year. That would fix the budget problems for the 19 sports Maryland still has.
If we are pulling the noted author Jim Collins thing and going from “Good to Great” as Kevin Anderson said two years ago in January, maybe this is the plan.
Wayne the fan
No more Duke Maryland games? Nothing good ever lasts. I was very used to not being their rivals. Just when Syracuse shows up to give us another rival type school and a made for TV rivalry with Pitt.
Oh well. If true greatness is determined by football, then the Big Ten makes sense. Oh, wait, I forgot that the big news a few weeks ago was the Notre Dame was coming in and that would change ACC football.
Meanwhile back to this weeks news/rumor… we could have all those big football schools coming to Byrd. Wisconsin, Michigan, Nebraska and the hated (still) Penn State.
We would find our hoops rivals in Michigan State and probably Indiana.
If it comes off, the move to the B10, that would be a nice “stick in the eye” to the All Carolina Conference. I heard that FSU was out the door as well.
We had it right for basketball with 8 or 9 teams. You play everyone twice, have an intense rivalry with everyone and some teams you just hate. For football you could have some good non-conference games, really for basketball too.
The writing is on the wall. It will be four 16 team conferences. . The B10 needs an east coast outlet and Maryland fits the bill. Plus there is the B10 network that brings in $. If the B10 can capture DC and north (think Rutgers), it would bring in even more money.
Face it, Pitt and Syracuse don’t bring a lot of eyeballs. In the end, even Wayne the fan knows it is about money.
The Last Home Game
The football season still seems over to me. It has for a few weeks. I am looking forward to national singing day in February. I think we will have a good recruiting class for pigskin.
I think it will take 3 classes to get the depth Maryland needs to get to the eight win plateau. We need to establish a baseline of winning and have the outlier years be 10 wins. I look forward to being in a bowl game every year for a stretch.
One could write a book on what could have been. I think that without the qb injuries, we would have gotten to seven wins. After the NCSU and BC games, the injuries were just too much. How I wish it were not the case. A four win season is progress.
I will miss the defense next year. Vellano, Francis, Hartsfield and Tate. For a while in 2010 and 2012 they had it all going on. Thanks for the memories.
As for this week, I will go out on a limb and hope for a close game. I think it will look a lot like last week against Clemson.
The Black Ops Look
Wayne the fan loves the Black Ops and really like the White Ops look for the WVU game. Jordan (Viener) is upset that we have the great uniforms and a black out but the game is at 12p. He said (an I think he is right) that a black out games has to be at night.
I have had Terp fans and even not Terp fans reach out over the past few days and say “wow, great unis”. May favorite is still the Pride look with the white jerseys. You know, the unis that make us look like the flying Terrapin Clowns. No one else has a look like that.
Basketball
We got the two guys signed that we needed. A center (Damonte Dodd) so that we have depth if and when Alex Len leaves and a real point guard. Roddy Peters is the point and much like Steve Blake, might start as a freshman.
The Terps have some issues right now because there is no true point guard. We will get through the season and Seth Allen along with Nick Faust will get the job done. I think they both will be better off playing their natural positions off the ball.
As far as this season goes, I think the team is already getting better. I think you will see a team that was good against UK be much better once ACC play starts in January. It will be a quick learning curve and I expect the Terps to be 11-1 when VT comes to Comcast on Jan 4th 2013.
The Show
Remember to catch the Show at 8am on Saturday, in the DC area on 1580am radio and streaming live on the Internet at www.terptalk.com. You can watch the show as well on TerpTalk.