MVC targeting Valpo & Murray State to create 11 team league

[TheAsianSensation]

Market's pretty darn irrelevant in this process.

That said, we added a school from Chicago last time, so who the hell knows.

[VU2014]

If you want to get technical, NW Indiana has around 800,000 people in Lake, Porter, LaPorte, Newton, and Jasper counties. This is the second largest metropolitan area in IN, outside of Indianapolis.

What is laughable is how cocky NDSU fans appear to be. When you have a run of success in basketball similar to what we/Murray State have, then you can talk. In football, you can talk all you want, as your program is king of FCS, but this isn't football.

Cocky? Not at all, just trying to bring some knowledge to all this nieve information. How many of your 800k actually care about Valpo basketball? Ndsu has a state following with a strong reach into MN of people who care about ndsu sports, not as their 2nd or third option. Ndsu has done amazing things in a short time in DI basketball with a handful of top 25 wins. Ndsu would compete very well in the MVC, and the support structure would push them to the top of the league.

Valpo has A LOT of grads in Chicago as its only a 40 minutes from downtown of the third biggest city in the whole country.

Valpo definitely does have a very large/active Chicago alumni base (Loyola would be happy see the attendance boost from the Valpo fans). They also have a big/active alumni base in Milwaukee if they eventually joined the MVC.

Another thing to keep in mind is they have a sizable Alumni base from St. Louis and there is a very large Lutheran Population from the St. Louis, MO area and obviously is where Arch Madness is held so that may be a nice little to boost to attendance (but its still going to hurt losing WSU shuttling in those fans).

The best schools available are Valpo and Murray State. So go 11 teams (EDIT: play a 20* game Conference regular season) and wait a year or two and make a school like Milwaukee or some other school earn their invite to the MVC. Put on a 1-2 year tryout.

Maybe Belmont changes their mind or maybe the A10 slips (a team or 2 gets poached) and SLU or Dayton look else where. For SLU or Dayton to even consider the MVC is for the need improve and add the best basketball schools possible (both Valpo/Murray St) and show that the MVC can still be a 2-bid league. Valpo/Murray St are a shot in the arm and programs like IL St/UNI need to keep the success going and SIU, Bradley, E-ville, IN St, MO St need to get back to historical success. The bones are there for those programs. Loyola hasn't been great, but they have stacked together back to back good recruiting classes and they will be better and surprise some fans.

[uniftw]

The basis of your reasoning for SEMO is every bit as good - maybe better than UWM. They are similar schools in many ways with what they could offer. The issue with SEMO is they are so god awful at basketball. I'm talking they had 3 wins 2 years ago. They've gone winless for entire conference season in the OVC in the last decade. RPI's are tough to compare because of how it works and OVC vs MVC but they've been worse than 300 almost every single year. Never better than 237. Only once better than 250. EDIT: THEY WERE 175 IN 2004 WHEN THEY WENT 11-16.

Their football program is that bad as well. Taking SIU and ISUb to the limit the last few years means not much. They have been 2 of the 3 or 4 worst programs in the conference for a while.

They do give the MVFC some leverage against whatever the Dakota's may want to do, but that's not enough of a reason to bring them in.

We shoudln't be adding the worse program in one of the worst conferences, especailly if the "best" reason to do so is to get to 9 rather than 8 football members. Also, if we grab 2 OVC programs WIU doesn't go Horizon, they go OVC because they are going to need programs.

If SEMO was like a WIU level football program and Loyola level basketball program then maybe.....maybe, but even then probably not.

[uniftw]

The best schools available are Valpo and Murray State. So go 11 teams (play a 22 game Conference regular season) and wait a year or two and make a school like Milwaukee or some other school earn their invite to the MVC. Put on a 1-2 year tryout.

20 game conference schedule for 11 teams. You don't play yourself twice.

I mostly agree with this. I don't want to force 12 if we don't have too.

We can play 11 for a couple years. Wait to see what happens, but be ready to be proactive - which is what this league has struggled with.

I have a feeling there is something on the horizon with the B12/AAC/A10/Big East.

