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Thread: A very happy.........

  1. #1

    A very happy.........

    Pac-12 day to all of you! If my 'facebook memories' are accurate, we received our invitation 7 years ago today. Who would have ever thought? Its still surreal to me in many ways.

  2. #2
    Quote Originally Posted by UtahsMrSports View Post
    Pac-12 day to all of you! If my 'facebook memories' are accurate, we received our invitation 7 years ago today. Who would have ever thought? Its still surreal to me in many ways.
    I think it might have been 6/17 if MY FB memories are correct. Either way, what a ride it has been!
    “It only ends once. Anything that happens before that is just progress.”

    Well, because he thought it was good sport. Because some men aren't looking for anything logical, like money. They can't be bought, bullied, reasoned, or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn.

  3. #3

    A very happy.........

    Someone in my timeline retweeted this last week. So I believe the invitation happened on the 16th and Utah formally accepted at the state capitol or wherever on the 17th. At the time, the Tweet had 10 likes. So that means, the biggest announcement in U of U history garnered, at most, two retweets and ten likes. Oh, the early days of Twitter when not even the President of the United States could try to litigate his Presidency in front of the whole world.




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  4. #4
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    Quote Originally Posted by Dwight Schr-Ute View Post
    Someone in my timeline retweeted this last week. So I believe the invitation happened on the 16th and Utah formally accepted at the state capitol or wherever on the 17th. At the time, the Tweet had 10 likes. So that means, the biggest announcement in U of U history garnered, at most, two retweets and ten likes. Oh, the early days of Twitter when not even the President of the United States could try to litigate his Presidency in front of the whole world.




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    Most avid social media users in our fanbase in 2010 were on Utefans. Talk about changing tides.

  5. #5
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by SoCalPat View Post
    Most avid social media users in our fanbase in 2010 were on Utefans. Talk about changing tides.
    I remember how nuts that board was on that day and the day before. Chat was a madhouse.

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  6. #6
    I have a print out of the official PAC-10 invitation PR statement in my office. Old logo and everything.

    After the 04 season, I thought the PAC would be smart to invite Colorado and Utah, boost their footprint and grow beyond the coast. When it happened it was beyond awesome. Being at the Capitol building when Larry Scott formally invited the U was incredible.

    The next summer, at the RedZone store for the midnight opening with PAC-12 gear was a carnival. Webmonkey and a bunch of others were there, it was electric.

  7. #7
    Someone on another forum reminded me of the infamous Dick Harmon meltdown on ESPN at that time. What was ESPN thinking, bringing him on? Did they do ANY research into who he was?

    'Utah is invited to the join the Pac-10, so lets bring on..........the biggest homer in the media of Utah's arch rival!'

    I cant seem to find the clip. Too bad.

  8. #8
    I would love to see that clip.

  9. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by Utah View Post
    I would love to see that clip.
    Theres a couple of cougarboard posts that 'link' to it, but it looks like in the archiving process, ESPN just kept the article and ditched the video.

  10. #10
    Dang. I wonder if Milton vanderslice has it.

  11. #11
    Quote Originally Posted by Utah View Post
    Dang. I wonder if Milton vanderslice has it.
    ESPN: So, Dick, why Utah?

    Dick: Well, frankly, because they're not BYU.

    It was laughable then and now, but I'm always amazed at how many BYU and Utah fans still believe it.

  12. #12
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by UtahsMrSports View Post
    Someone on another forum reminded me of the infamous Dick Harmon meltdown on ESPN at that time. What was ESPN thinking, bringing him on? Did they do ANY research into who he was?

    'Utah is invited to the join the Pac-10, so lets bring on..........the biggest homer in the media of Utah's arch rival!'

    I cant seem to find the clip. Too bad.
    I remember how taken aback the ESPN guys were. It was really pretty funny. Probably the greatest beclowning of any sportswriter ever.

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  13. #13
    Does anyone have any inside info about how the invite came to be? My hunch was Chris Hill had a lot to do with it, getting CU interested, approaching the new PAC10 commissioner letting him know that CU would be on board, etc.
    Or am I wrong? Was it entirely the PAC who started the process?

