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Goodbye WCC?


During "The Mark Few Show" of December 2nd, Coach Few's answer to a fan question caught my attention:

The question - What are your thoughts of University of the Pacific joining the West Coast Conference?

I jotted down the response the best I could, but there may be some paraphrasing here...

Coach Few: "...If and when it happens, you know, it'll just be another tough out in the WCC, but who knows...I think the message I take out of this is, Gonzaga, we need to be ready and willing and nobody really knows where this is going to lead, the end product, whether we end up with some sort of BCS situation in basketball like we have in football or we continue to have 340-350 division 1 schools that are all available and viable to go to the NCAA tournament. If you talk to a lot of people at the traditional final 4 type schools, they think we're heading the direction of a BCS type situation - you know, not just football schools, but the top schools will break off - it's going to be interesting, it's interesting times right now - you start seeing Maryland leave the ACC, Syracuse leave the Big East, you know, you could have never guessed in a million years that happens...I think it would be naive and ignorant on our part to sit here and think it's not going to affect us someday, so, we got to be ready to do what's best for Gonzaga."

Then this morning from Andy Katz at ESPN:

1. While the Big East's seven non-FBS basketball schools are deciding what course of action to take next, there is one school that would love to be a part of any new conference or conglomerate: Gonzaga. Sources say the Zags would love to part with the West Coast Conference and be a member of a national, branded basketball conference. The theory is that if Boise State and San Diego State can be in the Big East for football, then why couldn’t Gonzaga in a basketball version? Of course, the easy response is that football is played once a week and there is usually a maximum of four or five league road games. Still, the Zags are looking out for themselves and would like to be positioned with fellow national Catholic-based schools instead of regional ones in the WCC. Gonzaga might not have a choice, but is starting to be a bit more proactive if an opportunity arises.

I do not follow College Football, and since it's driving the Conference realignment, I haven't paid attention. I thought the "BCS" concept was about arriving at a football national championship without a playoff system. Why would College Basketball change - the NCAA Basketball Tournament is pure, right? Wait...bring in the power and influence of the RPI and suddenly the season and schedule take on a different appearance.

I'm interested in hearing different perspectives...what is going on here?!

This post does not reflect the views of the blog authors or SB Nation.

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