Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Pitt football beat writer Paul Zeise must have had a lousy weekend.
I’ve spoken with countless people at Pitt about this situation — and mostly because I am getting bombarded with e-mails, voicemails, text messages and every other form of communication about it not because I believe any of it — over the last few days and this is the message I’ve gotten loud and clear —
There is no announcement planned (the phrases “total fabrication” and “absolutely 100 percent false” and “there is absolutely nothing to these rumors, nothing at all” have been used on more than one occassion) because there is nothing to this whole ‘Pitt to the Big Ten’ stuff. At least not right now and not in the near future. And to take it one step further, there have been no formal discussions (and I’ve been told there haven’t even been any informal discussions between Pitt and the Big Ten, in other words, there have been no discussions at all) between Pitt and the Big Ten and all of these rumors are just that.
He also points out that Pitt isn’t formally commenting because it is wiser to make sure the door is open if it ever gets to a point where the Big 11 expands.
I don’t know that its happening (although I talked to a player whose dad knows a woman who works at a coffee shop …), but bad, bad move if it does. The Big N is little more than a name now.
Given that tUofPgh would NOT be a destination for players who want to go to the Big N (and the fact that Wanny’s the HC), I doubt if football recruiting picks up at all. Its likely to decline, in fact.
Forget about BB recruits. And I think this is the event that makes Dixon leave for an elite program.
And re: football. Wouldn’t Pitt like to have gotten a few of JoePa’s recruits who would rather play against Michigan, Ohio State and Happy Valley before crowds of hundreds of thousands instead of 30,000 or so in Storrs, Louisville and, um, Piscataway?
Big N hoops has already sucked for several years now. The Big East is the best hoops conf in the country. We’ll lose those recruits, and I think Dixon as well.
I’m sure Pitt would have loved to get some (but not all) of those football recruits, but they would more likely have ended up at tOSU, WVU North, or some other Big N school, not Pitt. Pitt doesn’t have the name to attract them.
Thanks.
Drive Safely.
Re: Big 10 hoops, they’ve got as storied a past as the BE, see the last 20 years for Indiana, MSU, Michigan and Illinois and compare to Georgetown, UConn and Syracuse.
Football, what can I say? Wouldn’t you want the ketchup field filled to capacity every Saturday instead of the peanut galleries you see for teams like UConn, Syracuse and yes, even RU? (Damn, they should even close off the upper deck like they do at the Rock for SJU and Nets games.)
C’mon now. Do you think recruiting would suffer if Pitt were in the Big 10, especially if UConn, W Va, Cincy and the like are abandoned?
It could hurt a lot, you’re assuming (fb) that we would have a winning record in the Big Whatever. It’s probably better to be 10-3 in the Big East than 3-10 in the BiG 11.
Do you realize that Syracuse took two B10 bowl teams into overtime thsi past year and even beat one of them (Northwestern) who later on beat Iowa, a BCS team? For as bad as the Cuse and UL were lately, do you not realize just how bad Indian stinks? My god, they were beaten 47 to 7 by Virginia … yes, that very same Virinia team that lost at home to Bill & Mary.
Pitt will certainly have more problem winning the B10 title than the BE title but there is no reason to believe that this year’s Pitt team wouldn’t have finished in the top of half of the conference. Just remember, the Pitt team of two years ago, which I believe was not nearly as good as this year’s team, beat a good Iowa team which tied for third place in the BE that year.
The B10 is a step up in FB than the BE but not nearly the large step that you seem to imply in your post .. not even close.
I think we could count on 5 losses right off the bat, OSU, PSU, UM, MSU, UW, and Iowa. I think that we can beat the bottom 3 with maybe one loss to one of them and the rest being a toss-up. Northwestern just had a bad day, and we lost to NC State remember? When is the last time we beat MSU?
Aren’t we cranky, cranky, cranky? Cutting little tidbits from sports pages an posting them here doesn’t make you clued in. You haven’t proved anything but your lack of class.
Let’s face it, college sports is changing quickly. The Big Ten is on the rise and looking to expand. The fact that three Big East teams are rumored (re: interested) to be going to the Big Ten speaks volumes. No one is even suggesting that a Big Ten team would be interested in leaving and going to BE.
The Big Ten is NOT GOING TO STOP AT 12 TEAMS. They are going to 14 or 16 eventually. Ultimately, there will be more money for everyone in a bigger conference. And when the Big Ten does get bigger, stronger Pitt doesn’t want to be on the outside looking in with what is left of the BE.
Just a reminder: We have this basketball team that just came off a disappointing loss and has a game tomorrow night against the school many of us hate more than Penn State. No conversation about that at all, which is a little strange since Pitt’s national rep is currently based more on basketball than football.
Chas: I hope you’re working on some Pitt v. WVU basketball content so the talk can turn back to the here and now instead of something that still seems to be 1-3 YEARS away.
Thanks in advance, and Hail to PITT!
No offense taken, just my attempt at humor also.
