Nuggets from Blaudschun's ACC article

BC beat writer picked the middle of the summer to rehash and look back on BC's move to the ACC. Blauds has always been a subtle critic of the move and used BC's lack of championships as a jumping off point for the piece. Most of it is worthless regurgitation of old talking points, but there are a few worthwhile pieces of information inside.

Spaz's pessimism

Spaziani has continued to build, although he sees some choppy waters ahead.

“When we came into the ACC, Florida State and Miami were in down cycles,’’ said Spaziani. “Now they’re both on the up cycle. It’s not going to be easy.’’

This is another example of where I think Spaz needs to change his approach with the media. It comes off as lowering of expectations. That public attitude impacts players and fans.

Obligatory quote from Tranghese

Former Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese, who had an up-close look at BC’s departure six years ago, says that while he didn’t agree with the way BC departed, he understands the reasons.

According to Tranghese, the BC president, Rev. William Leahy, “had concerns about the league getting away from its base and adding schools, and Gene [DeFilippo, the athletic director] was worried the league was going to implode. And both of those concerns had some merit.’’

Tranghese's certainly softened his stance. This is as much of an "I was wrong. They were right" admission as you will ever get from him. It probably doesn't hurt that he is no longer employed by the Big East. But I also hope he realizes that his attempts to bully and belittle BC publicly only made the BC community that much more determined to leave.

UMass update

With the University of Massachusetts moving to the FBS level, DeFilippo has offered it two-for-one deals over a six-year period, meaning the Eagles would host UMass four times and play twice on the road (which would be at Gillette Stadium).

“We’ve offered UMass what we’ve given every MAC school — a two-for-one deal. I think it’s fair,’’ he said.

I've been on board with the UMass series, so this confirmation is good news (for me). A two-for-one with the away games at Gillette is a no brainer. Hopefully UMass will take it. They are unlikely to find four road games against a BCS opponent that would be a bus trip.

Scheduling

But DeFilippo also helped by not overburdening the Eagles in their nonconference schedule, turning seven-win seasons into nine-win seasons and nine-win seasons into 11-win seasons.

BC’s nonconference record since 2000 is 48-9. But in those 57 games, it faced only five ranked opponents. In fact, until the Eagles faced (and lost to) No. 13 Nevada in last season’s Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl, they had not played a ranked nonconference opponent since 2004.

“It helped Tom to build,’’ said DeFilippo. “Tom’s a good football coach and he did a fine job here.’’

So now the narrative as to BC's watered down schedule is that it helped TOB build. I got it. Still that doesn't explain the current philosophy. Who are we helping build now? I clearly understand Gene's point. I was a student when our non-conference schedule was Ohio State, Notre Dame, Michigan, Michigan State and Army. We don't need to do that every year. I also don't think we need to play a schedule more difficult than most. But Gene also needs to realize that a big name opponent will help interest in the program.

The only thing about the article that surprised me was the timing. I am not sure why Blauds is writing it now. It will be interesting if some of the talking points established here will get reused if BC struggles this year.