natetheskate wrote:
No offense and no argument that the A-10 is the better conference, will probably give us a better chance to get an at-large but I am not a data guy....So not being able to attend the Conference Championship is more important to me than playing St, Bonaventure.and having bragging rights over friends who went to ISU and SIU and Bradley( and attending games with them) is more important than playing Rhode Island. and even though the A-10 may get more bids we will have to up our play to get one.
This is not about which Conference is better or who gets more bids...for me it is about my personal experience as a fan and the A-10 is just not as compelling to me as a fan.
I completely understand your point, and my hope is that you end up getting the best of both worlds. Nothing prohibits us from playing Bradley, SIU, and Illinois State in non conference play, and I suspect with our increased travel budget, we will want to schedule as many Illinois non-con games as we can. I foresee us trying to keep rivalries going with those teams, and they are certainly better for scheduling than Coppin state, Norfolk state, D2 schools, etc.