Thoughts on Conferences: 2021 Edition

[JoeFedorowicz]

I'm going to split this into multiple posts because I don't want people quoting the whole thing and I think I hit the max. Sorry for the length.

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I made my coaching post the other day, but there is a much bigger issue that has plagued La Salle since both 1995 and 2012. What happened in 1995? La Salle joined the Atlantic 10. The decisions in the early 1990s regarding conferences probably doomed them and put us in the position we’re in today. Here’s a recap:

In 1992, La Salle left the MAAC and joined the MCC, which would become the Horizon league. The decision to leave a relatively local league and join a midwestern league was stupid and will always be stupid. The MCC was hoping to expand eastward and also deliver Notre Dame, but the men’s basketball team never joined. La Salle had to pay the MAAC for leaving and the cost of travel skyrocketed. So La Salle jumped again and moved to the A10.

So joining the Atlantic 10 in a bubble would have been a questionable move because of the jump in school size, competition and facilities, but it has to be given with the context of being in a terrible position with the MCC. The roster of schools in 1995 was as follows:

• Duquesne (just left MCC) – Pittsburgh
• George Washington – Washington DC
• UMASS – Amherst, MA
• St. Bonaventure (Olean, NY)
• URI – Kingston, RI
• Temple – Philadelphia, PA
• St. Joseph’s – Philadelphia, PA
• Va. Tech – Blacksburg, VA
• Xavier – Cincinnati, OH
• Dayton – Dayton, OH
• Fordham – The Bronx, NY
• La Salle – Philadelphia, PA

I made a map!




So looking at this map, the biggest distance between schools is UMASS to Xavier at 810 driving miles or roughly a two hour flight. With the exception of the two Ohio schools, Duquesne and St. Bonaventure, all of the other schools 8/12) are on/near the I95 corridor. It’s quite a drive from Washington DC to Amherst, but it’s a normal drive and you basically pass ½ of that A10 in the process.

The center of that map is about Harrisburg, so it made sense that the Atlantic 10 headquarters were near the closest schools to center, in Philadelphia. It was a “mid-Atlantic” conference and some would even argue that it was a northeastern one. The Ohio schools…and Virginia tech as a weird outlier, were the outcasts.

[JoeFedorowicz]

So I mentioned in my first post that 2012 was an important year for La Salle and conferences. That’s because that is when the realignment happened. What happened then?

Note that two major standing changes occurred between La Salle joining the things below. Richmond and Saint Louis both joined, in 2007 and 2005, respectively.

• Temple left
• Xavier Left
• Butler joined and then left in 2013
• Charlotte, who had joined in 2005, left
• VCU joined
• George Mason joined
• Davidson joined

So here is a list of schools after the 2012-2013 shakeup:

• Duquesne (just left MCC) – Pittsburgh
• George Washington – Washington DC
• UMASS – Amherst, MA
• St. Bonaventure (Olean, NY)
• URI – Kingston, RI
• St. Joseph’s – Philadelphia, PA
• Dayton – Dayton, OH
• Fordham – The Bronx, NY
• La Salle – Philadelphia, PA

Another Map!



So you’ll notice that you see a lot more of the country in this map. St. Louis and Davidson really opened up the longest commutes. Saint Louis is over 1100 miles and a three-hour flight. Davidson is about 800 miles but kind of remote. Also noticeable on the map is the addition of Richmond and VCU, who can over the Va. Tech role and George Mason, which moves the center of the map to somewhere in West Virginia.

So who brought about these changes? Bernadette McGlade, who was named commissioner in 2008. McGlade is from New Jersey, but went to UNC and worked for a decade in the ACC. She worked two decades at Georgia Tech. Her career in Athletics prior to the Atlantic 10 was in the south and since she took this job, she has transformed the Atlantic 10 from what it was, to a southern conference.

Right after she took over, McGlade moved the headquarters from Philadelphia to Newport News Virginia. That change signified the changing power centers of the conference…the largest schools with the biggest enrollments, are in the south. VCU has 30k students. Richmond has a 1.5B endowment. Saint Louis and Davidson are so remote when compared to the other schools, that their mere existence in the conference makes it more difficult for all other members.

