SEC reportedly eyeing UNC and Duke
With Louisville joining the ACC this morning, conference realignment has basically become a big game of musical chairs. The Sporting News’ Matt Hayes has an article out this morning discussing the tenuous conference realignment landscape, in which he cites a source that says the SEC has been after Duke and North Carolina for “at least three years”:
The dismantling of the ACC and strengthening of the Big Four is coming. The only things that can stop it are high-priced lawyers.
“We’d be absolutely foolish to not watch Maryland,” one FSU official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told Sporting News. “If or when they get out of (the $50 million buyout), everything changes. It’s almost like free agency.”
If that’s true, Maryland is the Curt Flood of college football. And it could lead to the one remaining mega move still out there: Florida State and Clemson to the Big 12.
If that happens, the two crown jewels of the ACC become available. Duke and North Carolina, which an ACC source said have been chased by the SEC for “the last three years,” will choose between the Big Ten and the SEC.
For those who don’t think this is serious, consider this: The ACC announced Tuesday it had filed suit against Maryland to force the university to pay the full $50 million exit fee. Maryland and Florida State were the only two ACC schools to vote against the league’s $50 million buyout fee.
Duke and North Carolina in the SEC?! I think my mind just exploded.
76 Comments for SEC reportedly eyeing UNC and Duke
I can’t handle this.
I think it would be a very smart move. Make the SEC tops in both sports.
Sounds like ol’Cal is prophetic again… super 4 conferences is coming and the NCAA unable to control them.
I would LOVE to play Duke and UNC every year home and home.
wow. just think about dook/unc playing in places like mississippi and bama
Louisville hasn’t even rented a moving truck yet and already the neighbors are fleeing. They must have googled the KSR pictures from Louisville hate day.
So in two sports, the two dominant College sports, Football and Men’s basketball, the SEC Championship would be the NATIONAL Championship?
That would be way kewl….
I think all of this conference realingment sucks ass!!
6- lolz
I can see UNC coming, but why Duke?
Rumors and wishful thinking! Lol whatever makes you feel better
I think it would be nice to see the over privileged white kids get knocked around
in Starksville and Baton Rogue. I don’t like the idea of sharing a conference with them
just because they are elitist assholes, but the SEC would stand a solid shot
at taking over the world if this happened.
I say go get ’em! then SEC would have football and bball national champs locked down for years! hey, tom “squidward” crean, put that in your pipe and smoke it your barbershop quartet pants!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I won’t believe it until it happens because everyone’s always said this is all about football. But it would be insane. If you add 2 more of the top 5 programs in basketball, it’d be amazing.
It’d also really mess with that super tournament being planned in a few years.
John Calipari for President. How long ago did he call this?
Gonna be really funny when UofL is sitting alone in “the New Big East,” aka the acc.
Whatever conference Louisville joins it falls apart. If the ACC loses these 2 schools it doesn’t have the prestige anymore.
That would be impressive if they made that happen.
Dumb on their part, both schools are academically superior to the majority of the schools in the SEC. The Big “10” is a much better fit. Duke is a basketball school getting better at football but could possibly contend in another major conference. UNC is an all around great school and would be an awesome addition for anyone.
I think Kneel needs to read the paper a little more instead of smoking it.
VT to SEC
UNC to SEC
DUKE to B1G
ND or GT to B1G
FSU to BIG12
GT or CLEMSON to BIG12
rick pitino continues to use awkward “leave your wife” comments.
That makes the acc the new big east.
Apparently, this person just got home from a 20 year prison stint. UNC all around great school? “Academically superior to the majority of the schools in the SEC”? Where has this person been? Amazing.
Dont forget if KSR is reporting it its going to happen
#18-Call me one of the uneducated, unwashed masses if you will, but do you think this proposed realignment is based on academics?
Makes me sick
This will make Vanneti cry.
24-if uofl were at least a top 150 academic school (let alone top 100) they couldve gotten a serious look from big12. if uofl were a top 50 academic school they’d already be in acc or big12
Anyone else think it is more likely that we will end up poaching NC State and VaTech?
19 & 22) I’m sure you will find this WORLD ranking quite interesting.
http://www.thebestschools.org/blog/2011/08/11/the-100-academically-best-universities-in-the-world/
Take a close look at 35 & 41. The only two really good schools in the SEC are Vandy and UF academically.
24) You are correct, sir. If academics had anything to do with realignment, then Louisville would not be voted into the ACC. Because Louisville is for dumbasses.
so if maryland has to pay $50mil exit and then the conference dies sometime later anyway, who gets the $50mil.
