College football realignment: Dissecting that Notre Dame-Stanford conference proposal

The Atlantic Coast Conference is doing due diligence on the potential addition of two schools that sit an average of 18.5 miles from the Pacific Ocean. This means we’ve clearly entered the No Bad Ideas phase of conference realignment brainstorming.

Yes, just now it’s reached the Bad Ideas phase.  Not when USC and UCLA decided to join the same conference as Rutgers, but only now it did.  OK.

If Swarbrick and Notre Dame’s leadership were truly serious about helping out the aforementioned world-class academic institutions, they could. They could form a conference of their own.

Here’s the thing, Andy – Notre Dame has helped out Stanford and Cal by going to bat for them in the ACC.  Would it be better if Notre Dame sat back and didn’t go to bat for the two at all?

Sure they can do more but they can also do a lot less than they have.  Without Jack Swarbrick going to bat for them then Stanford and Cal would have no shot whatsoever of gaining entry to the ACC.  They still seemingly hardly have one but their chance of getting in a big-time conference at least still has some life because of Notre Dame’s actions.

Staples proposed conference would be Notre Dame, Cal, Stanford, Army, Navy, and Air Force.

This would put historic rivalries Notre Dame-Stanford and Notre Dame-Navy under the same umbrella. It would include the Army-Navy game, which is a massive television property. It would include the other games that decide the Commander-in-Chief’s trophy. And — this is the part that should appeal to the people in charge in South Bend — it would bundle six of the nation’s most selective academic institutions into one unit.

You do this Andy and it’s a death certificate for Notre Dame going forward.  For good measure why not invite Northwestern, Duke, and Vanderbilt too, right?

Georgia Tech perhaps, too?

Yes, it would provide that.  What it would also provide is brutal football compared to the actual power conferences that exist.  Yeah, Notre Dame brings value on that front and Stanford and Cal historically are better than the likes of Duke and Northwestern (usually) but they’re not exactly powerhouses, either.

This would be comparable to what the Big East was in basketball after everyone left about a decade ago – just worse.

This would be Notre Dame joining a football conference on its own terms by making its own. It could be football-only, allowing the schools to play more sensible regional schedules in their other sports.

That doesn’t make it any better, Andy.  Notre Dame doesn’t want to join a conference.  They don’t want to be forced into a conference.  They don’t want to go create their own conference.

I’ll say it again just to make it clear for you (and a few of my colleagues here on the College Wire sites):

Notre Dame has no interest in joining a conference for football.

Meanwhile, the Irish probably could up their share — which could be significantly more than the others because they are the main draw — by forcing NBC to bid against CBS and ESPN/ABC, all of which would want the Irish on their networks.

Have a deal and relationship with NBC that has gone on for over 30-years and you want to go and try roughing up those feathers, right as Pete Bevacqua is leaving NBC Sports to become Notre Dame’s athletic director.  Seems like a flawed idea.

Notre Dame could still play USC every year and would have six other schedule slots to play with. Would SEC and non-USC Big Ten schools still schedule the Irish? Absolutely. They guarantee a full stadium and a big TV rating.

Or they could play USC, Stanford, and Navy every year and continue to have 9 games to fill besides them (4 after the current ACC agreement).  Andy is right here that they’d still be able to schedule big-time opponents out of conference, sure.  They’d also turn themselves into the Gonzaga of college football where they’re the giant fish in a small conference pond.

So what’s in this for Notre Dame? Nothing, really. And that’s why it would never happen.

As you can tell from the national response to Notre Dame pitching for Stanford and Cal to join the ACC there is nothing in it for them there, either.  Yet they did it in an effort to try and do the right thing – unlike seemingly the rest of this sport.

This is just another example of why you should never listen to what the people in charge of college sports say. You should only watch what they do.

I did watch and I saw Notre Dame do more to try and help Stanford and Cal than literally any other college or university in the nation since the fall of the Pac 12.

Sure, Swarbrick thinks it would be a tragedy if Cal and Stanford didn’t have a major conference home for their sports. So do most people who work in college sports. But Swarbrick and his associates in South Bend actually have the juice to fix what they have identified as a problem. Will they do that? No. They will choose the best path for Notre Dame — which is absolutely their right — and let the others fend for themselves.

Yeah you’re right Andy – Notre Dame should have just kept their mouths shut and not tried to help at all.   Or better yet – abandoned Stanford like almost the entire rest of their conference did.

See below for the best social media reaction to Staples’ piece

Nothing brings out bad takes from national writers like Notre Dame.

It’s interesting how people want to hold