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Ideal Big Sky Conference

Stop_HammerTime69

Well-known member
It's already the offseason for us, sadly. We've got ourselves a coaching search that I'm already exhausted from. So, let's screw around with the conferences. What's your ideal version of the Big Sky conference, or any conference that includes Montana? Could be FCS or FBS, hell, even D2. I'm just sick of hearing the H-word around here.
 
CDAGRIZ said:
It depends on what Hauck wants for the team.

HelenaHandBasket said:
Baylor
Oregon
Boise St

Hawaii
Arizona
Utah
California
Kansas

Sweet, finally get to dust this one off.

TmZcSVZ.jpg



But seriously... If it was still in the FCS I'd love to see the Dakota schools join the Big Sky even if it meant some others left (as long as Weber stuck around). Or if a new conference was formed with them. Likely it's never going to happen though, so maybe a Mountain West invite would be nice instead (but also not likely of course).
 
Montana--Montana St--North Dakota--North Dakota St--South Dakota--South Dakota St--Idaho-- Eastern Washington--Weber St
 
I've always thought that a league comprising of every DI team west of the Mississippi that isn't a Pac-12 team would work nicely. Break it up into 6 or so conferences. You would have three championships to vi for; conference (via the standard round-robin) league (with three game playoff that every team plays in at some level, champion or consolidation rounds) and send the top few teams to the national playoffs. You'd need to minimize the pre-conferece schedule to keep the games right around 11.
 
Knowing for a fact the Dakota schools are never going to abandon their Summit and Missouri Valley affiliations, I'd really like to see our two schools, the Idaho schools, Weber, EWU, perhaps Central Washington with the understanding they upgrade their venues and merge with the West Coast Conference for all nonrevenue sports.

I personally would appreciate seeing baseball, rowing and crew, soccer, wrestling, and a number of other sports such as lacrosse added to the opportunities for the college kids. Hell, we could even have skiing, rifle teams, bring back handball...
 
CatGrad-UMGradStu said:
Knowing for a fact the Dakota schools are never going to abandon their Summit and Missouri Valley affiliations, I'd really like to see our two schools, the Idaho schools, Weber, EWU, perhaps Central Washington with the understanding they upgrade their venues and merge with the West Coast Conference for all nonrevenue sports.

I personally would appreciate seeing baseball, rowing and crew, soccer, wrestling, and a number of other sports such as lacrosse added to the opportunities for the college kids. Hell, we could even have skiing, rifle teams, bring back handball...

I like your teams as long as CW can be truly competitive. In general I am kind of a Pacific NW oriented person and though I have nothing against the Dakotas I would rather travel West for games. Does Oregon have a team that has FCS potential?
 
cmtgrizzly said:
CatGrad-UMGradStu said:
Knowing for a fact the Dakota schools are never going to abandon their Summit and Missouri Valley affiliations, I'd really like to see our two schools, the Idaho schools, Weber, EWU, perhaps Central Washington with the understanding they upgrade their venues and merge with the West Coast Conference for all nonrevenue sports.

I personally would appreciate seeing baseball, rowing and crew, soccer, wrestling, and a number of other sports such as lacrosse added to the opportunities for the college kids. Hell, we could even have skiing, rifle teams, bring back handball...

I like your teams as long as CW can be truly competitive. In general I am kind of a Pacific NW oriented person and though I have nothing against the Dakotas I would rather travel West for games. Does Oregon have a team that has FCS potential?

The only team that plays D2 in Oregon is Western Oregon. They have Home field attendance at around 1500 to 2000. They are also not good. All other teams play D3 or NAIA. Southern Oregon is pretty good and has gone 11-0 this year, beating all Frontier Conference schools. They are the one of the most likely to be competetive athletically although monetarily they are not. 6000 student liberal arts school.

The other is Linfield, a D3 school with a hell of a tradition. They are private, so they may have more money, but they don’t compete anywhere near at the level of play they would need to to be competitive. They would make UNC look like the New England Patriots.

Duck fans think OSU should go to the Big Sky where they will be more competitive, but that’s just rivalry talk. Although this year they were not wrong. Oregon is really infertile grounds for FCS expansion.
 
