2025-26 Around The Valley

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bigsportsfan said:
www.si.com

How Illinois State Men’s Basketball Bucked the Transfer Portal Trend

Power programs often lure up-and-comers in the mid-majors with NIL offers and greater exposure, but the Redbirds’ stars chose a different path.
www.si.com www.si.com
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Cool to see kids stay at a school and try to build something. With that said, I hope ILSU absolutely shits the bed. Something about that program just bugs me. I’m not convinced Pedon is capable of navigating a 20 game conference schedule and in all honesty if the redturds don’t finish in the top 2, his seat might be heating up.
 

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Part of me wants two private and one public to maintain the balance, the other part of me just wants us to bite the bullet and make NDSU, SDSU, and Youngstown State full members.

Some combination of St Thomas, Omaha, Milwaukee, and NKU wouldn't be bad either. Hard pass on Oral Roberts.
 
If 14 is true, gut reaction is I'd like top 5 teams to have Thursday bye. Teams 6-11 to play on Thursday. Bottom 3 teams not qualify for Arch Madness.

Might be many ways to slice it, but I like idea of 5 teams earning the bye, & don't want the tourney to start on Wednesday.
 

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RunSyc said:
If 14 is true, gut reaction is I'd like top 5 teams to have Thursday bye. Teams 6-11 to play on Thursday. Bottom 3 teams not qualify for Arch Madness.

Might be many ways to slice it, but I like idea of 5 teams earning the bye, & don't want the tourney to start on Wednesday.
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What about teams 11 and 12 hosting teams 13 and 14 on campus on Tuesday, and then Arch Madness proper starts Thursday? I say Tues because I think Wed-Thurs doesn't leave enough travel time.
 
MovingScreenOfDeath said:
Part of me wants two private and one public to maintain the balance, the other part of me just wants us to bite the bullet and make NDSU, SDSU, and Youngstown State full members.

Some combination of St Thomas, Omaha, Milwaukee, and NKU wouldn't be bad either. Hard pass on Oral Roberts.
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Why the O.R. hate. I've seen posts like that before. They tend to have respectable basketball and I think they have pretty good baseball.
 
IndyTreeFan said:
No schools without football. No privates. No UMKC or Omaha.

I know, I live in a fantasy world...
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I was curious what this FCS list looks like.. it's not very good.. not counting the Summit League MVFC schools

Austin Peay (14-19 basketball, 45-14 baseball)
Central Arkansas
Chattanooga (29-9 basketball, no baseball)
ETSU (19-13 basketball, 41-17 baseball)
Eastern Illinois
Eastern Kentucky
Morehead State
SEMO (21-12 basketball, 30-25 baseball)
UT Martin
Western Illinois
Youngstown State

Austin Peay, Chattanooga, ETSU, and SEMO are the only schools I would consider out of that list. Austin Peay only for the baseball.
 

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Dymotic said:
I was curious what this FCS list looks like.. it's not very good.. not counting the Summit League MVFC schools

Austin Peay (14-19 basketball, 45-14 baseball)
Central Arkansas
Chattanooga (29-9 basketball, no baseball)
ETSU (19-13 basketball, 41-17 baseball)
Eastern Illinois
Eastern Kentucky
Morehead State
SEMO (21-12 basketball, 30-25 baseball)
UT Martin
Western Illinois
Youngstown State

Austin Peay, Chattanooga, ETSU, and SEMO are the only schools I would consider out of that list. Austin Peay only for the baseball.
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None of these trip my trigger!!☹️
 
Dymotic said:
Austin Peay, Chattanooga, ETSU, and SEMO are the only schools I would consider out of that list. Austin Peay only for the baseball.
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Austin Peay is part of the big new ASUN/WAC merger into the UAC, they're not leaving that. Same boat for Central Arkansas and Eastern Kentucky. Chattanooga and ETSU aren't going to give up all of their cheap regional travel in the SoCon to fly to Iowa in the middle of winter. SEMO would be okay but we're already 6 to 5 in favor of publics, we need another private member like St Thomas/Bellarmine/Detroit Mercy to keep balanced.
 