I think the Big East is going to break on their private school thing. It will add UCONN and VCU.
I think the B12 goes to 12 and grabs 2 American football programs - say Houston and Cincinatti

That leaves the American with UCF, ECU, TULANE, USF, Temple, Tulsa, Memphis and Wichita. All of a sudden Wichita's move doesn't look so good. The American is going to need to start poaching and will grab CUSA football programs and A10 basketball programs.

Eventually Dayton and SLU are going to get the message that they aren't getting the invite they think they deserve. Maybe Dayton does for AAC basketball.

SLU is, eventually, going to get the message. Maybe WSU finds out the AAC grass was greener, but it was painted green and eventually that washes away. You think they hated Evansville, Drake and Indiana State? Imagine them carrying UCF, Tulane, ECU and USF. All FBS football first programs that care about basketball like Indiana State.

Hang on at 11 with constant monitoring of schools and the 12th will appear real quick down the road.

[RacerJoeD]

Marketing. This is actually something that the Murray State Alumni Association has been looking into. What has been found is that there are large numbers of Murray State alumni throughout the media market, and that often, that tie is one of the strongest, meaning that by bringing the number one sport of the number one unifying interest in that disparate market, you will actually have the ability to effectively advertise in that market.

As for Belmont. Their biggest asset is their quality in basketball. They have very little fan support, even in Nashville. Bring them in for their basketball product, but if you think they will bring fans to games or will get you into the Nashville market, think again. Lack of access to the Nashville market (even with a successful Belmont) is why the OVC moved their tournament to Evansville.

[MissouriValleyUnite]

I can't believe how many of you dudes are like, "well, convinced me," or "PantherU makes good points."

As I understand it, Panther's argument is this:

Anyone who is close to the Milwaukee program (unless they're naive) knows that the athletic director sabotaged the team during the final years of the Rob Jeter era in order to fire Rob Jeter. That happened a year ago. Her job is tied to the success of the new coach, LaVall Jordan, who has 100% support from the community and fan base. She would be absolutely nuts to do anything but try her hardest to support the basketball program now.

The APR ban was due to mishandled paperwork by a former compliance officer who left in 2013. He failed to file paperwork on several players who had been playing pro ball and would be exempt from the APR score (including Chiefs TE Demetrius Harris, who has since gotten his degree). He also failed to file paperwork on subsequent appeals, and was the only employee in athletics to be aware of it (as he was both the only person in compliance and the administrator overseeing academics in MBB). He left in summer 2013. Since they discovered the problem, the basketball team has put up a perfect 1000 APR score. Academics are not an issue.

So, the MVC should take Milwaukee because--if we take PantherU at his word, though it sounds a bit preposterous to me--they've have an AD who is willing to "sabotage" the program for several years just so she can fire the coach, and because the only reason the NCAA put them on academic probation is that they hire incompetent compliance officers ? That's an argument for taking Milwaukee? How many other schools have been put on probation in the last 5 years because of their APR? And the AD tried to sabotage the program for three years? Yeah, right--any woman in her first job as an AD would intentionally try to sabotage her school's most prominent sports program. What better way to assure your own personal successs, right? The idea of firing him right away because of the team's 8-24 record the prior year? Apparently never occurred to her.

That bizarre accusation might make us consider the course. Is this the same PantherU mentioned here: http://www.mvcfans.com/viewtopic.php?f= ... erU#p43736

@PantherU on twitter:

Not able to confirm this 100%, but it looks like Belmont, Oakland and Evansville will be joining the Horizon League. I'm not hearing any other schools brought up by my contacts, and too many contacts are using those three together. Either everyone I talk to is conferring with each other, or where there's smoke there's fire. I'm thinking the latter.

Panther also assures us:

In a survey a couple years ago, students and fans overwhelmingly cited "low level opponents" such as Youngstown State as why they wouldn't go to games. Moving to the MVC would eliminate that in a heartbeat. I'd be willing to bet we'd be in Top 3 in attendance by Year 3 in the MVC.