I don’t want this to be a slight on the conference. The A10 is more successful now than it was when La Salle joined…at least in terms of basketball. It is consistently a multi-bid conference and must be considered one of…if not the best basketball mid-major in the country (depends on what you call the AAC). But it is a different conference then what it used to be. And I don’t think it is right for La Salle

[JoeFedorowicz]

THE MAAC

That long preamble brings me to what I think La Salle should do. The MAAC has been mentioned more than probably any other non-A10 conference on this board over the years. It makes sense from a nostalgia standpoint. The MAAC’s current roster is: Fairfield, Iona, Manhattan, St. Peter’s, Canisius, Niagara, Siena, Marist, Rider, Monmouth, Quinnipiac.

Tightly clustered, all NJ, NY and CT based (Canisius and Niagara are the only trips). The average enrollment is 4985 but, if you take Quinnipiac out that drops to just under 4400. La Salle’s listed enrollment is about 5200 right now (this seems high but it’s what Google gives me).

Since La Salle left in 1992 (or since inception in 1984), the MAAC has gotten two bids just twice. The latest was in 2012 when Loyola and Iona both got in as 15 and 14 seeds, respectively. The conference has six NCAA wins since 1992 out of 39 games. So they’re 6-33 in the NCAA tournament. Iona has been the tournament participant the last four years.

It’s not good. Actually, it’s really bad. The MAAC is a bad conference and I want nothing to do with it. It would be a tremendous step down for everyone, not just basketball. Call me out on the MAAC.

NET RANKINGS (La Salle – 195)

• Siena – 127
• Iona – 156
• Monmouth – 160
• Saint Peter’s 172
• Canisius – 197
• Niagara – 216
• Marist – 221
• Quinnipiac – 252
• Manhattan – 268
• Rider – 278
• Fairfield – 300

[JoeFedorowicz]

THE CAA

Another conference talked about is the CAA. In the CAA is College of Charleston, Delaware, Drexel, Elon, Hofstra, JMU, Northeastern, Towson, UNC Wilmington and William and Mary. None of the schools are religiously based. Average enrollment is just under 17,000 and their map is just a ton of schools up I-95 from South Carolina to Massachusetts.

I’m not going to spend much time here. The conference also stinks, but it is filled with huge schools (with huge endowments and nice arenas) that stink at basketball. They’re also much more spread out. And no Catholic (or religious) schools. Count me out.

NET RANKINGS (La Salle – 195)

• James Madison – 130
• Northeastern – 145
• Drexel – 147
• Hofstra – 150
• Delaware – 211
• Charleston – 225
• Elon – 227
• UNCW – 231
• Towson – 276
• William and Mary – 287

[JoeFedorowicz]

THE NEC

Finally, so I cover all my bases, let’s talk about the NEC. Schools are Bryant, CCSU, Fairleigh Dickinson, LIU, Merrimack, Mount St. Mary’s, Sacred Heart, St. Francis College, Saint Francis University and Wagner College. Average enrollment is 5600, but that drops to 4300 when you take out LIU. Three of the schools have 2000 or less students. I like the NEC more than I like both the CAA and the MAAC, to be honest. The schools are very tightly clustered and all mostly of a similar size. It kind of blends the previously mentioned conferences. They’ve had some success, but not much. Five of the schools are Catholic colleges.

If I had to pick a conference, I would pick the NEC, but we’re accepting the fact that La Salle will become a low-level mid-major. And maybe that’s ok. Travel would be better. Expectations would be lower. There’d probably be more all-conference plaques in the future in all sports. But it’d be a lesser competitive level. But this isn’t my dream. I’ll move on to my bigger point.

NET RANKINGS (La Salle – 195)

• Bryant - 131
• Wagner - 157
• Mount Saint Mary’s - 174
• Long Island - 214
• Merrimack - 218
• Saint Francis (NY) - 237
• Fairleigh Dickinson – 243
• Sacred Heart - 248
• Saint Francis (PA) - 262
• CCSU - 301

[JoeFedorowicz]

THE DREAM

La Salle doesn’t belong anywhere that currently exists.

