Time to leave the Patriot League?

Was it an emergency meeting or just a regularly scheduled one?

The plot thickens!

Crucis, I thought you were there and while you know my hearing stinks, since I was the one who asked the question, I do not recall hearing Vince say it was an “emergency” meeting at all. My takeaway was that coincident with my question, it just happened that the PL presidents had a meeting and one of the topics was athletics in the age of league turmoil/chaos. Most importantly, he made very clear that they are of one mind, that the league has solidarity amidst that chaos and stand together. 

There won’t be any defections. OTOH, who knows if there will be additions?

I can see it now…a 9 team league for Patriot League football:


North Division

Colgate
Holy Cross
Fordham

Central Division

Bucknell
Lafayette
Lehigh


South Division

Villanova
Richmond
W&M


Georgetown is officially shown the exit and provided some nice parting gifts.

Will my dream become a reality???

I understand the Bison are one of the PL Ivory Towers and have a great lax program, but seriously Bucknell football drags the whole league down. Just not competitive.

Unscheduled meeting = Emergency meeting

I saw the two award ceremony clips on your YouTube channel that I subscribed to when it made an appearance on Crossports (good fan's view of HC plays.) When you posted the clips were at the top of my feed until another subscription posted. You posted about your question to Vince on Crossports yesterday, I believe. I love free internet outlets like Crossports and YouTube.🤣

I think that there was 2 main reasons for the Presidents meeting.....

1. To ensure that Holy Cross remains loyal to the Patriot League...as much as some of you hate to hear it....HC has become a more attractive candidate due to your recent football success.

2. To discuss a plan of action if other schools become available.....ie William & Mary, Northeastern, etc.

Problem is, the last 3 aren’t and probably never will be.

Here's some of my thoughts on making the PL a better conference, especially one that would be a better fit for Holy Cross. This is our message board after all.

First, I think W&M, Richmond and Villanova are all great and everything, and would make the football conference stronger. However, I think the biggest problem with the PL from a HC perspective is that the basketball league flat out sucks. Let's remember that VIllanova and Richmond would be football-only members and do nothing for any of the other sports in the Patriot League. William & Mary basketball is nothing to get excited about at all, but at least they are strong in most Olympic sports and would be our top baseball program from Day 1, maybe soccer too.

Here's my "dream scenario" for the Patriot League becoming a more attractive athletic home for Holy Cross. And it's unlikely to happen but you never know.....

First, Delaware decides against FBS and then they decide along with William & Mary, Richmond and Villanova that they would like to pursue membership in a more stable conference as opposed to what the CAA has started to become. Let's face it, the CAA has done a great job scooping up "up and comers" over the past 2 decades to continue stability and competitiveness both at the FCS and mid-major hoops levels. Unfortunately, there are only so many Townson's, Albany's, Campbell's & Monmouth's left to backfill membership. Do pograms with a ton of long-standing tradition like W&M and UD really want to be in a league that in 5 years might include the likes of Bryant (likely next CAA all-sports member), Merrimack, Morgan State, Howard and Queens Univesity of Charlotte?

So, I'm imagining the following:

PL Football

1. Holy Cross
2. Fordham
3. Colgate
4. Lehigh
5. Lafayette
6. Bucknell
7. W&M
8. Richmond
9. Villanova
10. Delaware

PL Basketball

1. Holy Cross
2. BU
3. Northeastern
4. Fairfield
5. W&M
6. Delaware
7. Loyola
8. American
9. Army
10. Navy
11. Colgate
12. Lehigh
13. Lafayette
14. Bucknell

We'd have 20 conference games in basketball. Like many other conferences, we'd have a system of primary partners. We would play BU, Northeastern, Fairfield and Colgate home-and home and the other eight schools just once per year. And we'd have a legit season-ending conference tournament at one site. 4-day event at a neutral location. Nothing says "low-major" like a conference tourney held at home sites, mostly in the middle of nowhere, since that's where PL schools are located. Mohegan Sun, Worcester, Wilmington, DC, Scranton and Baltimore would all be options. 

In football, I parted ways with Georgetown who moves on to the NEC and becomes the next Sacred Heart. Win for all. 8 conference games, with every team playing 8 of the other 9. So OOC, we're looking at Harvard OR Dartmouth, one flex game and 1 FBS opponent. Again, one reason why I'm not meh about Richmond and Villanova is that a) they do nothing for the basketball conference and b) would definitely restrict our OOC scheduling flexibility when it comes to continuing series like UNH, Yale, Dartmouth and Brown. And I guess Merrimack too.

So I’d be just as happy to bring in  just W&M and Delaware in football (since I have them joining for all-sports) to go to an 8-team football league with 7 conference games and 4 OOC. 

Totally agree with you. And the same thing could've been said of football for most of the two decades prior to 2019.

I'm not so much blaming the PL for our own institutional struggles in Men's Basketball as much as I'm saying that I'd like to be in a conference where the hoops culture is a little bit more there. It's a really boring basketball conference. And the attendance figures across the board tell that story. At least, there's some decent football tradition at 5/7 football playing schools.