6 dollars for the three toll booths on 64/71 is the price you pay for moving up in the world.

BackNine wrote:  

However, to all the high-brow folks all over the country (even here) who constantly beat up WVU academics, give it a rest. If you want a good education, you can certainly get one there. Most educational experiences are what you the student make of it. Going to some place like Notre Dame doesn't ensure you of learning more or better info than going to WVU, ECU or Mt. Olive College for that matter. If you're inclined to learn - you will. And a school like WVU provides plenty of quality opportunity.

WVU in particular is a poor state with limited resources. Its to their benefit to educate as many people as they can in hopes of lifting the educational level of their overall population. Like most places, they need jobs in WVA (but worse). They need for their "achievers" to remain in-state instead of going elsewhere. As such, they have an open enrollment policy to help accomplish these goals. For the state of West Virginia this is a smart strategy and the right move. They aren't trying to be Harvard (nor are we for that matter). I just get irritated with all the snobs around who want to claim that only certain schools provide good academics - that someone all the others are unworthy somehow. Rubbish! That's an elitist attitude that sounds a lot like some other groups we know. Furthermore, its just not accurate.

I'm not sure who this is aimed at.  My point about the academics wasn't aimed at WV as a university.  With the massive slide that has happened at NC State in the national rankings since MAF left, we can ill afford to throw stones as we live in a glass house.  Mission #1 for our Chancellor should be improving this (and in conjunction our alumni giving).  

My point about academics was with respect to WV's move to the Big 12.  It was specifically about the impact of this type of travel schedule on the student athlete.  I think that term is laughable for the revenue sports (outside of the Ivy League), but a move like this only makes that term even more ridiculous.  

It is sadly even worse in the non-revenue sports that don't have chartered planes, have to play on week nights, etc..  That's where you find the true student athletes, who come into the school recognizing that there is not mythical pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, outside the degree.  WV tossed over the rest of the student athletes for a money grab in football.  I think that they do deserve to have their noses rubbed into it, particularly given they're now complaining about travel.

When people talk about leaving the ACC, I think that this is something they forget about.  Right now we can reasonably play GT, Clemson, UNC, Duke, Wake, Va Tech, UVA and MD with a fairly short bus ride.  Move to the SEC (and assume you do that with Va Tech) and you may have Va Tech and S. Carolina.  Move to the B1G and you've basically got MD.

RedLight wrote:

RowanWolf wrote: This is why I say that eventually these mega-conferences are going to implode. One day, and I don't know when, tight geographic conferences will return. It's happened before. The old Southern Conference was the first mega-conference. Had close to two dozen schools. Some schools in the mid-Atlantic broke off and formed the ACC. Some schools in the deep South broke off and formed the SEC.

The world is smaller than ever.  Distance is not the factor it once was.  WV's problem is their remoteness from the rest of the conference.   It would be different if there were 3 or 4 other schools somewhat closer to them. 

This is why the WV fans were/are stirring the expansion pot.   They were hoping to get Clemson, FSU, GT, etc. to jump to the Big 12 and create an "eastern" division with them.  Of course those schools were not about to do anything of the sort.  I think the "UNC to the B1G" rumors were started by MD people for the same reason.

Well those schools aren't that much closer.  Really their best fit geographically, culturally and academically is the SEC.  Big 10 and ACC fit them geographically too but apparently not academically.

ribread wrote:

When people talk about leaving the ACC, I think that this is something they forget about.  Right now we can reasonably play GT, Clemson, UNC, Duke, Wake, Va Tech, UVA and MD with a fairly short bus ride.  Move to the SEC (and assume you do that with Va Tech) and you may have Va Tech and S. Carolina.  Move to the B1G and you've basically got MD.

Georgia, Tennessee and Vanderbilt are about as close as GT, Clemson, UVa and MD.  And Auburn and Alabama are no more than two hours farther than GT.  We probably have one of the lowest travel costs of any major BCS program, because of the very unusual situation of having 3 other in-state schools in our conference.

Sucks for miami