More Great West Expansion

[bincitysioux]

Chicago State Accepts Invitation to Join Great West

The Great West Conference added its seventh all-sports member when Chicago State accepted an invitation, Commissioner

Ed Grom said today. The immediate addition of Chicago State gives the Great West seven members competing in all sports,

along with the three football-only members.

Good deal. The more the merrier.

[nodakvindy]

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/colle...0,7056312.story

An interesting quote "Joining the Great West won't change that immediately because the league is ineligible for an automatic bid until 2015, Commissioner Ed Grom said."

2015 is much earlier than I thought the new league could get a bid. That would only be a couple of extra years beyond the transition that UND would have to wait for a bid if they can't get into another conference.

[Hammersmith]

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/colle...0,7056312.story

An interesting quote "Joining the Great West won't change that immediately because the league is ineligible for an automatic bid until 2015, Commissioner Ed Grom said."

2015 is much earlier than I thought the new league could get a bid. That would only be a couple of extra years beyond the transition that UND would have to wait for a bid if they can't get into another conference.

That quote from Grom doesn't make any sense. It should be 2022 for MBB and 2020 for everything else(but FB) if nothing changes from today. Maybe Grom knows something we don't(or the quote is partially out of context), but the NCAA manual is pretty clear on the subject. I'm puzzled.

[dakotadan]

Not a big surprise but still nice to see. We would have likely seen many games with CSU in all sports even if they had stayed independent. Still, it's a plus for UND and USD to have a conference mate that is at least reasonably near by. And now they won't have to worry about working out contracts every time there is going to be a game between the schools.

On a side note, when they announced the conference I remember reading that the website would be completely redesigned by mid-Sept. Hopefully that is still soon to come.

[nodakvindy]

Maybe Grom knows something we don't

Obviously, this is what I am hoping.

[dakotadan]

Maybe Grom knows something we don't

We can only hope. (I mean that in a good way.)

[darell1976]

So with all these teams joining the GW whats our chances for moving to say either the Big Sky or the Summit for BBall or Missouri Valley for football?

[mksioux]

So with all these teams joining the GW whats our chances for moving to say either the Big Sky or the Summit for BBall or Missouri Valley for football?

I wouldn't look for anything to happen for a few more years until we're done with the transition and the moratorium on reclassification is lifted. At that point, your guess is as good as anyone's.

But the fact that the Great West is adding teams, I'd say that has no impact on whether UND will end up in a different conference. UND would leave the Great West in a hearbeat if it were invited to any of the three conferences you mentioned.