As I see it, we will eventually attain AAU status 5-20 years down the road.
But even when we do, I am not certain that our brand size will ever be large enough to attract B1G interest.
We can always hope so, but I wouldn’t put money on it.
I hope I’m wrong.
You mean like Rutgers.
Okay, that makes sense 
Rutgers’ football attendance is way higher than ours (52K per game in 2022), and they are in a bigger market.
Sucky though they may be, money wise, they are a bigger brand, based on that.
And that’s why they are in the B1G, and why we may never be.
Their attendance may be higher right now because they play better teams……
It’s not apples to oranges at all.
And no, they are garbage and always have been….had the BIG had a chance to do it again they would pass.
And what market is that? I hope you are not including NYC like people there are watching Rutgers football….
Give us a few years and we will be way more valuable than what you perceive.
You need to realize that brand SIZE and brand QUALITY are not the same.
It’s like comparing Bud Light (a huge in size, but low quality brand) to St. Arnold’s (a higher in quality but far smaller brand).
Keep in mind that college football is a monetocracy, NOT a meritocracy, and that that is what drives conference realignment. It’s about brand size, not brand quality.
That’s why Nebraska will always be in a “power” conference despite not having won a conference title since the Clinton Administration. As awful as they have been in recent years, they are still averaging 80K+ per game, even when they play sucky opponents.
UH, by contrast, only drew over 30K once last season at home.
Playing better opponents will help out UH attendance, but our attendance will likely never match that of the average SEC or B1G team.
It never has during my lifetime, and I’m over a half century old.
Sorry…but it is what it is.
We’re a SMALL brand, no matter how good in quality our brand may be.
And it’s brand SIZE that matters.
That may be enough to keep Cincy and TCU out of the P2, DESPITE the fact that both have been to the playoffs.
Consider that! High quality brands based on recent success….but SMALL brands based on attendance, fan base, etc.
And that’s true and will remain true regardless of whom they play.
Dude get serious.
You are not the be all end all on everything.
You have your opinion and I have mine……they differ.
You’re not in court right now.
I’m just stating facts that may help you to reconsider your views, and which support mine.
You can take them or leave them as you like.
You mean were not in the baseball forum?
Crap… can’t we just enjoy being in a great conference with our natural rivals, good road games and killer hoops for now?
I’m so freaking tired of “oh no, we need AAU so we can be in the Big 10”… blah blah blah.
I honestly don’t care.
You should take your own advice counselor….because even when you are flat out wrong on different topics rather than “reconsider your views” you go back and twist things around….you comeback and say all kinds of gibberish and twist and turn….you do absolutely anything possible to make sure you are never wrong about anything rather than “reconsider” anything.
Even on topics where your knowledge is not that of others….you still do it and must have the last word even when wrong.
Maybe it’s the lawyer in you, I don’t know.
You are clearly an intelligent guy and I respect your service to our country.
I’ll leave it at that Law.
Better.
Oh wow, the useless peanut gallery has arrived.
Good stuff Danny, would you like me to take you to school in football, basketball? Both?
We can do that too….it will be fun.
I’m with you on that.
Perfectly happy to be in the Big 12, which has been our administration’s goal (and my personal preference) for many years now.
Glad we are not in the PAC or ACC, which have either collapsed or appear destined to collapse.
Would I LIKE for us to be in the SEC or B1G someday? Sure.
Do I think that it’s likely or even realistic…hmmmm…not really. Would love to see it, but the realist in me says it’s probably not going to happen, given the smallness of our brand and fan base, but if it doesn’t, then I won’t really be despondent about it.
I think we’ll be in a good position where we are for a good little while.
I don’t think I’m wrong on this, with all due respect, for the reasons I’ve posted…all of which are FACTUALLY based.
You can THINK I’m wrong all you want…but that doesn’t change any of the FACTS that I provided.
Facts are stubborn things.
As for you “not caring,”…if you truly “don’t care” what I have to say…then why do you apparently “care” enough to respond to my posts with regularity…sometimes in a rather confrontational sort of way (which is strange, because I don’t respond to your posts with a similar tone)?
If you “don’t care” what I have to say…then PROVE it by showing indifference and not responding.
How does one go AAU? is it volume of published work, quality?
It’s mostly based on research dollars, with an emphasis on biomedical research, and with an EXCLUSION of USDA funded agricultural research (it was the latter emphasis that got Nebraska kicked out of the AAU).
There are also a few other criteria such as undergraduate graduation rates, etc.
They are all published on the organization’s website.
Still though…there does appear to be some inconsistency there.
I can understand USF’s recent ascension…they do over $500 million in research per year, chiefly in the biomedical arena.
But I can’t understand how Oregon…which a research budget FAR LOWER than UH’s…remains a member.
Doesn’t seem fair.
One needs to ask the question though
When you haven’t won anything in 23 years …that means there is an entire generation of husker fans who have never seen a Nebraska championship of any kind
How many generations does it take before the fandom falls away? Or at least decreases substantially
Rice filled a 70k seat stadium back in the 60s. Now they can’t attract 20
The alarm bells for Nebraska clearly haven’t gone off yet but eventually they might
Eventually coming back to the big12 might look good
In Nebraska, who else is there for them to root for?
It’s a fair question. I’m not sure how many decades of futility it’ll take.
But remember…Rutgers has absolutely SUCKED for most of my life and they still averaged about 52K per game last year.
As for Nebraska…as I said…you’d have to go back FOUR presidential administrations to find their last football conference title.
Yet they still averaged HUGE attendance last year.
On Pollard’s argument about “who you play.”
Nebraska played Division I-FCS North Dakota at home last season.
You know what their attendance was for that I-FCS opponent?
Over 86,000!!!
Hell, even in some of our best seasons, we’d be lucky to get 25-30K for that game.
So you see…it isn’t as much about who you play as some people think. It’s a factor, for sure. I don’t deny that. There’s a reason we will sell out the UT game next season, but may have a tougher time for the rest. Were we in the SEC, we could count on home sellouts for LSU, and/or UT, and/or OU, and/or aTm every year (we might not get quite the same crowds for B1G teams and other SEC teams though). Granted, many of the people in the stands wouldn’t be cheering for UH, but the point is the same.
But we aren’t the kind of LARGE brand that can do what Nebraska does attendance wise, that is to say, get 80K plus for every game…no matter how bad the team is…and no matter the opponent…with almost all of the fans in attendance being Nebraska fans.
That’s the difference between a “large” brand…and a not so large brand.
Given that, as @UHRedCat pointed out, they are literally the ONLY such brand in their state, and have no real in-state competition for the sports entertainment dollar…Nebraska’s brand position seems unassailable, and it seems like their brand size could persist throughout our lifetimes.
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