  14. #14
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    Quote Originally Posted by Nice Marmot View Post
    Does anyone have any inside info about how the invite came to be? My hunch was Chris Hill had a lot to do with it, getting CU interested, approaching the new PAC10 commissioner letting him know that CU would be on board, etc.
    Or am I wrong? Was it entirely the PAC who started the process?
    No inside info, but this is how I understand it went down:

    Chris Hill had positioned Utah for the last 15 years to be ready when/if the PAC-10 decided to expand. That included building partnerships, scheduling them as much as we could, and keeping our financial house in order. He was constantly pushing the PAC-10 to expand, but they didn't want to. He made sure they knew we were there if they decided to.

    The push to expand the PAC-10 came from Larry Scott when he became commissioner. He saw the PAC-10 as stagnant, which was borne out by the TV contract. Because the Big-12 was on fire, they originally wanted to try and poach Texas and Oklahoma from them along with 4 other teams, and make a PAC-16. Colorado was one of those schools and they jumped early. When the others didn't follow suit, the PAC-10 was in a position where they now had 11 and needed another. Utah was there and ready.

    So, yeah, Utah was really a safety school, but I don't care. Hill did the work to put Utah in a position to take advantage of any opportunity that came along, and it worked.

  15. #15
    Quote Originally Posted by U-Ute View Post
    So, yeah, Utah was really a safety school, but I don't care. Hill did the work to put Utah in a position to take advantage of any opportunity that came along, and it worked.
    Yeah, I wasn't in the room either, but this is the only thing I've heard that works. When the Pac-12 needed another team, Utah was the obvious choice. Utah was 2-0 in BCS games and had received #1 votes in a recent AP poll. The only comparable football program that made sense geographically was Boise State, and Utah was a far better fit in every possible consideration.

    So I don't think Chris Hill working the phones during expansion mattered. I think what Utah had done in football and in other things during the 21st century mattered. Hill could have stayed on vacation, and the Pac-12 would have still arrived at the obvious conclusion.

  16. #16
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Nice Marmot View Post
    Does anyone have any inside info about how the invite came to be? My hunch was Chris Hill had a lot to do with it, getting CU interested, approaching the new PAC10 commissioner letting him know that CU would be on board, etc.
    Or am I wrong? Was it entirely the PAC who started the process?
    This is what Hill told me (and many others in my presence, later): As soon as Larry Scott announced his interest in expanding (maybe even a little earlier, I don't recall) Chris called the Colorado AD on the phone and said, "Let's go talk to Larry Scott about our two schools joining the PAC." The two of them had stayed in touch and both knew that the other was interested in moving. They called Scott and met with him together in Walnut Creek a few days later. This was before the Oklahoma-Texas thing got going. So Hill did get CU and Utah on Scott's radar screen right away.

    He later had no illusions about Utah's chances if Texas-Oklahoma moved to the PAC, so he was working on backup plans. While everything was going down in the USA he was in Paris on a long-planned vacation with his wife. He spent much of his time in France on the phone to the US. (Chris later made that up to his wife with another trip.) I know he was talking to Kansas and Kansas State about joining a reconfigured MWC if the Big 12 fell apart -- which would have happened if the Texas and Oklahoma schools had left. Crazy times, but it worked out for Utah.

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  17. #17
    Administrator U-Ute's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by sancho View Post
    Yeah, I wasn't in the room either, but this is the only thing I've heard that works. When the Pac-12 needed another team, Utah was the obvious choice. Utah was 2-0 in BCS games and had received #1 votes in a recent AP poll. The only comparable football program that made sense geographically was Boise State, and Utah was a far better fit in every possible consideration.

    So I don't think Chris Hill working the phones during expansion mattered. I think what Utah had done in football and in other things during the 21st century mattered. Hill could have stayed on vacation, and the Pac-12 would have still arrived at the obvious conclusion.
    I think it goes beyond football too. Obviously Utah's history in basketball helped too. Not to mention things like gymnastics, softball, and skiing. It showed Utah has a commitment to non-revenue and women's sports. Then there's the academic side where Utah has a good history as well. Not Stanford or Washington, but still pretty good relative to size.

    All those things put it heads and shoulders above any other school in the region.

  18. #18
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    Quote Originally Posted by U-Ute View Post

    The push to expand the PAC-10 came from Larry Scott when he became commissioner. He saw the PAC-10 as stagnant, which was borne out by the TV contract.
    This is true. The Pac-10 under Tom Hansen was a dinosaur. From the moment Scott became commish, the writing was on the wall about expansion.

