Coming soon...

...the preseason look at the end result will be up next week. I have the field already chosen, just need to make a seed list and then bracket them. I'll also have a superpost predicting the 32 regular season races the next day.

Still nothing to see

Wishful thinking on my part that the NCAA would name the East Region host site for the 2013 Men's tournament. If it isn't obvious by now, the NCAA has decided to string this out for no good reason at all so it can make a triumpant announcement that the East Region in 2013 will be played at Madison Square Garden, but it can't for one of 2 reasons:

1) The multi-million dollar renovation is not expected to end until the Summer of 2013. or;
2) The Circus is objecting.

Of course it could be true that the Garden is not even in play here and the NCAA is looking over to Barclays Center in Brooklyn, but who knows. The simple fact the NCAA is not even throwing out hints as to where it wants to go is troubling enough, but with the 2013 tournament now 18 months distant, the clock is ticking louder. The need to hold up this information like it's a Soviet state secret is looking more and more ridiculous. The NCAA must come clean within the coming days and just announce the site already. A nation waits with great anticipation.

As the Conferences turn

The tetonics of the college sports planet have awaken during this August of Discontent, and it's as active as it was last June. This time, it involves the fates of three conferences not touched by last year's upheave. But it also includes one of the central characters of last year trying to survive.

A 14-school SEC...maybe
The most vexing question to the direction of these moves is the potential of the SEC to go from the 12-team structure it pioneered in University Division Football in 1992 to 14, or possibly 16, teams in the next few years. The most likely candidate to join is Texas A&M, whom, as you'll read about shortly, are thinking about bolting the Big 12-2. If the Aggies join, a 14th team will need to be in order. Reports out of Florida have ACC member Florida State as the 14th team(much to the potential disgust of UF AD, Jeremy Foley, who's made loud noises about having his Gators be the only Sunshine State school in the league). But the SEC might not stop there. Schools like Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Missouri, West Virginia, Clemson, Virginia Tech, North Carolina and NC State have been linked to possible expansion. If it's limited to the first 3 schools, the Big 12-2 is almost toast, if the choices come from the last 5, Jon Swofford may have to merge the rump of the ACC with the football playing "Big East" schools. So it's likely the SEC will split the difference, which may bring in the Big Ten to pick off schools like Kansas, Missouri(if the SEC doesn't move first), Syracuse, Rutgers, Maryland, and possibly Virginia. Now why is such a move possible?

Big Brother-Little Brother Syndrome
Despite being enriched by television deals with ESPN and the Fox Sports Media Group, Texas A&M officials have been very frank about their unhappiness with their situation in the Big 12-2. It's only increased with Texas' new Longhorn Network, which will launch in 2 weeks. One beef with the new ESPN-owned service is that the Horns are seeking to have at least one Big 12-2 game on in order to increase it's worthiness to Cable and Satellite systems. The other beef was the fact that LHN sought to air High School games, but the NCAA shot that idea down. Nonetheless, the Aggies are trying to get out, even Govenor Rick Perry admits to the notion of escaping(despite previous attempts by him to keep UT and TAMU tied to each other during last year's tetonics).

Action, Reaction
It seems inevitable that TAMU and the SEC are going to elope and join forces. Then what? Will the remainder of the SEC go over Jeremy Foley's head and invite Florida State? Will they go to 16 and go after Oklahoma? Oklahoma State? In the east, how bout Clemson? UNC? NC State? Virginia Tech? Can Dan Branch, chair of the influential Texas House Higher Education Committee try to trim funding for TAMU?

The answers are coming soon, and if you ask me, I think the SEC goes to 14. With Florida State joining in as well.

Now we know the bitter truth

The NCAA made an announcement today on future sites for the Division I Men's Basketball tournament. Unfortunately, it wasn't the one I harped upon last year around this time.

The announcement that Dayton will host the next two years of the First Four was well known in advance, but the NCAA's continued silence on who will host the East Regional in 21 months time continues to be the most deafening silence ever uttered since Manfred Mann released The Roaring Silence in 1976.

It's now very obvious the NCAA is witholding the identinty of the site so that Madison Square Garden can complete it's renovation by March, 2013. But there is one problem, the renovation will not be totally complete until October, 2013. If I'm positive, the NCAA wants the arena to be fully renovated(not just the seating bowl) before hand. So what excuse could the NCAA possibly have? A secret deal between it, St. John's, and the Big East(the potential hosts of any garden party)? A lukewarm reception from other prospective hosts?

Obviously, the NCAA needs to name a host site and school by September. Otherwise the prospective hosts will have very little time to prepare. IMO, they should have named the host LAST September.

OT: Something I've been working on

Over the last several months, I've been quietly setting up a new forum dedicated to the history of the NAIA. I'm here to tell you that it's now open to all. Please go to this address: http://naiahistoryforum.freeforums.org/index.php. Enjoy it, you'll like it. Note: I'm in the process of moving the centerpiece of the forums, a detailed history of the NAIA's various playoffs to determine the qualifiers for the Men's and Women's basketball national championships to it's very own dedicated forum, so it will take some time.