Division I college basketball coaches across the country know one thing about their sport: It has changed, and largely without their input, creating sprawling conference boundaries more accommodating to football than basketball.
“As I said over the past year or so, the SEC has had no particular interest in expansion,” Southeastern Conference Commissioner Mike Slive said. “We were, and are, happy with 12 teams. If Texas A&M’s president, Dr. Bowen Loftin, had not called me in late July, we had no plans to explore adding an institution.”
When the SEC men’s basketball coaches gathered last year for their media day in Hoover, Ala., the consensus was there was no use complaining about the shift of teams and that they should accept the reality.
“I think every coach in our league realizes football is the money maker and we need to not only survive but prosper,” Vanderbilt coach Kevin Stallings said. “If we don’t realize it, we need to have a less-than-flattering word printed on our forehead.”
The grin-and-bear it approach is common even if none of it makes sense to the traditionalist inside every old-school coach.
“When I say it doesn’t make sense, it makes sense. It’s dollars and cents,” Auburn coach Tony Barbee said. “It’s money, so it makes total sense. But if we’re truly concerned about the welfare of our student-athletes, if that was our No. 1, priority you wouldn’t be seeing these changes.”
Georgia coach Mark Fox also has been confused at the message that was sent by the recent shuffle of teams from conference to conference. Fox, who has coached in the Pacific 10, Big 12 and Western Athletic Conference, said at SEC media day he sees the potential for his players to miss class time because of travel — a result NCAA President Mark Emmert said was unacceptable when he took over last year.
“Our job is to promote education, and if we shy away from that responsibility because of anything else, then we got sad days coming in intercollegiate athletics,” Fox said.
Less than a month after Slive’s comments about expansion, the SEC welcomed the University of Missouri. Now league administrators must come up with a league schedule for a 14-team conference without divisions before next season.
“I think we’re set at 14,” Vanderbilt chancellor David Williams said. “Our thoughts were we need to go to 14 (after adding Texas A&M) for balance and scheduling.”
After last spring’s conference meetings, league head coaches voted 11-1 to eliminate the two divisions of the 12-team league and seed the conference 1-12 for the SEC tournament in March. However, the 2011-12 conference schedule allows for the former Western and Eastern Division schools to play twice.
This so-called compromise still angers most of the coaches because the schedule still creates an imbalance in the league. This imbalance will affect schools’ rating percentage index, strength of schedule and record, which could prove costly for programs trying to make the NCAA tournament.
“There’s nobody I would trade Mike Slive for in leading during times such as these, and that’s why I don’t worry about any of those things,” Ole Miss coach Andy Kennedy said. “I’ve got confidence in our leadership. The SEC is going to be a premier league in all things, not just football. I don’t think success in particular sports for a league or institution is mutually exclusive. You can win championships in everything.”
The only dissenting vote on divisions was Mississippi State coach Rick Stansbury. With all the confusion about schools moving in every direction, the veteran MSU coach, who is in his 14th year, admits his opinion doesn’t matter any longer.
“I don’t worry any about things I have no control over, so what I’ll do is read about who comes in the league when you guys write it and somebody will tell me how our schedule is made up,” Stansbury said.
“They don’t ask my opinions, and I don’t waste energy giving them anymore.”
SEC coaches will be asked to vote for the current 16-game format or a new 18- or 20-game conference slate that not only could dramatically change how a conference champion is crowned but also affect every school’s nonconference schedule before New Year’s Day.
“It really depends on what the school presidents do with the amount of total games we play because I think 18 games is very realistic and 20 is probably not unrealistic, but I wish everybody could see what that does to non-league play,” Fox said.
University of Kentucky coach John Calipari has an idea. Calipari, who is essentially obligated to play rivals Louisville and Indiana every season and to be a part of a premier televised tournament event, said the “super conferences” will make up the entire NCAA tournament when conference realignment ends.
“Do you know what the buyout is in this league? Zero. If you want to leave, beat it. You’ll be replaced in 45 seconds,” Calipari said. “What will happen is we’re going to have four leagues and then you’ll have conferences with football-playing schools, parochial schools and non-football schools. Everybody screams for parity and that’s how you do it, everybody looking the same.”
No matter what moves happen from now until the start of the 2012-13 college basketball season, all the coaches agree their sport has a postseason national tournament that creates billions of dollars for the NCAA.
“I think basketball will always be ahead of the game in that we’ve always had a true champion anyway with this thing called a tournament,” Fox said. “Realignment isn’t going to affect our sport as much because every team’s dream heading into the season is winning six games in our tournament. Maybe one day the football guys will have the same thing.”
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