United Basketball Conference

[Bison_Kent]

WDAY in Fargo has reported that NDSU and SDSU, along with four other independents have agreed to a scheduling alliance. The new league will play games on Thursdays and Saturdays with women on the road when the men are at home.

Just guessing, I believe the other schools would be Utah Valley State, Longwood (VA), Texas-Pan American, and New Jersey Instintute of Technologies.

The league plans to play all their games in January and February to avoid the void of no games when other DI's are playing their conference slate.

[Rabbitlivinginverm]

Re: United Basketball Conference

That's good news for the interim.

[filbert]

Re: United Basketball Conference

That takes care of ten games of the schedule, anyway. Interesting that Savannah State and IPFW aren't in the mix. Personally I wonder if SSU isn't eventually going to drop back to D-II. And IPFW must think that this time they'll get into the Mid-Con or the Horizon.

[Bison_Kent]

Re: United Basketball Conference

I am not sure on the four other schools (besides NDSU and SDSU). I was just speculating. IPFW might be one of the six.

[filbert]

Re: United Basketball Conference

I suppose there will be an official announcement in the near future, now that the NCAA Convention is over.

For now, I'm not finding any announcement from anywhere on the Internet. I'm watching the WDAY-TV 10 pm news from last night but I also haven't (yet) heard anything about this.

[Rabbitden]

Re: United Basketball Conference

I think IPFW is the other school, not Longwood.

GO JACKS!

[filbert]

Re: United Basketball Alliance

Assuming that this is actually happening (i.e. waiting to see some confirmation somewhere), calling this group of colleges a "conference" is stretching things a bit. "Alliance" is probably a better term.

Reason is: according to the NCAA bylaws, in order to be a full D-I conference, you need to have seven members. (Of course, you need to have them for five/eight/thirteen years depending on how deeply you read the bylaws before falling asleep, but that's another problem).

This "alliance" only has six, so it's stretching the term to call it a "conference" -- even assuming that it will have any kind of life expectancy. It might just manage to hold onto life as an entry-level-scheduling-alliance/conference of last resort for schools just moving into D-I. It won't have and probably will never have an NCAA tournament auto-bid.

[HoboD]

Re: United Basketball Conference

Filbert, you are right, but this could be a useful tool for schools in the transition phase, with each of the schools meeting each spring and "signing up" for the following year. The understanding is/would be that it is just pass through alliance (I like league) and that all the members are ultimately looking for conference affiliation.
AND there should be a "championship" for winning the round robin.

[Jacks99]

Re: United Basketball Conference

AND there should be a "championship" for winning the round robin.  

I agree, even if it's not recognized by the NCAA.

[RodentiaX]

Re: United Basketball Conference

AND there should be a "championship" for winning the round robin.

Agreed. All it costs is the cost of a trophy. Never underestimate the motivational power of some wood and metal. ;D

Making it a conference would have the advantage of allowing a post-season tournament, even if it is never going to get an autobid. Think of it like your first apartment, you probably didn't want to stay there forever anyway.

[filbert]

Re: United Basketball Conference

Agreed. All it costs is the cost of a trophy. Never underestimate the motivational power of some wood and metal. ;D

Making it a conference would have the advantage of allowing a post-season tournament, even if it is never going to get an autobid. Think of it like your first apartment, you probably didn't want to stay there forever anyway.

I don't at the moment have the inclination to pour through the D-I Bylaws to figure out whether or not a conference championship tournament held by a non-NCAA-recognized conference would be allowed to count as only a single game against the season limit of 28 like NCAA-recognized conference tournaments are. So unless someone else wants to, that will remain an open question.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for the scheduling alliance until we get into a real conference. If there's hardware to be won at the end of the season, all the better.

But I'd feel better if I saw a release from one of the proposed participant schools.

[Jacks99]

Re: United Basketball Conference

See the "Attendance Up- Argus Story 1/11/2005" story/thread for the proof that they are at least working on this "alliance".

[filbert]

Re: United Basketball Conference

See the "Attendance Up- Argus Story 1/11/2005" story/thread for the proof that they are at least working on this "alliance".

I have no doubt that some of the independent D-I schools are working together on coordinating schedules--that almost goes without saying.

What I'm waiting to see is some announcement of something a bit more formal than that. Something that, if not an official NCAA "conference," would at least have most of the trappings of a conference--a championship, weekly stats/player-of-the-week awards, web site, etc.

I imagine if such a thing is in the works, it takes a while to get organized. I'd like to see it happen.

[89rabbit]

Re: United Basketball Conference

Highlights from the Forum (sub. site but it is free):

http://www.in-forum.com/articles/ind...Jeff%20Kolpack

Don’t get too cozy with UBC

Jeff Kolpack, The Forum
Published Friday, January 13, 2006

The UBC will never be confused with the ACC, we know that. So, North Dakota State fans, don’t go buying United Basketball Conference apparel unless you believe it will be some sort of collector’s item some day.

The Bison are one of six schools that will comprise the UBC, a group of programs that huddled up last weekend at the NCAA convention to try and put some teeth into a plan that was started almost a year ago.

At this point, here’s all you need to know: Division I independents NDSU, South Dakota State, Texas-Pan American, Indiana Purdue-Fort Wayne, Utah Valley State and New Jersey Institute of Technology are forming a men’s and women’s league in most sports.

All six are still trying to find other leagues to join so, really, this conference is more of a scheduling alliance than anything.

It is not starting the clock to petition the NCAA for automatic qualifier status and maybe it never will. This group would have to wait 13 years before it would be eligible. . . .

“Whether we’ll be fully recognized as a conference, I don’t know,” Taylor said. “But you have to start somewhere.”

In basketball, the UBC’s redeeming value is consistent scheduling in January and February, when everybody else is in the middle of their conference seasons. Each school will have games every Thursday and Saturday. . . .

Maybe being part of the UBC will make NDSU more appealing to the Mid-Continent Conference. NDSU is in a homeless situation, so the school has to scrap, beg and work for everything it can get.

History shows that all decent Division I programs eventually land in a league. When the independents started talking about this alliance last March, there were nine schools at the table.

But Northern Colorado joined the Big Sky Conference, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi got into the Southland Conference and Longwood University (Va.) decided it couldn’t afford the UBC.

That has to be a comforting thought for Longwood boosters: your school can’t afford the six-team UBC.

NDSU can only hope the UBC isn’t a long-term solution.

If the Mid-Con or Big Sky comes calling in the next two years, the only UBC around here will be the United Building Centers in Detroit Lakes.



Go State! ;D

[filbert]

Re: United Basketball Conference

Money quote of the Kolpack article:

That has to be a comforting thought for Longwood boosters: your school can’t afford the six-team UBC.