What Does BYU's Independence Mean For....?

By now everyone has heard the big news this week that BYU has made it official and will go independent in football. I, for one, never thought this would work out since the defection of Fresno State and Nevada from the WAC, because, well.. seriously? The West Coast Conference?! But I've been convinced this is absolutely the best move for the school as a whole and the football team, especially. But what does this move mean for everybody else?

What does BYU's independence mean for...

The Mountain West Conference--They have now lost the two teams that were the center of this conference geographically, financially and basically carried the MWC since it began. The addition of Boise State will ease the pain, but every sport besides football will hurt. Badly.


Utah--The recruiting battle in Utah almost changed dramatically when Utah received the invite to the Pac-10. But the promise of having every game be on national television is a huge hook for out of state recruits (see Manti Te'o) where Utah had an immense advantage, while BYU has generally won the in-state recruit battle. So, throw in BYU playing in Texas, vs Notre Dame and against Pac-10 schools every year and I see a big change coming unless Utah can really play well in its first couple years as a Pac-12 school. Everyone thinks Utah will be getting a huge load of money with a new Pac-12 deal-- not so much. The Utes minimal share (they don't get a full member share until 5 years) will pale in comparison to BYU's ESPN deal for football and basketball.


ESPN--To be honest, no much. But Dave Brown, ESPN VP of broadcasting, made it sound like they just secured the biggest cash cow in the nation, which he should do of course to advertise this deal.


BYU-TV--ESPN told BYU they could re-broadcast every BYU sporting event in their archives as many times as they want. This is huge! One reason BYU athletic leaders disliked the TV deal with the Mtn so much is that they were promised the authority to re-broadcast games, but Craig Thompson didn't deliver. Dick Harmon of the Deseret News discusses the financial benefits for BYU-TV at Harmon's Halftime. (It doesn't let me post the link.)



BYU football--A lot. Besides the whole national exposure and big financial jump, it puts BYU in a situation where they have to schedule big teams to make this a legit move, and they are good enough and talented enough to hang with Texas and beat the rest of the teams they already have scheduled in the next few years (Notre Dame--which will be much more difficult in 3-4 years, Oregon St, Boise St, and reportedly the likes of Texas Tech, Clemson and I'm sure we'll see some more Pac-12 schools on the docket pretty soon). Expect big things in th enext 5-10 years from BYU football.



Notre Dame--This puts pressure on Notre Dame, even though I don't think it's something they're worried about now. They have struggled the last couple years, and if BYU beats them the first couple match-ups and basically beats Notre Dame at their own game (independence), Notre Dame fans will be furious. They are special. Other teams are not supposed to be able be a consistent winner as an independent anymore, because they aren't Notre Dame!! But if BYU does, look out...



The Rest of College Football--If BYU succeeds as we just discussed, do similar programs try to follow in their steps? Texas was reportedly close to giving it a try earlier this summer. And what if Florida, USC and Alabama find a way to double their tv deal dollars and keep their BCS access, and their conferences can't match it? I don't see this happening, to be honest. Texas was probably just bluffing because they got less money each year than all the other big programs, but the Big 12 gave in and made special concessions. It would definitely be an interesting sequence of events though.