Their fans might not want it. But we know fans are no longer the driving factor. They certainly werent the driving factor in this expansion (or the expansion that added us, or the expansion that added Penn State for that matter.)
TV drives the bus, and this expansion makes it clear that its about adding more marquee matchups. At some point Fox and ESPN are gonna say - you know - if we cut this whole thing down to 32 (or 40 or whatever) teams, we would have marquee matchups almost every week and we could charge alot more for ads and you would then make a ton more money.
The fans mention is more of a throwaway statement in there in there but an admin isn't going to want a once name brand program be turned into an also ran or worse. It somewhat matters though because if they turn into that or worse than fan support and popularity can wane over the longer term. Not everyone has such a loyal base as Nebraska, including blue bloods.
Of course tv drives the bus and I've always said that. They influence everything from who plays where and when and who gets in and who doesn't. You pay billions of dollars, you're gonna have a lot of control in shaping how things look.
The only place I'd stop is I think it's going to cement as a P2, not a P1 like where others think it's heading. At one time 4 16 power conferences were all the rage and now what's happened to that theory. Now all the rage seems to be the road to a P1 and I don't see that for reasons I've given in a couple threads. No blue blood wants to turn into a loser. Plus as a P2, all the brands in those conferences are gong to make an immense amount of money there's no real motivation to leave a P2 to form a P1.
I've said before that almost all the moves in realignment come out of necessity and fear of being left behind and worry over big financial disparities. That was true when Miami, VT, BC left all the way up to now with USC/UCLA leaving. I don't think that dynamic exists with a P2. The B10/SEC are both going to make tons of money and have very good access to any playoff and shape how it looks. Like I've said with every realignment move, there's inertia there and schools don't really want to move. They feel they have to out of necessity because of the factors I mentioned above. I don't think those factors exist in a P2 and so I don't know that the inertia will be overcome in a P2 setting.
edit: should also add regarding marquee matchups...if some of these blue bloods turn into blue dregs because everyone can't be a winner, a marquee matchup of today doesn't mean a marquee matchup of tomorrow.
You know thinking about it without doing the math, I wonder if you might not even get more marquee matchups keeping schools like us and others around because all the brand programs can remain blue bloods instead of turning into blue dregs. You’ll in turn have more marquee matchups as opposed to losing some marquee names that sink to the bottom if you only have brand names.
