The Future of BC

The Future of BC

For a university founded upon the tenets of Catholicism, Boston College sure seemed comfortable getting a divorce from the Big East.

Boston College’s decision to leave the Big East, a conference in which it was a founding member, for the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) has been scrutinized, criticized and analyzed in the intervening two year period since BC’s initial announcement. In deciding to leave the Big East for the Southern-dominated ACC, BC drove the final nail into what was once the nation’s greatest basketball conference, abandoned traditional rivalries with Providence, Notre Dame, Connecticut and Syracuse and made clear that the engine of college athletics is powered by football.

Since BC, Miami and Virginia Tech left the Big East for the ACC, the Big East has responded by raiding Conference USA, putting together a collection of hoops powerhouses that could rival the conference’s phenomenal success of the mid-1980’s and rearming itself in the battle for BCS dollars.

Whereas once conferences were dominated by natural geographic rivalries (Duke-UNC, BC-Providence), modern conferences are dominated by geographic spread. The ACC is not attracted to BC because it wants to have a Doug Flutie bobblehead night or thinks that Jerry York is just the guy to sell hockey to Clemson fans. Rather, the ACC (and the Big East following the loss of its three schools) is interested in increasing its geographic footprint. By adding BC, the ACC has a presence in several major television markets- Boston, the D.C. metro area, Atlanta, Miami and New York City by virtue of the large ACC alumni base in the tri-state area. It’s a fan base that literally stretches along the entire eastern seaboard.

The ACC’s decision to snap up BC is not a gamble on their part. In fact, adding BC is a coup for the ACC. The conference adds a major media market, a new 12-member power football conference and a big-money football conference championship game.

But joining the ACC is a major gamble for BC and the administration and athletic department are pushing the Eagles’ athletic future to the middle of the table. Recent success notwithstanding, the Eagles have never been a consistent national performer in football or basketball. But they suddenly face a conference schedule that will regularly feature three national football powerhouses (Miami, Florida State, Virginia Tech) and three national basketball monsters (Duke, North Carolina, Maryland). Add capable football performers like Virginia, Maryland and NC State and proven hoops’ schools Wake Forest, Georgia Tech and NC State and suddenly the Eagles’ schedule looks menacingly difficult.

Prior the reshuffling, one of the most glaring differences between the ACC and Big East was the quality of the competition at the bottom of the standings. The top-tier teams in both leagues were equally talented but BC feasted on the lowly Big East football and basketball teams from small, private Catholic colleges. Not exactly the most difficult of conference rivals.

The ACC is a whole different story, especially today. Consider the Wake Forest football team. The Demon Deacons are historically one of the worst teams in the ACC but have still managed to recently beat BC. In basketball, instead of playing woeful St. John’s or Georgetown, Al Skinner, Craig Smith and company will have to hope to get an easy game against dangerous Miami or Virginia Tech, both of whom have significantly upgraded their hoops’ programs since leaving the Big East.

But that doesn’t mean that the Eagles can’t compete- just that the Athletic Department (and Marketing, Alumni, Admissions and Development offices) will have to work twice as hard to keep up with conference rivals who have some inherent advantages over BC. In the end, ten critical issues may decide whether or not BC can survive (and maybe even thrive) in its new home.

5 Reasons for the Superfans to Feel Good About BC’s Future in the ACC

1. Endowment Money- Even though the Eagles have one of the ACC’s smallest undergraduate enrollments (approximately 9,000), BC and its loyal legion of Irish Brahmins have helped the BC administration boost its endowment to $1.2 billion, placing the Eagles behind only Duke ($2.8 billion) and Virginia ($2.1 billion) and in the same ballpark of North Carolina.

Rest assured, Superfans- the BC administration will use that money for a lot more than just scooping up the Archdiocese’s scraps. That existing money, the future fundraising booty that will come from high profile football and basketball games and millions more from the ACC’s BCS ties, will be funneled back into the athletic department’s coffers.

2. Craig Smith and Mathias Kiwanuka- For its inaugural ACC season, BC has two, legit Top-20 programs in football and basketball. As the new kid on the block, not only will the Eagles be under the microscope of every other ACC fan, but every ACC media member as well. Every game BC plays in basketball or football will feature television crews and newspaper reporters from below the Mason-Dixon Line. The increased national media coverage should help BC’s coaches attract more top recruits.

And as long as the Eagles don’t fall apart on the field or court, BC athletics earns instant credibility throughout the Southeast which is critical because it directly leads to reason #3.

3. Applications- Apparently, everyone wants to be a Superfan. For the 2,500 places in its freshman class, BC will receive approximately 22,000 applications. By comparison, North Carolina with a freshman population of over 4,000 receives 18,000 applicants. What does that have to do with Craig Smith and Mathias Kiwanuka?

The Northeast is getting old and frigid. The South is young and slutty. Way more kids are being born in the South which means way more high school students looking at colleges. And some of those kids are going to be standout athletes.

If BC can hold itself together in its first ACC season and perform to expectations, it should see an increase in its applications as more Southerners realize that BC has a lot to offer besides Mary Anne’s and mods. The increase in applications is a great thing for the athletic department because the more applications, the more selective the admissions department gets to be about who gets into BC and why. Though you can never really gauge how an admissions department will react to a coach’s request to let a player in, more valedictorians and 4.0 GPA’s should allow BC’s admissions department justify more borderline student-athletes. Though that is a very big should.

