BMWILK

I understand the doubts but I honestly think Florida recruiting grounds are just that fertile I think with it starts with the concentration of Floridas athletes, its overall population, and good weather for year round football breads a young football culture that is unique to our region. Just as northern states are breading grounds for basketball and can produce many high caliber teams in a small geographic area. No only that but for many out of state recruits the cities of Orlando and Tampa are very appealing a solid rivalry would surely ignite both teams renown nationwide. Even though I attend UCF I currently pull harder for USF's program. I see this from both sides and think this would be a good move for both programs. I do not want to marginalize the fact that already you guys swept the series vs UCF and you'd prolly beat us now or that you've beaten a both Florida State and Miami. But I think UCF and USF match up pretty well in nearly all categories academically, population, athletic facilities, player recruitment, and reown and do so not not only when compared to other potential rivals in the state but also the nation.

You seem like nice enough chap so I'll just ask where did you come up with that tidbit of "information"? State split in half and state vs state .... trying to equate our possible "rivalry" to those two is a losing battle. No, it won't ... 1.Well our Universities our generally very similar academically this can be looked up on collegeboard.com this year UCF has a slight edge, but it varies. However I've talked to a few people here at UCF probably like 5 in all who said that when they applied to USF after the two strong seasons they had USF rejected them sending a letter saying there had been a large increase in applicants due to the success of athletic programs. 2. Oklahoma state vs Oklahoma could be used as another example theres countless others like I used already Auburn Alabama ,or Wash st Wash, Mia Florida State, Texas v tecas tech, michican st michigan all in state and in conference rivalries. 3. To say this would not be a boon to recruiting is arguable. Such rivalries are great for sales and fan recruitment. In places like lake land there would be division between USF and UCF fans and young athletes in the area might grow up watching such rivalry games. Florida is obviously a fertile recruiting ground and feeds programs all over the U.S. As I say the best high school recruiting starts in the Southeast most city in the U.S. (Miami pretty much) and radiates from there. And its clear the southeast has been dominating. What I'm getting at is there is more than enough recruits for UCF and USF here. Many of the mid to high level recruits slip that slip our programs nowand go out of state could be locked in if such a rivalry was established. Both sides could use a few more local 4-5 star recruits.

There was a pretty good article on espn: http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/news/story?id=6054589. It was on the front page of the ncaa section yesterday and today, today its just not the first tab. As a student of UCF I think a lot of what's said is true. First being we now have the facilities similar to many elite schools nationwide, but we need to enter a better conference and gain a larger fan-base. To get in a good conference though were gonna have to start by increasing our fan base. We have a real soft fan base right now all around from students to alumni. I think this will begin to change but not sure how long its going to take For the alumns I can understand because or school just kinda shot up from a commuter school recently and never really had good athletics. During my week long career as a telemarketer for UCF trying to get alumns donations I noticed there are not many who care about whats going on here. They were in and out got their education and left. As far as current students I think the fan base is weak because we haven't appealed to sports fans in the past. Generally people attend this school because of the facilities unlike USF whose freshman enrollment GPA and sat scores shoot up after a good football season. We need more die hard fans but they're just not all here yet I think their in the making though. Speculating that perhaps we could land in the big east I do not understand why so many USF fans are opposed to the idea. There are many inter-conference rivals that thrive in such a situation Alabama Auburn to name one. Also I understand you've already whooped us a few times but heck a lot of rivalries start off worse. Texas beat oklahoma 7 times in a row to start off the red river rivalry. Give us enough times and we will beat you. It wont be the end of the world it will be the begging of an awesome rivalry. In the end us joining the big east would be a boon to both programs recruiting wise and in many other ways.