@ #29…
Give them a break…most of these cats (no pun intended) don’t realize how piss poor their own school ranks in regards to other SEC institutions much less the entire globe. Lets see the bottom half of the SEC academically goes like this Mississippi State, Ole Miss, LSU, Arkansas, Kentucky….fine and suitable company.
This is a terrible post…UNC AD made a statement yesterday confirming they weren’t leaving the conference.
http://espn.go.com/college-sports/story/_/id/8683443/north-carolina-athletic-director-email-responds-realignment-rumors
What the hell does Duke bring to the table, other than basketball, take UNC corner the Carolina market and get VT and call it a day, seeing Duke in the SEC is like seeing the hot chick in high school get pregnant, it would be a complete waste
If that happened dickey v would live in the SEC. Just bye him a camper and you would have game day dickey v style lol
Screw UNC & Duke! Give me NCSt. & VTech & call it a day long & twice on SUN!!!
32 I do believe UK ranks above UofL in academics
29-not saying that list is wrong but:
–northwestern is the 5th best academic school in big10?
–brown (ivy league school) is in between tOSU and UF academically?
–duke is only one spot better than texas?
–arizona/arizona state both made top 80 (in the world)?
29 was that ranking before the fake classes were discovered or after?
29) That is easily the worst list I’ve ever seen. I could make a better one in my sleep seeing as I actually follow the statistics(ie student performance, acceptance rate, yield, SAT score) of the best colleges. Cornell is easily the worst of the Ivy’s and Yale is a top 5 school in the world, better than Columbia. They seem to be looking for diversity in their rankings, putting the best public university (Berkley) second. Berkley, while the best public school, isn’t even close to the top 10 in the world. I’m legitimately laughing at the fact that U of Wisconsin is top 15 and Brown is 65th.
Duke, UNC, UVA and BC to Big 10 for sure. Va Tech and NC State to SEC. Clemson, FSU to Big 12. ACC becomes the Old Big East.
I cannot even describe how bad I hate this.
My real point is that UNC is a really good school academically, much better than most of the SEC. There are thousands of lists buy anyone remotely educated/informed knows that UNC is a better school than Ole Miss, Miss St, Arkansas, Alabama, Auburn, Mizzou, UGA, Kentucky, USC, Tennessee…
UNC, Duke, UVA and Boston College are 4 of the best schools academically period. Boston is a huge TV market too.
NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!NO! NO! NO! HELL NO!
UNC is great for academics, they give out free A’s if you’re an athlete.
Some fail in the thread, Northwestern is the best academic school in the Big Ten.
Kentucky is ranked 10th out of the 14 SEC teams in academics. Only Arkansas, LSU, Mississippi St. and Ole Miss are worse. All that said Louisville is still ranked extremely low and is worse than Kentucky.
Only Notre Dame competes with Duke in academics in the ACC, UNC is quite a ways down past the Dukes, Vanderbilts, Notre Dames of the world.
I like it. There will be only four AAU schools in the ACC when Maryland leaves (UNC, Duke, Georgia Tech and Virginia.) There are currently four AAU schools in the SEC (Fla, Mizzou, TAMU and Vandy) If UNC and Duke come to the SEC the conference would have six AAU teams….Not to mention the fact that realignment has nothing to do with academics.
#44 in Baastan maybe .Who the %$#& wants to go to Baastan
This is just like you guys! Like really? this will never happen. The only reason it’s a story on this site is to try and down play Louisville going to the ACC today. come on guys, who cares about Louisville. Report some more about UK!!!!!!
This site keeps getting worse!
this is so much fun. When its all said and done UofL will be left with away and away games with Tulane and E.Carolina Haaaaaaaaa!!!!!
#33: How many statements just like this have you seen in the last 2 years?
I think the SEC adds Virginia Tech or Virginia along with NC State within the next year.
I would love to have Florida State and Clemson, but you know.
ACC is about to implode. Getting Louisville as a last ditch effort to save the conference is not a good sign!!!!
Potentially two more wins in football.
49-maybe, but why is the acc adding uofl AND have a $50 exit fee, yet the big12 is staying at 10 schools?
–acc is worried. replacing maryland with UofL is not good. FSU or VT or UNC can all make more $$ in SEC/big10/big12.
@35 Dickey V already lives in the SEC. He is from Florida. 🙂
#uck Duke….wouldn’t mind UNC being in the SEC…I’d rather have FSU and UNC….that’d be nice….
