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[QUOTE="Scooch, post: 1014400, member: 628"]
Just to state a fact... UConn is actually a "national" hoops program.  They are consistently ranked in the top 10 when 'favorite college basketball team' is surveyed.  Last year they were 10th (Syracuse was 5th; Duke, UNC, Kentucky, Ohio State were 1-4).

But that, of course, had no bearing on conference realignment.  In a lot of ways UConn was a victim of self-inflicted wounds and lousy timing.  The football-centric ACC schools were not thrilled about SU and Pitt being added to the ACC, since they've long felt the league favored hoops (they, of course, were right).  So when Maryland bolted there was pressure to add a school that would bring football credibility.  There really weren't a lot of great options, and Louisville was in the midst of a nice resurgence under Charlie Strong.  Still, they had endured several mediocre seasons after Bobby Petrino left, so it's not like they were (or are) a perennial football power.  But they sure as hell looked infinitely more attractive than UConn football, who made a predictably terrible hire in Pasqualoni and saw their already fragile program decline.

Who knows, if they had made a dynamic hire and were riding a couple of 9/10 win seasons and attractive bowl wins maybe the ACC goes their way.  They certainly have a much better academic profile, and a better market to boot.  But there was no way to sell that football program to the FSU's and Clemson's of the ACC.
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