Saturday, May 22, 2010

Big Ten expansion update

Looks more and more like Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa State are moving up the leaderboard of possible contenders in Big Ten expansion scenarios.

The Big Ten meetings are this weekend, and a recent interview with commissioner Jim Delaney noted three important points:

1. Gaining a foothold in the South. "In the last 20 or 30 years, there's been a clear shift in movement to the Sun Belt. The rates of growth in the Sun Belt are four times the rates in the East or the Midwest.” This boosts consideration of stealing from the Big 12 -- teams close to or in the Sun Belt -- and away from the Big Least.
2. Extending the reach of the league's lucrative television network. The Kansas City (#26 metro area in US) and St. Louis (#18 metro area) areas are significant - with more than 4.5 million households in these two areas alone. ES explored this earlier.
3. Membership in the Association of American Universities would be “very important." A previous list by the ES lists AAU membership among potential candidates

Well, the ES still doesn't see Texas (AAU member), Colorado (AAU member) or Oklahoma (not in the AAU) in the mix so much. They are just too far away -- too far. So, reviewing the potential candidates, the ES sees expansion to 14 at this point -

1. Notre Dame (not AAU but the only exception to the rule).
2. Missouri (AAU).
3. Kansas (AAU).

Others on the outside looking in:

4. Pittsburgh (AAU).
5. Nebraska (AAU).
6. Iowa State (AAU).
7. Syracuse (AAU).
8. Rutgers (AAU).
9. Texas (AAU).

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

New website; Top 10 greatest Spartan events EVER

First off, the MSU Spartans website underwent an overhaul to keep it inline with the rest of the university's look, and also incorporate the new MSU image/design concept. ES gives this a big thumbs up -- pretty cool looking, easy to navigate. Although if the look is supposed to be consistent, the color seems a bit off and not the same tone of dark green... ES just begs to keep the Spartan sports history readily available.

Top 10 ES' Greatest Spartan Events Ever: #10


The ES is going to publish his top 10 greatest events as a Spartan going to MSU athletics... ever. Sometime over the next month, periodically we'll go over all 10 of them. Let's start with a strange entry at #10 -

10. MSU Men's Lacrosse vs Ohio Wesleyan circa 1992-1994.
I remember going out to this game, MSU was ranked and making a bid for the NCAA tourney. And, freaking Sparty showed up. And, so did the ES, with two of his buddies and another 24 buddies named Budweiser. Just sat there at Old College Field drinking beer and watching with a huge crowd of at least 1,000 as MSU wasted Ohio Wesleyan. It was a beautiful spring day, not a cloud in the sky. A surprisingly fun and unexpectedly raucous event, as the stands completed the wave.

Oh, and the ES wasn't the only one with beer at the event. It wuz a riot.

So while men's lax is now a club sport, back then it was varsity and the Big Green competed pretty awesome.

Wednesday, May 05, 2010

Taking a break

OK, so the Red Wings are toast, down 3-0 to San Josey.

MSU nabbed a verbal commit - Andre Sims - a 4.4-40 wideout from Georgia.

About the new look? 206 have voted (at right), and the average score is... well, average: a 2.995 on a scale of 1-5. Most respondents (56) voted 3: "3 - OK, a tad too-Nike. I'll warm up." ES gave it a 4 out of 5.

Other than that, the ES is just kicking back and taking a break.... back to posting next week. I have some pretty cool items, top ten lists, football preview updates, etc. It is all in the hopper.