Tales from Uber and Big East Football programs failing in the ACC
The old big east football teams should've stayed
Fantasy Football - about halfway through and our team “Southern Charm” looks poised to move to 5-2 this year — much better than our 0-6 start last year - the wide receivers only theory is working
Curtis Fingers is now doing picks for Filibusterfreestyle.com - Big 12 Football and likely Big East Basketball this winter — he went 2 and 2 this weekend (including Kansas state winning outright as home dawgs vs Texas)
Places listening - Clayton, South Australia/ Belfast N Ireland / Antwerp Belgium and Hofuf Saudi Arabia
Country rankings after US - UK, Saudi Arabia and then Singapore and Pakistan getting in the mix this week
Have a podcast idea - how the old big east football teams all ruined their winning legacies by joining the acc/ big 10 and big 12 - including Miami, WVU, BC, Rutgers, Syracuse
Nice the thesis is- the big east gave smaller programs a major platform. Like how psg gets to win French league every year.
But if psg joined premier league they'd come in 8th or worse and eve play in champs league again (like BC will never play in a New Year's Day bowl again)
The teams that are now in the American and to some extant the mountain west have that same chance
Miami - Big East 1991 - 2004 Joined ACC in 2004
In the Big East: 1st place in 91, 92, 94, 95, 96, 2000, 01, 02 and 03 // 2nd place in 93, 98, 99 // 5th place 1 time in 1997 (2 national titles, 7 national top 10 finishes)
In the ACC: Zero top 10 finishes , only 3 top 20 finishes - 1 divisional co-championship — zero BCS or now New Year’s Six Bowls, zero 10 win seasons
FAU/ FIU/ UCF and USF starting `1-A programs hurt them a lot too, but losing the mystique of dominating the Big East has hurt them too
Virginia Tech - 1991 - 2004 Joined ACC in 2004
Best argument for an ACC success story - IN BIG EAST 1st place 95, 96 and 99 // second place 94, 97, 2000
in ACC 4 first place finishes in first 7 seasons in ACC were second or third in the other years but since 2012 they’ve been tied for 6th, tied for 5th twice and tied for 4th — and that’s about when the conference expanded a second time
West Virginia - 1991-2012 Joined Big 12 in 2012
7 first place finished from 1991 to 2011 - most of which came after Miami, VT, and BC left
5 second place finishes between 1991 and 2011 - 60% of the time they were “top 2” - First 4 years in the Big 12? Tied for 4th, Tied for 5th twice and tied for 7th — though they are undefeated through six games in 2016
between 2005 and 2010 - six season - they won between 9 and 11 game each year — They’ve only managed to win 8 in the season once since joining big 12 - again that should change this year
BC- 1991 - 2005 Joined ACC in 2005
5 Top 3 finishes in Big East including winning the league in their final season (after Miami and VA Tech left)
4 losing seasons - 4-7 each of those years — Last 4 years in conference won either 9 or 8 games a season
In the ACC First 5 years they were first or second in their division - but in the last 6 years they’ve never been better than 7-6 and they’ve had 3 losing seasons including a winless ACC year in 2015
Rutgers - 1991-2013 Joined Big 10 2013
Rutgers struggled in the Big East only 1 winning season between 1991 and 2004 - but after Miami, VA Tech and BC left — they had 5 winning seasons in a row, 7 out of 8 winning seasons in their final 8 years
Joined the Big 10 and had a respectable 1st year - 8-5 season — last year they were 4-8 and this year they are going to be fortunate to finish .500
Once you start falling off in these deeper conferences — it becomes incredibly hard to regain your footing — in the 7 team Big East — you could catch your breath schedule wise - in these 14 team super leagues, you can’t
Syracuse - 1991-2013 Joined ACC in 2013
These guys just got bad at a really bad time to get bad — from 1994 to 2001 they were top 3 in the big east every season, including 3 straight Titles from 96-98
Then they fired a coach Paulie P who went 101-59-1 and 73-34 in the Conference (and he was falling off) but replaced him with Greg Robinson who came in last place basically every year and then Doug Marrone who finished 25-25 but 11-17 in conference and he bolted for the Buffalo Bills
Their first three ACC season - 14-23 overall and 7-18 in the ACC - better this season so far, but not good
Pitt - 1991-2013 Joined ACC in 2013
Pitt had a tough first 9 years in Big East - 1 bowl game and 1 top 20 ranking // but from 2000 to 2004 they had 4 straight top 20 rankings including a top 10 and went to 5 straight bowl games. In their final 7 years in the Big East - 3 more top 20’s including a top 10 and a 5 straight bowl appearances… they’ve been middling in the ACC an have cracked the top 25 once