Not a fan of going to 14 but if we do here are my adds:
Green Light:
St Thomas & Milwaukee as a package deal. I'm starting to change my tune a bit and think that St. Thomas would be a good add. Grabbing these two schools would get us in the upper midwest, but also relatively close to the current MVC footprint - which I don't think is a bad place to add and also get 2 pretty good markets into the MVC (I hate "market" adds for the sake of markets but if they check off other boxes I'm all for it). as a package deal these 2 just make sense now. I also believe that Drake becoming the premier program in the MVC plays a role as the recent shift of the conference going southeast hasn't been the best for the Drake and UNI, this add helps them out.
Northern Kentucky: If you add St. Thomas & Milwaukee going southeast and grabbing a solid mid-major in a basketball crazy state makes a ton of sense to round the MVC at 14. In a perfect world, these are the 3 most realistic adds I could imagine that would add some value.

Yellow Light:
Wright State: I believe financial woes have kept them out of the MVC, but they do tend to fit the current MVC make up; especially the current public schools in the MVC.
Morehead State: see Wright State.
SEMO: I'm going to need a little bit more convincing on this one, but I don't think they would be the worst add we could make? could they?

Red Light:
SIUE - Are they even in the discussion?
The Dakotas - Do they have solid athletics? yes. Are they in unique markets that they essentially have monopolies on? yes. But the Dakotas just ARE NOT a culture fit to the MVC. The same reason why Kentucky would never go B10, they just do not fit culturally with northern states and identify with the south.
Omaha - Just don't. This would be a nightmare add. This is Valpo 2.0
Kansas City - with the recent name change it sounds like a better add than UMKC but they are still UMKC. This again would be a horrible add and I'm not sure going west is in the MVCs best interest at this point.

Intriguing schools:
Chattanooga - not sure if they would have any interest at all, but I'd have a conversation with them
Austin Peay - not the best add but it could be worse
 

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treeman said:
Not a fan of going to 14 but if we do here are my adds:
Green Light:
St Thomas & Milwaukee as a package deal. I'm starting to change my tune a bit and think that St. Thomas would be a good add. Grabbing these two schools would get us in the upper midwest, but also relatively close to the current MVC footprint - which I don't think is a bad place to add and also get 2 pretty good markets into the MVC (I hate "market" adds for the sake of markets but if they check off other boxes I'm all for it). as a package deal these 2 just make sense now. I also believe that Drake becoming the premier program in the MVC plays a role as the recent shift of the conference going southeast hasn't been the best for the Drake and UNI, this add helps them out.
Northern Kentucky: If you add St. Thomas & Milwaukee going southeast and grabbing a solid mid-major in a basketball crazy state makes a ton of sense to round the MVC at 14. In a perfect world, these are the 3 most realistic adds I could imagine that would add some value.

Yellow Light:
Wright State: I believe financial woes have kept them out of the MVC, but they do tend to fit the current MVC make up; especially the current public schools in the MVC.
Morehead State: see Wright State.
SEMO: I'm going to need a little bit more convincing on this one, but I don't think they would be the worst add we could make? could they?

Red Light:
SIUE - Are they even in the discussion?
The Dakotas - Do they have solid athletics? yes. Are they in unique markets that they essentially have monopolies on? yes. But the Dakotas just ARE NOT a culture fit to the MVC. The same reason why Kentucky would never go B10, they just do not fit culturally with northern states and identify with the south.
Omaha - Just don't. This would be a nightmare add. This is Valpo 2.0
Kansas City - with the recent name change it sounds like a better add than UMKC but they are still UMKC. This again would be a horrible add and I'm not sure going west is in the MVCs best interest at this point.

Intriguing schools:
Chattanooga - not sure if they would have any interest at all, but I'd have a conversation with them
Austin Peay - not the best add but it could be worse
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Northern Kentucky, Wright State, and Chattanooga would be my adds. Why add another private school who is just going to use the MVC to get into the A-10?
 
I've still seen ZERO leadership out of the new commissioner on his long term vision for the conference. So we're likely getting 3 more non-football privates.
 
Jason Svoboda said:
I've still seen ZERO leadership out of the new commissioner on his long term vision for the conference. So we're likely getting 3 more non-football privates.
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Interesting. What makes you say 0 leadership? I also think at least one of the 3 schools will have to have baseball.
 
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