I was surprised that the most recent SEC additions didn’t include a North Carolina school. If it’s all about TV markets, any school in NC would have been more desirable than Missouri, which has less population. But maybe the SEC has tried but hasn’t been able to get it done. East Carolina would be another option; 2nd biggest school in the state enrollment wise. Not much prestige but neither was SC when they joined.
Conferences really are like neighborhoods. When the thugs move in, the people with the resources to move get the hell out before the property value plummets. Louisville is going to make the ACC’s property value plummet.
i love the long standing tradition of inter-conference rivalries. hate to see the mixing of college basketball’s historical teams into the melting pot of “where’s the money?” change is the only constant, but you don’t always have to buy in.
We get two passionate fan bases to add to the fold in a new TV market and it adds two more basketball schools to increase attendance numbers when they go on the road to places that don’t traditionally draw any crowds for basketball.
My wish is for North Carolina to join the conference and idk who else but somehow the Miss. schools leave…Ugh…Duke being in would bring the SEC down because 2 private schools aint a good idea but def get Carolina in.
UNC is a great school for the most part, they just commit academic fraud to get their football and basketball players eligible bc their school is so tough. The regular student body is a very elite group academically.
“but somehow the Miss. schools leave”
Careful what you wish for there kiddo…if a poll were put out to the original 12 members (the newest two haven’t been here long enough) to get rid of Ole Miss, Mississippi State, or Kentucky I’m pretty sure UK would win that vote by 60%+. The heart and soul of the SEC is based in the deep South–getting rid of either of those two would likely be considered blasphemy.
Before you mention, “well what about basketball???” No one else in our conference cares…
If the Duke-UNC combo is legitimately on the table, make no mistake that the addition of Duke is simple to attract UNC to come. Because my guess is that UNC doesn’t go anywhere unless Duke comes with.
I agree with #52 … FSU and Clemson makes the most sense from the perspective of the SEC fan. But it’s all about geographical regions for TV. Yuch.
I news to watch Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer again. I could swear I saw a cardinal with teeth on the Island of Misfit Toys. Looks like Santa dropped it off somewhere on Tobacco Road.
Dear NCAA,
If you wish to speak with us please leave a message and we will get back with you if we so choose.
However, if I were you I would be getting moving trucks and auctioneers lined up because we won’t be calling you back….you bunch of bumbling,. self-serving elitest.
Oh! And did I mention corrupt and agenda driven.
Have a good day !
We saw LaMont and Fred using a garbage truck to move in our new neighbor. Anyone know where we can get a FSBO sign? 50 million to leave this dump is a small price to pay.
From Wiki…Duke and NC have protested adding LUVUHL to the ACC. They cite the conflict that exists between moonshiners and meth labs. They fear the loss of revenue when the flat bills and line beards start parking their shopping carts in the tailgate sections. ACC schools do not accept Big Buford wrappers as lawful entry into football games.
If N.C. and Duke were not already basketball schools, they will find out in about 2 years that is all they ever will be, after being thrown into the S.E.C. football chain saw.
If FSU, Clemson or Ga Tech bolts for the BigXII. The SEC would be dumb not to offer UNC/Duke/VA Tech. If it takes accepting Duke to get UNC do it. The TV package deal would be astronomical. However, I think FSU, Clemson and Ga Tech would be stupid to go to the Big XII. It is controled by Texas. Texas will tell them what to do and when to do it. Thats why Mizzu and T A&M are in the SEC.
It makes the most sense that Duke and NC will join the Big 10 since they are both members of the AAU. It also seems to make sense that Fla.St. and Va.Tech would fit in the SEC and Clemson and Ga.TEch to the Big 12. Where does that leave UL? Right back where they started with the Big East. The ACC had no choice but invite UL, who was left, Connecticut? Enjoy the ACC UL, while it lasts.
Haters really going to hate. Why is it so hard to say good job? You really fhink that if you were not in the SEC that they would let you in? You are a good basketball school in a crap bball concerence and a crap football school in a good football conference. And funny you want to talk how bad the ACC is yet you went there for your football coach.
This is why UK is hated, the fans.
This is the reason why I hardly ever visit this website!! It’s like watching the fake news channel Lmao!
Duke and NC in the SEC will NEVER happen, The UK administration would fight that to the death. NO WAY does UK want to face them in a conference because they are use to dominating the Bunny League that is SEC basketball!! With Duke and NC in the mix UK would go to 3rd fiddle!!
74 bazinga!
Brian, any conference additions to the SEC will be because of football TV contracts. So no one else is going to give a damn if the UK administration is worried about losing their dominance in basketball. Everyone else in the league would understand the move would be a revenue enhancer.