Dennis Cox, Brian Murphy break down the pros and cons of requiring in-state competition.
Uh Brian appreciate you for taking the time
Let's start with kind of the the the basics of
it
This this bill that's promote pro been proposed by by
lawmakers diving into the scheduling of athletic events for for
state schools
Like what all does it entail and what does it
mean Yeah this was kind of expected
I mean Jason Saint has been talked about this uh
o over the break here um as a way of
kind of keeping that money in the state particularly when
you had schools from California
He was particularly aggrieved about that
This would require UN C and NC State to not
only play each other at least once a year in
football men's basketball women's basketball which isn't a problem now
that they're in the same league but if they were
not in the same league could be an issue but
it would also require both those schools both UN C
and NC State to play at least one home or
away game against Appalachian State East Carolina as well as
UN C Charlotte in football men's and women's basketball as
well
Um And then it requires over a six year period
for them to play home and away games against each
of those schools
So it really does get into the the minutia of
scheduling
I don't know how realistic passage is but I think
this is a messaging bill uh from lawmakers that say
hey you guys need to play each other more often
to to me there's there's kind of two parts to
this
One is the one you started with which is NC
State and UN C being required to play each other
every year
That's an unnecessary bill if they're in the AC C
together
So is this in preparation for maybe expecting one of
them or both of them to go in different directions
Yeah I I mean I've spoken with lawmakers a lot
about you know conference realignment and what they expect to
happen or what they think should happen
Um and almost everyone unanimously they think NC State and
UN C should remain in the same conference again
We don't know if that's going to be possible or
or we don't know if how likely that is
We don't we don't know if either of these teams
are even going to leave the AC C at some
point
But I do think they've made it clear they want
those schools if they're not in the same conference to
be playing each other every single year
Um they are you know the legislature people say why
is the legislature getting involved They've invested billions of dollars
quite frankly in both of those universities they've invested billions
in in the whole university system
But those two schools in particular get a lot of
money a lot of funding a lot of support from
the state and they want to make sure both of
their athletic departments are doing well
Brian Murphy WRL sports investigative reporter joining us on the
Easter Automotive Group hotline
Um Is this putting the the wants and and kind
of benefit and raising of the smaller programs as as
a priority maybe ahead of NC state and UN C
who might use that nonconference schedule in other ways to
benefit their program
Yeah I mean you got to remember and this is
one of the big things about the legislature right Every
county gets representation
So there are plenty of people who want to see
Appalachia State or Charlotte or East Carolina taking care of
Um And they have just as much sway in many
cases as the people representing Chapel Hill and NC
And you know Raleigh do in a lot of cases
the people representing those parts of the state are Republicans
and the parts and the people representing Chapel Hill and
Raleigh are Democrats and they have less say
Um So I you know Jason saying who's one of
the sponsors on this bill is a Charlotte guy
There's a couple of a state guys on this bill
So yeah they're definitely looking out for number one I
think they say why why are you gonna play Uh
I'm trying to think of a team South Alabama
Why are you going to play Troy Uh when you
can just play Charlotte or a State I mean the
part I don't know a state might be too good
Well right
Right
They think fans want to see it
And it's true though
Those games generate much more fan interest than the game
against Toledo or Miami of Ohio or Troy
But but those are also no win games for for
NC State and UN C if if UN C loses
to East Carolina which they have you know they get
pilloried for it but if they beat East Carolina ok
Well you're supposed to beat East Carolina like it's kind
of a no win situation
They got to hear about it for 365 days
If they lose to Miami of Ohio or they lose
to to to LA you don't have to hear about
it all the time and it could also preclude them
maybe from playing another power five opponent in an era
where resumes and big wins matter so much for selection
committees and playoff appearances
Yeah I mean I I'm a little less sympathetic to
that because there's obviously three or four nonconference games
I mean NC State and Carolina are not like you
know some of the other teams in the AC C
that they have to play an SEC rival
You know in the last game of the season it
really limits you know the number of nonconference opportunities
They have NC State and NC State
I mean NC State and UN C have four games
to play with all year you know four nonconference games
to play with every year
They can play a power five you can play two
power fives quite frankly uh you know maybe an FB
an F CS school and then still have room on
their schedule for one of these G fives
Of course
And you mentioned it a State ECU and Charlotte not
not as much but app state ECU can beat them
You know those are games that you might lose
And that really you know that's that's not how you
want to build your schedule with a potential loss to
a G five team
This is this is half joking but maybe not
Uh right there's always gonna be a little push back
when when lawmakers kind of stick their nose in sports
and it's oh don't you have something better Should we
be looking at like fandoms before we we cast votes
because like hey I need to make sure my my
lawmakers are defending my my schedule
Yeah I mean I think that's the the regionality of
where people come from
You know it's supposed to supposed to take care of
that
I mean Chapel Hill Raleigh they have they have people
defending their it's just but I mean this comes up
a lot
Right
We we talked we've talked about the Board of Governors
and who you know who's being appointed to the Board
of Governors and are there more NC State people than
than UN C people And and what are they going
to do if if realignment does come around and UN
C wants to leave Are they going to be more
loyal to NC State So I mean certainly in in
in a state like this where there's a lot of
different colleges people have gone to to many different schools
they have different allegiances and alliances
I mean you know that that that becomes a factor
to say it's not a factor I think would be
naive
You gotta grab that is is that breaking news It's
like when Adam Schefter is on NFL live and all
of a sudden he's getting news about a trade um
last one before we let you go and this one
I actually skipped over my notes
But I but I wanna see if you've done the
uh the background on it
Do other states have rules like this or is North
Carolina kind of breaking ground on this We like I
think of it like the cast of friends like they
negotiate everything as a unit to make sure everybody is
getting the same
Like do other states operate this way with their state
schools and their athletic programs You know I haven't dug
into it but I know that there's been some you
know especially like with some of these rivalries breaking apart
because the conference realignment there's been talk that like Washington
and Washington State have to play every year
Oregon and Oregon State
Uh certainly you know Texas and Texas stopped playing and
haven't really renewed that that's going to be renewed now
that they're both in the SEC
Um but as far as playing like G Fives or
or lower division teams um I I can't think of
an example where that's happened
Um you know I think Louisville and Kentucky some of
some of those you know teams in the same state
always play each other and I don't know how much
of that's dictated by lawmakers but as far as having
to play like a G five team I'm not sure
that that exists anywhere