So attendance will get better with that MVC invite? Well, couldn't you say that about any team moving up to the MVC from the Horizon, then? My guess is that fans at other Horizon schools aren't flocking down to see Milwaukee. And you know what Milwaukee's average attendance was last year? 1560. 9th in the 10 team Horizon. The year before, even though they won 20 games, it was 2667, below the Horizon average and in the bottom half of the conference.

But don't worry:

For big opponents, Milwaukee has always come out - this has included conference games like Valpo and Green Bay

Yeah--a whopping 2267 for Valpo this year, and 2626 for their arch rival, Green Bay.

But there's an excuse. In the other thread, though, he argues:

I have heard a few people bring up that Milwaukee's attendance is an issue, so I want to address that and end any worry about it right here, right now.

Several months before the 2015-16 season, our Director of Ticket Sales, Brian Morgan, left to go to Marquette. We were left with our assistant ticket manager, Eric Becker. He was running the office until August, when he took a similar job at Pitt.

The reason Morgan has not been replaced yet is because the athletic department is currently in a reshuffling to prepare for growth as a program. In short, they're currently trying to model the program after elite mid-majors and the spot just hasn't been filled yet.

So if you're wondering how attendance was bad this year, just know that Milwaukee Basketball was having tickets sold by student workers. That won't be the case moving forward.

In other words, "we've had terrible management, but trust me (a fan with a website), we'll get better." OK.

And of course, there's always the fact, as Panther points out, that their new coach wasn't hired by another school. That's convincing, eh?

Now, he's right on two things: they've got a big arena and they get you into the Milwaukee market. Oh, and he's right, in a series that began 7 years ago, they went 2-2 against UNI teams that never made the tournament. Well, sign me up!

Meanwhile, in another threat http://www.mvcfans.com/viewtopic.php?f= ... 54#p105754, Panther argues that Milwaukee deserves a bid because they lost the Horizon League to Butler in 2010 and 2011. Shiver me timbers!

I'll go with squirrel, who points out:

Until 1999, Milwaukee was among the worst programs in DI. Period.

From 1999 until 2005 Milwaukee was fortunate to have Bo Ryan and Bruce Pearl in succession. Even Ryan in his 2 seasons only managed to get them to 3 over .500 for his two years-a testament to just how horrendous the program was in the nineties. Pearl was able to take a good situation and lead the program to 3 NCAA bids before leaving in 2005. They were probably very fortunate to avoid any sort of NCAA problems stemming from the Pearl era.

Rob Jeter, a Bo Ryan product, took Pearl's program to the tournament in his first year, and then proceeded to finish higher than 4th just twice over the next 10 years, and just 4 times higher than 5th. While he did have a second NCAA appearance, it was as a fifth place finisher.

As for the two seasons you cite, Milwaukee finished 4th in 2010, behind Wright St and Green Bay as well. So they ran into more than just The Greatest Mid-Major of All-Time (which is openly debatable.) I'll give you 2011 since they not only tied Butler for the league title, they also beat them. But they won fewer overall games and didn't even make the tourney because of a schedule that wasn't good enough to get them in...that's a Valley no-no, unless you're the Redbirds, but they'll never get it.

They've had losing Horizon records in 3 of the last 5 years.

Look, its OK to try and sell Milwaukee, they're not at the top of my list, but if we're being honest about history, the program has largely been a trainwreck. Now, they haven't been as terrible as they were in their early DI days, but they have had more teams closer to the bottom of DI than they have RPI 100 teams since Bo Ryan and Bruce Pearl have been out of the picture.

Their performance profile beyond that is the very definition of meh.

In the other thread, Panther again argues:

it's a hell of a lot easier to recruit better players in the MVC. It's a hell of a lot easier to get fans excited about the program in the MVC. It's a hell of a lot easier to build a schedule in the MVC.

Isn't that true of any Horizon program? So if Milwaukee is one of the weaker programs in the HL--weak on attendance, so-so on the court--where's the benefit of taking them over, say, Wright State or Green Bay, which draw better and have been better on the court? Or Northern Kentucky, which won 24 games, made the Tournament, has the best facilities in the Horizon, and would get the MVC a toehold in the Cincinnati market (NKU is in a Cincy suburb).

