[Softball Fan]

I’d much rather see Betts at UCLA than Notre Dame.

I'm afraid I don't agree, just based on player well being.  Next year will be fine, but the travel arrangements for her junior and senior years will be horrific.  Frankly, I think UCLA and USC should never have been allowed to subject their "full time students" to those pressures, and it will be worst for basketball.  Those two schools sold the well being of their students for a bigger conference payout.

I think it's premature to describe future travel arrangements as horrific for UCLA and USC WBB.  I know many Big-10 WVB teams travel by charter.  They pretty much leave an airport on their schedule, not waiting for available commercial flights, and fly directly  to their destination.  The money is available for it.  Also the Big 10 may come up with some creative schedules to minimize travel for Olympic sports.   It won't be as easy as flying to PAC-12 schools but also probably not that much worse.

As for Betts, I'm glad she's at UCLA.  It will be interesting for me to see how she does next year.  I don't hold anything against her.  Whatever her reasons for leaving Stanford, I'm sure she and her parents believed them to be good reasons.

To me the big downside is coaches using this for recruiting purposes; telling sought after recruits; "Well Stanford has good academics but a #1 player thought that wasn't enough to override other deficiencies in the Stanford WBB program.

[Softball Fan]

I’d much rather see Betts at UCLA than Notre Dame.

I'm afraid I don't agree, just based on player well being.  Next year will be fine, but the travel arrangements for her junior and senior years will be horrific.  Frankly, I think UCLA and USC should never have been allowed to subject their "full time students" to those pressures, and it will be worst for basketball.  Those two schools sold the well being of their students for a bigger conference payout.

I think it's premature to describe future travel arrangements as horrific for UCLA and USC WBB.  I know many Big-10 WVB teams travel by charter.  They pretty much leave an airport on their schedule, not waiting for available commercial flights, and fly directly  to their destination.  The money is available for it.  Also the Big 10 may come up with some creative schedules to minimize travel for Olympic sports.   It won't be as easy as flying to PAC-12 schools but also probably not that much worse.

As for Betts, I'm glad she's at UCLA.  It will be interesting for me to see how she does next year.  I don't hold anything against her.  Whatever her reasons for leaving Stanford, I'm sure she and her parents believed them to be good reasons.

To me the big downside is coaches using this for recruiting purposes; telling sought after recruits; "Well Stanford has good academics but a #1 player thought that wasn't enough to override other deficiencies in the Stanford WBB program.