Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, April 13, 1991 TAG: 9104130217
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B3 EDITION: BEDFORD/FRANKLIN
SOURCE: Cox News Service
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The commissioners of the Big East and Atlantic Coast Conferences met in Chicago this week with Notre Dame athletic director Dick Rosenthal and the executive directors of the Orange, Sugar and Cotton bowls to discuss bowl alliances, Big East Commissioner Mike Tranghese said Wednesday.
"There was a willingness to take a look and see if there's anything there that makes sense," Tranghese said, refusing to discuss specifics but saying the tone of the meetings was optimistic.
One item most assuredly on the table was a bowl scenario in which the Cotton, Orange and Sugar bowls would give their at-large bids to the champions of the Big East and ACC and Notre Dame.
How would it be determined which team would go to which bowl? Apparently by ranking.
The highest-ranked team from the Big East-ACC-Notre Dame trio would play the highest-ranked team in a bowl: either the SEC champion in the Sugar, the Big Eight champion in the Orange or the Southwest Conference champion in the Cotton.
The advantages: All match-ups (with minimum won-lost records) would be attractive. Further, one of the three bowls would have a decent chance of having a national championship game, or Notre Dame. The Big East, helped by the addition of Miami, would gain immediate credibility by having its champion playing on New Year's Day.
The next step? Tranghese said all the groups will ponder the idea, then meet again. The only timetable he is working on is to have the 1991 Big East champion play in a major bowl Jan. 1, a goal he said he feels confident he can achieve.
"I like the fact that we have not played a football game in a league and we are sitting in a room with the Cotton, Sugar and Orange bowls and the ACC and Notre Dame," Tranghese said.
by CNB