    What's not true (IMO) is the idea that Utah was always a safety school. Taken in a vacuum, the Pac-12 needed to get to 12 teams, and Utah/CU was always going to be that combination. What threw the idea of a Pac-16 into the mix was expansion elsewhere. The seeds were sown for Utah when Scott took over in July 2009. At that time, nobody envisioned the tumult that would come in the Big 12 with Texas A&M (and to a lesser degree, Missouri) leaving for the SEC. Plus, the Big 10 was really the tail wagging the dog, another scenario that developed in 2010.

    Utah went from being one of two sane choices, to possibly being left out, and back to being one of two sane choices. If the Pac-12 would've gone to 16 schools in 2011, I'm not sure of a scenario existing that includes Utah, unless the Bay Area schools and USC don't compromise on academics and give Texas Tech the boot. Now, the league did just that with Baylor, as the CU invite was the league's way of saying not only no, but hell no to Baylor. But that wasn't going to turn off Texas. Turning aside Texas Tech might have done just that.

    That's how I connect the dots. In the end, it doesn't really matter if we're Hawaii to Colorado's Alaska. We're in and that's all that matters.

  19. #19
    Administrator U-Ute's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by SoCalPat View Post
    This is true. The Pac-10 under Tom Hansen was a dinosaur. From the moment Scott became commish, the writing was on the wall about expansion.

    What's not true (IMO) is the idea that Utah was always a safety school. Taken in a vacuum, the Pac-12 needed to get to 12 teams, and Utah/CU was always going to be that combination. What threw the idea of a Pac-16 into the mix was expansion elsewhere. The seeds were sown for Utah when Scott took over in July 2009. At that time, nobody envisioned the tumult that would come in the Big 12 with Texas A&M (and to a lesser degree, Missouri) leaving for the SEC. Plus, the Big 10 was really the tail wagging the dog, another scenario that developed in 2010.

    Utah went from being one of two sane choices, to possibly being left out, and back to being one of two sane choices. If the Pac-12 would've gone to 16 schools in 2011, I'm not sure of a scenario existing that includes Utah, unless the Bay Area schools and USC don't compromise on academics and give Texas Tech the boot. Now, the league did just that with Baylor, as the CU invite was the league's way of saying not only no, but hell no to Baylor. But that wasn't going to turn off Texas. Turning aside Texas Tech might have done just that.

    That's how I connect the dots. In the end, it doesn't really matter if we're Hawaii to Colorado's Alaska. We're in and that's all that matters.
    True. The term "safety school" was poorly chosen. We were really a backup plan in case the Big-12 teams didn't fall all over themselves coming to the PAC-16.

  20. #20
    SoCal is spot on. From what I've heard, Colorado was taken to make sure Texas couldn't force a Baylor into the 16.

    The plan was always:

    Utah/Colorado

    Then Colorado, Texas, Oklahoma, etc.

    Then Utah/Colorado.

    Also, being the #2 choice behind Texas is never a bad thing.

  21. #21
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by SoCalPat View Post
    In the end, it doesn't really matter if we're Hawaii to Colorado's Alaska. We're in and that's all that matters.
    Ding-ding-ding-ding-ding!

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  22. #22
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    One more thing of note with regard to Pac-Mas. Remember that weekend in June when Larry Scott was on an airplane tour of the Big 12, extending invites? His meeting at Texas A&M didn't go as planned (I strongly believe they made their SEC/Texas split intentions known at this point), and an unplanned trip to Kansas City (Lawrence) was made on the spot. I was living in Wichita at the time, and a massive thunderstorm hit the area. It was a true monster. There was no way a private jet could fly in that weather -- I was on I-35 for a short drive to pick up my wife and I was doing 30 MPH on the freeway. Scott's flight was diverted and he never made it to KC. Hours later, Texas started re-thinking its commitment to the Big 12. We'll never know what would/could have happened if Scott made it to KC.

    https://www.weather.gov/ict/event_20100614

    The interstate cluster in the upper-right hand corner is metro Kansas City. Wichita is dead center, and the interstate cluster to the south is Oklahoma City. Notice the time-elapse on the radar loop -- there's a period of several hours where small aircraft simply could not fly into KCI.

    Here are a couple of good stories from that timeframe that I'm sure had our interest at the time ...

    http://www.oregonlive.com/sports/ore...rs_pac-10.html

    http://www2.kusports.com/weblogs/big...th-10-million/

  23. #23
    More proof that God is a Ute fan.

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