4. Media Coverage- Forget for a minute the BC football team’s nationally televised games against Florida State and Virginia Tech and consider the basketball team. A Top 15 program with games against Duke, North Carolina and Maryland. Dickie V. in Conte. ESPN’s national Wednesday night game. CBS’s Saturday afternoon game. The Eagles have rarely sniffed those rarified ratings’ air.

With more national exposure comes more potential BC applicants and more potential BC athletes. There is a reason Coach K. shills for American Express. While every other coach is sitting on his coach, Coach K. is in every recruit’s living room, night after night, after intolerable night.

5. Regional Recruiting Monopoly- Imagine being a basketball coach at North Carolina State, trying to recruit a big-time in-state talent. Not only do you have to compete with every other national power but you have to contend with three other major hoops’ programs- Duke, North Carolina and Wake Forest- all within a relatively easy drive of your campus.

BC, on the other hand, doesn’t run into another ACC school until it gets down to College Park. Don’t think that matters? A Duke, UNC, Georgia Tech, Clemson, NC State, Florida State, Wake Forest, Maryland, UVA or Virginia Tech coach can reasonably expect to drive to see a recruit in the Southeast. But if the recruit ends up being from New York City, Hartford or Boston, all of a sudden that recruiting trip requires an airline ticket and hotel room. In the grand scheme of things, even a powerhouse like Duke will have to decide where to allocate its resources: Do they send an assistant coach to see a Top-100 player at Worcester Academy or do they fly out to Texas to a see a consensus Top-10 player? Even Duke doesn’t have an endless recruiting budget.

Sure, BC will still be recruiting against the UConns and Syracuses but it can offer recruits something no other school in the Northeast can: the chance to compete on national television against the likes of Duke and North Carolina every season.

5 Reasons Why the Superfans Should Be Worried About the Move to the ACC

1. Lack of Regional Talent- Though BC should begin to do better in its regional recruiting; Chestnut Hill doesn’t exactly lie at the epicenter of the national high school recruiting scene. All those families moving out of Massachusetts need to settle somewhere. Booming populations in the South mean more high school athletes for the local schools to cherry-pick.

High school football is still stocked with loads of players from Florida and the Southeast where BC has a limited recruiting presence. High school hoops is not quite as regionally dominated but the number of native-born New England high school players making a major impact at the Division I level is small.

2. Academics- Only the NCAA could put together a collegiate sports environment where quality academic standards are actually a detriment to athletic success. BC is a very selective private university. In the ACC, only Duke and Wake Forest are comparable.

All three are small, private universities with enrollments under 10,000. But all three are competing against major public universities like North Carolina, Maryland and UVA with enrollments north of 15,000. And everyone is competing against less academically selective schools such as Florida State, NC State and Clemson.

In the Big East, BC was usually in line with the admissions’ policies of the other conference schools. Like BC, Notre Dame, Providence and Georgetown are all academically selective, private, Catholic institutions. Let’s just say that Bobby Bowden isn’t too worried about whether or not his recruits worked with Habitat for Humanity in high school.

The attitude of BC’s admissions department could go a long way to determining whether the Eagles are contending or just competing in the ACC.

3. Fans/Alumni Base- BC has two problems with its fan base. The first is a numbers’ game. With a smaller enrollment than most ACC schools, there are just fewer BC fans to go around. With tens of thousands fewer alumni, BC has to work harder to sell tickets to away games, bowl games and sometimes even home games. That just doesn’t happen at the other ACC schools.

Which leads us to BC’s second problem: the school’s northeastern demographic. College sports are just viewed differently in the South. Maybe it’s the region’s paucity of professional sports’ teams. Maybe it’s the lack of smaller, private colleges. Maybe it’s the tradition. Maybe it’s the weather. But the rest of the ACC schools have a major advantage over BC in terms of a fan base.

4. Location- “Hey, Mr. Blue Chip recruit, I know that you’re considering going to Miami because of the nightlife but have I told you about the scene in Lower Allston yet. And yes, it will be freezing for most of the school year but who wants to sit on the beach all day and check out supermodels when you can be walking uphill through the snow to get to your dorm.”

5. Travel- No more bus trips for the Eagles. Now every away game is really an away game. This isn’t as big a deal for the football team because with only one game a week, there is a fairly set schedule in terms of practice and schoolwork.

But the basketball team suddenly faces the prospect of a game in North Carolina on Wednesday night followed by an afternoon game in Florida on Saturday. Either the team flies back to school early Thursday morning and then flies back out again on Friday or the Eagles stay down south from Wednesday through the Saturday game. Neither option is all that appealing. Considering the lofty expectations for this season’s hoops squad, expect the Eagles to play a lot of Wednesday night road games for ESPN primetime. And don’t forget those Sunday night games on Fox. Nothing like a trip down to Blacksburg on a Sunday night.

In all likelihood, all ten issues will come into play as BC attempts to succeed and thrive in the ACC. But in the end, BC’s consistent success in its new league will depend on whether or not the Eagles can maximize all their positives while addressing some of the potential pitfalls that will come with competing in the ACC.

And if things don’t work out in the ACC for BC, the Eagles can always make the move to the NESCAC.

Jamie Chisholm