“Relax”, you may say. Some might say that isn’t nice, but hear me out. The A10 as it was in 1996 was perfect for where La Salle was going. If that conference still existed today, it would be perfect for La Salle, in my opinion and I wouldn’t have already written 1250 words about moving conferences. But none of these other conferences make more sense than the A10. The reason is money. La Salle benefits financially by being in the Atlantic 10 because they get 2-4 teams in the tournament each year and that money is, at least partly, shared. Now granted, La Salle’s athletic department is surely in the red, but as currently constructed they’d be more in the red if they were in a much smaller, less successful conference.

So what should they do? They should become Explorers. (I’m so sorry).

Let’s just look at the Atlantic 10 and quantify teams that meet the following criteria:

• Don’t fall out of the boundaries of the 1996 Atlantic 10
  
• Aren't 2x the Median of the A10 enrollment wise
• Aren't Public State Schools

That leaves these schools:

• La Salle
• Saint Joseph’s
• Fordham
• St. Bonaventure
• Duquesne
• Dayton
• Richmond
• George Washington

Of that list above and since the 2012 re-organization, Saint Joseph’s has two A10 tournament championships, St. Bonaventure has one and let’s say Dayton would have won last year…so one. None of the teams listed above has show the ability to be dominant year in/year out like VCU has.

Where am I going with this? You can take six schools on that list above: La Salle, Joe’s, Fordham, Bonnies, Duquesne and GW, that are just out of place in the current conference. Whether it be location, size, success or facilities, having any of these schools compete continuously with SLU, VCU…even Dayton and UMass in some aspects…just not a level playing field.

So where am I going with that? Is there a world where seven Atlantic 10 members leave the current conference and create a newer, more Northeast centric one? I have no knowledge of what it takes to disband the Atlantic 10, but if 50% of the membership were to leave, the conference would likely not be able to enforce their $2M exit fee, which would be huge for the vast majority of the schools that wanted to leave.

And then you take those other conferences, and you pick and choose who you want. Two routes to take here, in my opinion. Secular or not. You can go by similar size and strength and say La Salle, Joe’s, Fordham, Duquesne, Bonaventure, and URI. Go and poach other schools from the conferences mentioned above. Drexel, Iona, Quinnipiac, JMU.

You can also go the Catholic route. La Salle, Joes, Fordham, Duquesne, Bonnies, Dayton, Mount Saint Mary’s, St. Francis (Brooklyn), Iona, Marist, Manhattan, Niagara…find one more. Maybe Loyola MD.

This is crazy. It’s never going to happen. But if I’m Brian Baptiste, I’m sending feelers out to see who else is unhappy with the current Atlantic 10. In my opinion, dropping a conference is very messy. You need that conference to have a spot and to accept a bigger school coming in. You’re not going to have your pick.

Count me in on the idea that La Salle needs to do something else. It stinks too, because they are competitive in a lot of sports in the Atlantic 10. The Atlantic 10 championships that I competed in were great and the teams I was on were some of the best in the league. But it’s a basketball school and the basketball team isn’t going to be able to compete at the Atlantic 10 level due to travel and opponent size/strength. At least in my opinion. Sorry for the length.

[thelasallelunatic]

You just brought me back 15 years reading your collegian articles.

[JoeFedorowicz]

Mar 3, 2021 19:31:19 GMT -5 thelasallelunatic said:

You just brought me back 15 years reading your collegian articles.

I think they only published three of them! And this was longer for sure!

[thelasallelunatic]

A half drunken rebuttal....McGlade is terrible, and Linda Bruno sucked as well. I'm from South Jersey as well, but what McGlade did to the A10 Tourney is criminal. It's a fucking traveling carnival. The 18 game schedule is shit as well. The A10 is a league that relies on scalps to build it's Tournament profile. Cutting 2 nonleague games from everybody takes 2 pieces of the pie from all of us. We aren't the ACC or the Big 10, we aren't a stand alone conference that can get stronger playing each other. I know coaches like it because scheduling requires work, and the league just lays out a schedule to play.

