In the modern world of college football, TV revenue makes the wheels go round. It has been this way since at least the 1980s..
Problem is the schools on the Northeast, home to the lucrative New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Washington D.C media markets, never quite embraced the potential of football TV revenue the way the schools in the rest of the country did..
The Big East Conference had never bothered with football, despite hosting several historically powerful football schools like Syracuse, Boston College, and Pittsburgh. The Conference refused to invite Penn State due to weak basketball. And attempts by Penn State to join again continued to be stymied by the Catholic Seven. Little did they know at the time, their refusal to add Penn State would backfire on them and set into motion a chain of events that would create one of the nation's most powerful athletic conferences.
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Joe Paterno sighed as he got off the phone with representatives from the Big East. They would NOT be adding Penn State as a member school for the 1990 season, after another attempt to join, was vetoed by the Catholic Seven again.
How could they be so stubborn? Football was a huge revenue sport and with as many TV markets as they had access to, an East Coast Football playing conference should be a major money maker, yet because the Catholic Seven of the Big East refused to even entertain the idea of expanding into football, the football schools remained seperate and disparate.
What didn't help was that with the Supreme Court's ruling that the College Football Association's control over scheduling violated the Sherman Act. Conferences could negotiate their own TV deals, and with the rise of cable TV, that meant more players could enter the market. Independents like Penn State without high profile TV deals would increasingly be left behind.
An idea filled his head, what if Penn State and the other East Coast football schools united together and formed their own conference. With the amount of major TV markets that could potentially be brought in, this would guarantee large TV contracts, which could be distributed to all member schools. With the idea in mind, he picked up his phone and started to make a few phone calls to see what other Eastern schools were interested in his vision of a made for TV sports conference.
And so, the process to create the East Coast Conference began. And the course of college sports history would forever be changed
(And my first TL is up, feel free to collaborate as you wish)
.
Problem is the schools on the Northeast, home to the lucrative New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Washington D.C media markets, never quite embraced the potential of football TV revenue the way the schools in the rest of the country did..
The Big East Conference had never bothered with football, despite hosting several historically powerful football schools like Syracuse, Boston College, and Pittsburgh. The Conference refused to invite Penn State due to weak basketball. And attempts by Penn State to join again continued to be stymied by the Catholic Seven. Little did they know at the time, their refusal to add Penn State would backfire on them and set into motion a chain of events that would create one of the nation's most powerful athletic conferences.
---------------------
Joe Paterno sighed as he got off the phone with representatives from the Big East. They would NOT be adding Penn State as a member school for the 1990 season, after another attempt to join, was vetoed by the Catholic Seven again.
How could they be so stubborn? Football was a huge revenue sport and with as many TV markets as they had access to, an East Coast Football playing conference should be a major money maker, yet because the Catholic Seven of the Big East refused to even entertain the idea of expanding into football, the football schools remained seperate and disparate.
What didn't help was that with the Supreme Court's ruling that the College Football Association's control over scheduling violated the Sherman Act. Conferences could negotiate their own TV deals, and with the rise of cable TV, that meant more players could enter the market. Independents like Penn State without high profile TV deals would increasingly be left behind.
An idea filled his head, what if Penn State and the other East Coast football schools united together and formed their own conference. With the amount of major TV markets that could potentially be brought in, this would guarantee large TV contracts, which could be distributed to all member schools. With the idea in mind, he picked up his phone and started to make a few phone calls to see what other Eastern schools were interested in his vision of a made for TV sports conference.
And so, the process to create the East Coast Conference began. And the course of college sports history would forever be changed
(And my first TL is up, feel free to collaborate as you wish)
.
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