My solution to Penn State leaving the Big Ten

Ever since Penn State joined the league I've heard them complain that they aren't a good fit in the conference.  That their 'East Coast' mentality doesn't mesh well with the Midwest.  I know they say that as a slight as somehow the east coast is better than the Midwest but I think they are forgetting one big factor.  They aren't on the east coast.

It's 230 miles from Penn State to New York and 200 miles to Philadelphia.  They are an East Coast school like Columbus is on Lake Erie.  I remember back in school my teacher explained the East coast culture as the area that stretched from Boston to Washington DC.  She had a specific name for it – the Megalopolis.  The area was one continuous city and as of the 2000 census had 17% of the country’s population squeezed into 2% of its land mass.  The population density was over 900 people per square mile. 

This area had the nation’s government and financial capital along with many of the cultural trendsetters.  The packed in nature of the megalopolis created a situation where conflict and compromise were part of everyday life as people literally lived on top of one another.

Let’s compare that to Penn State.

Note that the East coast megalopolis is evident in this picture too.  I’ve included the Big Ten geography as well so you can see how it looks.  From Pittsburgh to Cleveland, Columbus to Cincinnati, west to St. Louis and Kansas City, north to Detroit and Chicago, and even further to Milwaukee and Minneapolis, the Midwest has some of the greatest American cities.  Despite the decline of the industry many have remained and eventually will turn their economies around.  Work ethic is the cornerstone of the Midwestern mythos.

 

Note that between the start of the highly populated purple area in Pittsburgh and the eastern megalopolis there’s a large green area with one blue dot in the middle of Pennsylvania. That blue dot is Penn State.

Fans of the school complain they don’t fit into the Big Ten and they are right.  But they don’t fit in the east either.  People from east and Midwest go to Penn State but they aren’t truly part of the culture.  The culture is made by the people that live in that area and there culture has a different name.  Appalachia.

 

Appalachia is the name given to the area dominated by the Appalachian Mountains and is mostly rural in nature.  Historically “endowed with abundant natural resources, Appalachia has long been associated with and struggled with poverty. In the early 20th century, large-scale logging and coal mining firms brought wage-paying jobs and modern amenities to Appalachia, but by the 1960s the region had failed to capitalize on any long-term benefits from these two industries.” ¹

Popular culture has made fun of this area and it’s historically backward ways.  Pennsylvania and Penn State specifically have avoided being lumped in with the states to their south main due to their proximity to the major urban centers like Pittsburgh and Philadelphia.

The recent Sandusky scandal has changed that to some degree.  Where many saw Penn State as a great institution that happened to have a great football team, now many are seeing the school as full football crazy lunatics.  The truth is most of the people that go to Penn State are great citizens.  Penn State fans on the other hand suffer from the fact that live in that area is difficult economically and Penn State football is one of the true joys they have in life.

Living in Columbus and being close enough to Appalachia to be able to take a day trip on my bike there, I know full well the dangers of a fan base that takes the game too seriously.  What Ohio State and Columbus have to keep us in check is a media glare that shows our idiocy which creates good local debate.  That doesn’t happen in State College.  Add to the mix a coach that is deified by many and you have a situation ripe for abuse.

But I digress.  Penn State has said they want to get out of the Big Ten and many feel the ACC would be a good fit.  While it might be better than the Big Ten they are missing the point.  What I propose instead is the Appalachian Conference.  This conference would be made up of schools that would make them feel right at home.

Penn State, West Virginia, Marshall, Ohio, Kentucky, Virginia Tech, Wake Forest, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and Tennessee, Middle Tennessee State, and UAB.

12 Teams.  All in Appalachia.  Let the couch burnings begin!

(This post is somewhat in jest as I’ve met many people in Appalachia and they are great people that live in a difficult area of the country to make a living.  Most aren’t like what we’ve seen portrayed in the news at Penn State but I would argue that fans that live in Appalachia have a higher percentage of idiots than fans in other parts of the country.  I include Ohio State in that designation as we’ve always been a little crazier than the rest of the B1G).

¹ – From Wikipedia entry on Appalachia