But it doesn't help the conference build a tournament resume.

[MisterD]

I want to think more about the overall topic, but are you sure the NEC is better than the MAAC? None of the conference RPI calcs I found support that.

[JoeFedorowicz]

Mar 3, 2021 19:46:05 GMT -5 thelasallelunatic said:

McGlade is terrible

I think she's effective in what she wanted to do. She wanted to move the conference south. She wanted bigger schools. She did all those things. And the conference is "stronger" in the top half. But 1/3 of the conference has no chance to compete.

[kinesiology]

Well done. Very reasoned and thoughtful.

[JoeFedorowicz]

Mar 3, 2021 19:50:55 GMT -5 MisterD said:

I want to think more about the overall topic, but are you sure the NEC is better than the MAAC? None of the conference RPI calcs I found support that.

Not from a strength perception but from a fit perspective, in my opinion. They are very close and both bad. Whether you were in the NEC or the MAAC, you're in a one-bid conference. 

[thelasallelunatic]

Mar 3, 2021 19:53:15 GMT -5 JoeFedorowicz said:

Mar 3, 2021 19:50:55 GMT -5 MisterD said:

I want to think more about the overall topic, but are you sure the NEC is better than the MAAC? None of the conference RPI calcs I found support that.

Not from a strength perception but from a fit perspective, in my opinion. They are very close and both bad. Whether you were in the NEC or the MAAC, you're in a one-bid conference. 

Like 16 seed bad... an automatic 1 and done if you win the conference tournament, and if you win the regular season and slip up in the tourney, it's NIT time.

Siena won 2 consecutive years when McCaffrey was coaching there.

[thelasallelunatic]

If you're really, really good in the A10, you can get a 1 seed.... if you're really, really good in the MAAC or NEC, you get 12 or 13 seed.

[hykos1045]

Mar 3, 2021 19:24:31 GMT -5 JoeFedorowicz said:

THE NEC...
NET RANKINGS (La Salle – 195)

• Bryant - 131
• Wagner - 157
• Mount Saint Mary’s - 174
• Long Island - 214
• Merrimack - 218
• Saint Francis (NY) - 237
• Fairleigh Dickinson – 243
• Sacred Heart - 248
• Saint Francis (PA) - 262
• CCSU - 301

Everyone crinkles their nose at this list, but as the prospective four seed on that list this year, at least we could have had a real shot at the dance more often than once every 20 years. and we could build off a good stretch of maybe back to back tournament teams if a good class comes in. In this conference, the tall ask of winning 5 games in 5 days, or even 4 in 4 is something that only Xavier has ever really ever been able to pull off. Duquesne came rather close once but lost in the final and went to a different tournament.

We know that the board (of trustees) has researched our conference fit no more than 2 years ago... Was entering in these local conferences, and eliminating plane travel seen as a net negative because of the lost TV and NCAA revenue streams? Or could it have potentially "saved" sports that are currently on the chopping block? I am curious, but not sure how much of baseball's 600,000 budget involves flying to St Louis and how much if it is personnel, schollies, and facilities related.

[fvp47]

I have just one thing to add on the MCC move. It was to be an east-midwest league. The east was to include St. Joe and Fordham and one or two others as I recall. At the last minute the Hawks and Fordham jumped to the A-10 and we were stuck as the only team in the east.

[hykos1045]

Mar 3, 2021 20:03:09 GMT -5 thelasallelunatic said:

If you're really, really good in the A10, you can get a 1 seed.... if you're really, really good in the MAAC or NEC, you get 12 or 13 seed.

relevant... because we were marginally good and got a 13 seed, so you're saying we could improve to a 12 or fall to a 15?

[belfieldhappyhour]

Nice break down Joe. When you said the other day that they need to doing something big, I thought your post was going to lead us to seeking an invite to the Big East.

Maybe that long rumored National Catholic Conference will come to fruition and we can sneak in there.

[fvp47]

Need to add one more comment. I agree with the above poster that financially the A-10 is probably better for us. Also we do well in the other A-10 sports and the women's BB team came in 8th this season.
A lot of the complaints are that we do not have enough talent. Do you think we would be able to recruit better talent with a move down in conference. Just asking.