The case for Milwaukee is no better (and in some cases quite a bit worse) than the case for Wright State, Northern Kentucky, Detroit, Oakland, Cleveland State, Green Bay, Omaha, Denver, Oral Roberts, UIC, or IUPUI.

Brilliant post. I agree that NKU is better long term than UWM.

Best course of action is to have a 1-3 year secret tryout for #12.

[mvfcfan]

Who is the 6th private? Even if Valpo gets added, that only brings it to 5. To have true balance, you would need (2) privates and (1) public added.

You have some decent points for SEMO, but as I just pointed out above, we would now be adding a 3rd school in a market much weaker than it's ranking. We might as well throw in UT-Martin and move the conference offices and tournament to Paducah.

I guess you're right, you would have to add two privates to make it even. I'm not really sure why I was thinking there was more privates than publics with the Valpo addition. I guess for some reason I was thinking it was even already at 5-5 rather than 6-4 in favor of public schools.

I tend to agree with some of the other posters as well. The best move would be to wait a few years before adding a 12th team. Make someone stand out before rushing into a decision. I'm perfectly fine with playing at 11 with a 20 game schedule. I just hope we can do it next year and we don't mess around so long that we have to play with 9 next year.

I think the ultimate addition that everyone can agree upon would be getting St Louis. If St Louis came out and contacted the MVC and said they were interested in joining they would be the no-brainer 12th option. I think we should wait and see what happens. Almost all of these teams (UNK, UNO, UWM, UIC, SEMO) are kind of sketchy 12th picks. And in all honesty all of these teams will still be options down the road. It's not like they are actually going anywhere as to where we couldn't invite them in a couple of years. A secret tryout or St Louis University is what we should be looking at.

[smidge34]

Their attendance isn't anything spectacular. They did get 5225 people in attendance for the Murray State game though, which SEMO won 82-69. For a comparison when SEMO played at Murray State, MuSu got 3080 people to show up. SEMO also won that game 75-74. Most of the time their (SEMO) attendance seems to be closer to the 1500 range.

I keep seeing these attendance figures tossed around as fact and they're just not. This is gonna sound self serving and it is, but it also happens to be fact that we report true attendance at Murray and if anything we underreport for some crazy reason. Anyway, like the 4000+ figure Morehead reported for our game I mentioned in another comment, I doubt they had 5200 there. The picture above of a full Show Me Center is what 4000-5000 looks like, but that's an older picture versus Murray State from the rivalry heydey 20 years ago.

[Redhawk]

I think the ultimate addition that everyone can agree upon would be getting St Louis. If St Louis came out and contacted the MVC and said they were interested in joining they would be the no-brainer 12th option. I think we should wait and see what happens. Almost all of these teams (UNK, UNO, UWM, UIC, SEMO) are kind of sketchy 12th picks. And in all honesty all of these teams will still be options down the road. It's not like they are actually going anywhere as to where we couldn't invite them in a couple of years. A secret tryout or St Louis University is what we should be looking at.

Yep...I think the 12th spot will be held open for SLU. Best option within the footprint, another MO school for MSU, balances out Private/Public.

[Red]

I think the ultimate addition that everyone can agree upon would be getting St Louis. If St Louis came out and contacted the MVC and said they were interested in joining they would be the no-brainer 12th option. I think we should wait and see what happens. Almost all of these teams (UNK, UNO, UWM, UIC, SEMO) are kind of sketchy 12th picks. And in all honesty all of these teams will still be options down the road. It's not like they are actually going anywhere as to where we couldn't invite them in a couple of years. A secret tryout or St Louis University is what we should be looking at.

Yep...I think the 12th spot will be held open for SLU. Best option within the footprint, another MO school for MSU, balances out Private/Public.

You ever met anyone from SLU? They think they are the Harvard of the Midwest. There's a better chance of me growing wings and flying than of SLU joining the Valley. Elgin can save the cost of the stamp.