PDXGrizzly said:
cmtgrizzly said:
CatGrad-UMGradStu said:
Knowing for a fact the Dakota schools are never going to abandon their Summit and Missouri Valley affiliations, I'd really like to see our two schools, the Idaho schools, Weber, EWU, perhaps Central Washington with the understanding they upgrade their venues and merge with the West Coast Conference for all nonrevenue sports.

I personally would appreciate seeing baseball, rowing and crew, soccer, wrestling, and a number of other sports such as lacrosse added to the opportunities for the college kids. Hell, we could even have skiing, rifle teams, bring back handball...

I like your teams as long as CW can be truly competitive. In general I am kind of a Pacific NW oriented person and though I have nothing against the Dakotas I would rather travel West for games. Does Oregon have a team that has FCS potential?

The only team that plays D2 in Oregon is Western Oregon. They have Home field attendance at around 1500 to 2000. They are also not good. All other teams play D3 or NAIA. Southern Oregon is pretty good and has gone 11-0 this year, beating all Frontier Conference schools. They are the most likely to be competetive athletically although monetarily they are not. 6000 student liberal arts school. Oregon is really infertile grounds for FCS expansion.

Oh. Too bad. Good information though. Thanks!

Anybody know if Washington has any other candidates? We have an Eastern, maybe a central or how about a Northern, Western or Southern Washington? Just kidding. Seriously though any other Washington school potential FCS teams?
 
cmtgrizzly said:
PDXGrizzly said:
cmtgrizzly said:
CatGrad-UMGradStu said:
Knowing for a fact the Dakota schools are never going to abandon their Summit and Missouri Valley affiliations, I'd really like to see our two schools, the Idaho schools, Weber, EWU, perhaps Central Washington with the understanding they upgrade their venues and merge with the West Coast Conference for all nonrevenue sports.

I personally would appreciate seeing baseball, rowing and crew, soccer, wrestling, and a number of other sports such as lacrosse added to the opportunities for the college kids. Hell, we could even have skiing, rifle teams, bring back handball...

I like your teams as long as CW can be truly competitive. In general I am kind of a Pacific NW oriented person and though I have nothing against the Dakotas I would rather travel West for games. Does Oregon have a team that has FCS potential?

The only team that plays D2 in Oregon is Western Oregon. They have Home field attendance at around 1500 to 2000. They are also not good. All other teams play D3 or NAIA. Southern Oregon is pretty good and has gone 11-0 this year, beating all Frontier Conference schools. They are the most likely to be competetive athletically although monetarily they are not. 6000 student liberal arts school. Oregon is really infertile grounds for FCS expansion.

Oh. Too bad. Good information though. Thanks!

Anybody know if Washington has any other candidates? We have an Eastern, maybe a central or how about a Northern, Western or Southern Washington? Just kidding. Seriously though any other Washington school potential FCS teams?

I did an edit to expand it somewhat.
 
North Division:
UM
MSU
Idaho
ISU
EWU
UND
UNC

South Division:
Poly
Sac St.
NAU
Davis
PSU
Weber
SUU

6 games against teams from your division. 2 or possibly 3 games against teams from the other division. Since there is no extra week for a championship, each division should get an autobid to the playoffs. Don't count the out of division games toward the division title. If you are a team that doesn't win your division but still has a good overall record, an at large bid should be a likelihood.

For Example...Idaho and UM both go 5-1 in division but the Griz win head to head and get the auto-bid. Idaho could be in theory 10-1 and need an at large. That would happen though and they probably would be seeded due to their great overall resume.
 
The ideal for UM is for us to leave the Big Sky Conference and join the Mountain West when we are prepared. At present, we struggle to win games in the Big Sky, so it will take some time, after, Bobby becomes our coach.
I am hopeful Bodnar will establish a move to FBS as one of our goals as UM has been in FCS far too long.
 
My choices based on IF the G5 decide to use a playoff system and TV providers decided that they are going to pay millions of dollars for TV contracts with more and more people watching online. Colleges then decide to be more regionalized.

BSC West Division
Montana
Montana State
Boise State
University of Idaho
Idaho State
Eastern Washington

BSC East Division
North Dakota State University
University of North Dakota
South Dakota State University
University of South Dakota
Wyoming
Colorado State
 
UM
MSU
UI
ISU
EWU
PSU
NCU
WSU
Boise State
Wyoming

Even though the last two would never do it, pretty much every game would be close enough to travel to and it would cut down a lot of cost for the U.
 
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