(07-04-2022, 06:49 AM)OutsiderFan Wrote: (07-04-2022, 05:57 AM)BostonCard Wrote: I’m not sure why Notre Dame should give much more of an iota of thought for whether Stanford is or is not in the conference.
Like everyone in this sordid affair, their calcula will be driven almost entirely by money, and Stanford’s existence doesn’t factor into that.
BC
I can see a very real possibility that Stanford and Notre Dame would be more inclined to join the Big Ten if the other does.
Stanford could follow Notre Dame because that cements the fact being independent is not a real option, and it would be clear to Stanford if it had any desire to stay relevant in college sports it would have to join the big leagues.
Notre Dame would follow Stanford because Stanford would be the premier athletic and academic institution being OK with joining a conference outside its traditional footprint to stay relevant in major college sports.
I honestly can't believe how nobody on this board or any reporter for the premium Stanford sports sites has any clue what Stanford's thinking is on the Big Ten issue. Speculation here ranges from go to Ivy model, to expand the Pac, to go independent. Nobody seems to have any clue what Stanford is thinking or even how it values money from media rights vs. other considerations.
I don't know what the Stanford administration is thinking, but I do think we have some clues based on past history.
1) Stanford was once the school that was willing to enforce strict admissions criteria on its athletes even at the expense of success in football.
2) Stanford was once the school that was willing to cut numerous sports ostensibly for budget reasons but more probably because the percentage of student athletes was--in the minds of administration and faculty--excessive compared with the relatively small undergraduate student body.
3) Stanford feels far, far more connected to schools like the Ivies, MIT, CalTech and U Chicago than it does to most of the other schools of the Pac 12/10, which (other than Cal) never had much in common with Stanford's mission as an elite university.
In my mind, Stanford athletics reached a zenith when a rare combination came along of a supportive Admissions director (after 2005), competent Athletics Director (before 2012), a couple of football coaches who fit in their own ways within the unique Stanford culture (after 2007,) and an avid donor with very deep pockets who endowed pretty much every coaching job at the university (2006-2013 were Arillaga's biggest gifts.) The identity and mission of the university was never going to deeply embrace athletics, but so long as athletics could pay for itself and have such splendid success the apathy abated and the intellectual crowd tolerated (and even enjoyed) the sideshow of sports. But this should never have concealed the fact that the culture was never, ever, going to be able to make the least sacrifice to the Stanford image as an ethical, elite, academic institution.
With the latest developments--too numerous but all discussed at length on this board--I have a hard time imagining a way forward that will preserve the wonderful success we had with our athletics program over the last couple of decades. External forces seem arrayed against our unique model. But we also lack the internal leadership that we had at the beginning of this heyday. I will hope that something gets worked out, since I want to enjoy the next couple of decades of retired life watching Stanford athletics flourish. But I think I know the Stanford culture quite well, and it leaves me less and less optimistic. I will be ecstatic to be wrong.
