The Big East is a Turkey and the Big 12 is Hungary

I have a passion for history. One of my favorite things about history is studying past events and relating them to today.  This is my attempt to do that with Big Ten expansion.

One of my favorite era's to study is the time between the end of the Napoleonic Wars and the start of the World War I.  After Waterloo there were 6 main powers in Europe - Great Britain, France, Prussia, Austria, Russia, and the Ottoman Empire.  During the first half of the 19th century these countries worked together to keep the peace but as time passed greed and their inherent differences made this difficult.  The instigator for much of this was the "Eastern Question" and the fact that the Ottoman Empire was little more than a shell of various nationalities.  The Austrian Empire was in a similar situation as they had a solid base but with lots of deep seeded turmoil on the periphery.  Everything came to a climax in early 1870s as Prussia invaded Austria and France to create the new nation of Germany and Russia invaded the Ottoman Empire which forced them to give up land in the Balkans and Caucasus.  Things settled down and peace settled over Europe.  It wasn't over - it was merely an intermission.


After that, Germany looked at France and Britain and the fact they "expanded" in the previous century.  Due to their power, the Germans were determined to get an even greater share of the spoils.  France and Britain were pretty happy to keep things as they were.  The Austo-Hungarian and Ottoman's were just desperately trying to hold on to power.   In 1914 when the new Balkan state of Serbia committed acts of violence against the Austro-Hungarian's, Austria attacked.  The Russians backed Serbia, Germany backed Austria and the result was World War One.


I am definitely simplifying a very complex time in history and I am not suggesting that the events in Europe from over a century ago are an exact match to what is happening to the NCAA today.  What I am suggesting is three things that happened back then are driving NCAA expansion -- 1) Greed is the ultimate motivator, 2) The oppressed will stand up to their oppessor if given the opportunity and 3) This is far from over.

In my example above though you can come amazingly close to history by substituting the following conferences with their post 1870s counterpart:

• Big East - Ottoman Empire -- All they need is a push and this "sick man" of the NCAA will fall apart.
• Big 12 - Austro-Hungarian Empire -- Just lost a battle with the Big Ten.  They are very strong at the core (Austria=Texas) but weak beyond that and have many bitter divisions just waiting to be exploited.
• ACC - Britain -- They've expanded and are happy with the status quo.
• SEC - France -- See the ACC only with more ego.
• Pac-10 - Russia -- They are in a different timezone than most and they want respect but mostly want to be noticed.  They've expanded a bit and are on the lookout for more opportunities.
• Big Ten - Prussia/Germany -- They expanded and changed the world.  The world awaits their next move.

When I started this analogy I wanted to compare the Big Ten with pre-WWI Britain as my ancestors came from there.  As I wrote this I realized that the only pre-WWI power that fits today's Big Ten is Germany.  After the Germans crushed the French in the Franco-Prussian War of 1872 the world waited for their next move.  This equates to the Big Ten adding Nebraska.  We could be nice neighbors and stop there.  We could also push the Big East and Big 12 into oblivion.  One thing is for sure ... the current state of detente in college football will be decided by the athletic directors and presidents of the Big Ten.  They will determine the fate of nations ... err I mean conferences.

Postscript - Before anyone starts waving their arms saying ... "But the British and French beat the Germans in World War I!!!" they need to remember something -- The British and French governments were exhausted after the first few years of the war and won WWI mainly because of American gold, American munitions and American soldiers.   Unless the United States government steps as the American equivilent nothing like this exists in today's world.  Achtung Baby!


Postscript 2 - According to history, the Ottoman Big East has nothing to worry about from the Big Ten but should be wary of the English ACC coming up from the south (minus the Lawrence of Arabia style robes).

Postscript 3 - If nothing else, I hope the blog title makes more sense.  In the future, I promise to lay off the spicy food before blogging as I really went off on a tangent this time.