[thelasallelunatic]

Mar 3, 2021 19:52:29 GMT -5 JoeFedorowicz said:

Mar 3, 2021 19:46:05 GMT -5 thelasallelunatic said:

McGlade is terrible

I think she's effective in what she wanted to do. She wanted to move the conference south. She wanted bigger schools. She did all those things. And the conference is "stronger" in the top half. But 1/3 of the conference has no chance to compete.

She poached the 2 best CAA teams that made Final Four runs. She poached the best SoCon team. She lost 2 of the pillars in Temple and Xavier, for different reasons obviously. This area lost the conference and the conference tourney, and it hasn't recovered attendance wise.

[thelasallelunatic]

Mar 3, 2021 20:04:38 GMT -5 hykos1045 said:

Mar 3, 2021 20:03:09 GMT -5 thelasallelunatic said:

If you're really, really good in the A10, you can get a 1 seed.... if you're really, really good in the MAAC or NEC, you get 12 or 13 seed.

relevant... because we were marginally good and got a 13 seed, so you're saying we could improve to a 12 or fall to a 15?

We could fall to a 16.

[sweat83]

La Salle and Fordham join the Patriot League. There are a few leftovers there from the ECC, which wasn't such a bad conference. Logistically is works, and you still have the DC, NY, Boston, Philly colleges there.
The CBB Landscape has changed Bite the bullet and move on. This is who we are in 2021.

[hykos1045]

Mar 3, 2021 20:09:15 GMT -5 thelasallelunatic said:

Mar 3, 2021 20:04:38 GMT -5 hykos1045 said:

relevant... because we were marginally good and got a 13 seed, so you're saying we could improve to a 12 or fall to a 15?

We could fall to a 16.

We could improve from a 12 in the A10 to a 12 in the NCAA. Just wanted to reiterate this again. It is not necessarily a bad thing for where we are coming from today. I would miss the UMass trips and Rhode Island trips and the George Mason pseudo rivalry. We would still play SJU. Not missing going to the Bronx or Olean. And they won't miss us except for the cheap wins!

[JoeFedorowicz]

Mar 3, 2021 20:07:14 GMT -5 belfieldhappyhour said:

Maybe that long rumored National Catholic Conference will come to fruition and we can sneak in there.

I love this idea but the days of getting Villanova or St. John's are over.

[hykos1045]

Some might not like this news, but we would be a longshot in the Patriot conf tourney. This move could potentially improve Fordham's chances, but we would still be an underdog.

[hykos1045]

Mar 3, 2021 20:14:06 GMT -5 JoeFedorowicz said:

Mar 3, 2021 20:07:14 GMT -5 belfieldhappyhour said:

Maybe that long rumored National Catholic Conference will come to fruition and we can sneak in there.

I love this idea but the days of getting Villanova or St. John's are over.

Or Seton Hall, or Butler or Dayton

[JoeFedorowicz]

Mar 3, 2021 20:11:47 GMT -5 sweat83 said:

La Salle and Fordham join the Patriot League.

It's not going to happen. We're not there academically. Our scholarships are out of whack compared to that league for other sports. 

[thelasallelunatic]

Mar 3, 2021 20:11:47 GMT -5 sweat83 said:

La Salle and Fordham join the Patriot League. There are a few leftovers there from the ECC, which wasn't such a bad conference. Logistically is works, and you still have the DC, NY, Boston, Philly colleges there.
The CBB Landscape has changed Bite the bullet and move on. This is who we are in 2021.

Sweat, we don't fit a Patriot profile, I remember there was talk of this when the football team was competitive, but that was the issue back then.

[JoeFedorowicz]

Mar 3, 2021 20:03:39 GMT -5 fvp47 said:

I have just one thing to add on the MCC move. It was to be an east-midwest league. The east was to include St. Joe and Fordham and one or two others as I recall. At the last minute the Hawks and Fordham jumped to the A-10 and we were stuck as the only team in the east.

Nothing like getting hoodwinked by Fordham.