ACC/Big East: Some Monday Night History

Miami finally made its announcement Monday, after spending one final weekend hogging the sports spotlight: they’re coming with us to the ACC. (Of course, the Canes wouldn’t put it that way… although we did make our decision and announcement first.)

I’m still waiting for the national media to attack Miami and Donna Shalala the way they’ve attacked VT and President Steger. Who started this mess, after all?

But perhaps I shouldn’t hold my breath waiting for fair treatment. After all, our school’s president wasn’t a Clinton Cabinet member, and hasn’t spent his career as an itinerant hired gun, going whereever he could make the biggest mark and bring the greatest glory to himself. Instead, he’s spent almost all of his career at his alma mater, working for its greater good. I suppose it’s easier to slander someone who is quietly competent, open and not defensive about his position than it is to go after a Clinton throwback who might fire back. It’s certainly more fun than attacking the glamour girl and the beautiful school on the beach. That doesn’t mean I have to like it, though.

Read More »

Hello, Old Friend(s)

What will you do as an equal partner?
No conference commissioner on your side
You won’t get your way
So now you go back home and say
Guys, won’t you bleed for me one more time

CHORUS:
Shalala — got the Big East on their knees
Shalala — they’re begging, Miami, please
Shalala — they’ll even buy the donuts for Paul Dee

You thought you’d bring along two suck-ups
And run your new conference just like the old
But Casteen stonewalled
And the Hokies got the call
So your Big East extortion began again

Shalala — got the Big East on their knees
Shalala — they’re begging, Miami, please
Shalala — they’ll even buy the donuts for Paul Dee

(with apologies to Eric Clapton)

Read More »

It's Official

It’s official. The goal to which Virginia Tech athletics has aspired for fifty years has been achieved. A press conference is expected to be held Thursday, at which Virginia Tech president Dr. Charles W. Steger will accept an invitation to the Atlantic Coast Conference. Virginia Attorney General Jerry Kilgore withdrew VT and his office from the lawsuit Wednesday at 4:15 PM, and the official announcement was up on the ACC’s website by 5:20 PM.

The real key is that this offer of admission is not contingent on what Miami does — which is good, since Miami is currently throwing a small temper tantrum that it didn’t get to dictate its terms and bring in its little Northern friends. For what it’s worth, I think Miami will accept the invitation and join the ACC — but if they don’t, I honestly don’t care. If the Big East can manage to keep UM by further selling itself out to Miami, it can go right ahead. I want to see the BE schools do well (well, OK, except for Boston College), but I want VT taken care of most of all.
As long as we play by the rules (which we did), everything else is secondary.

Read More »

VT Now In?!

Washington Post staff writer Josh Barr, who broke the news last week that Virginia Tech would again be considered for ACC membership, is now reporting that Miami and Virginia Tech have been invited to join the Atlantic Coast Conference for the 2004-05 season — without Syracuse or Boston College.

I’m utterly shocked.

Read More »

Thoughts from 20,000 Feet

I neglected to mention in my last entry that I was wireless-blogging via the free 802.11 network thoughtfully provided by Richmond International Airport. (Hey, at least the slight price premium over other nearby airports has some tangible value now.) So let me say now that I am typing (the start of) this article from seat 9F on a US Airways Embraer Regional Jet from Pittsburgh to RIC. It won’t be posted until I get home, though: first, I probably won’t finish it in the air, and second, I’m definitely more dedicated to the idea of getting home than I am to the idea of sitting in a near-empty airport blogging.

Read More »