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Playoff or pay-off? MEAC decision a 'win-win'
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Norfolk, VA (Sports Network) -
There's a difficult decision ahead for Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference football, and there may not be a right or wrong answer considering both of the given options have merit.
"A win-win situation," according to Norfolk State football coach Pete Adrian.
Just as the FCS is expanding its playoff format from 16 to 20 teams this season, Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference schools are weighing in on the idea of giving up the automatic bid afforded its champion, beginning in 2011, to return to a bowl game against the champion of the nation's other Historically Black Colleges and Universities league, the Southwestern Athletic Conference.
Talk of the potential Legacy Bowl has gone on for some time. Decision day is nearing.
Ironically, as FCS conferences desperate for an automatic bid like the Pioneer League and Great West circle the waters, there's good reason for the MEAC to considering giving up its bid. ESPN is believed to be offering around $1.5 million to the MEAC and SWAC for the television rights to such a bowl game.
The SWAC already foregoes sending its champion to the playoffs to have its own championship game, which draws huge crowds and revenue that stays within the conference. The FCS playoffs, meanwhile, aren't much of a revenue-generator for schools with small fan bases or those that, like the MEAC, rarely host.
"Hopefully it will be at some point in time in the fall, or before. At the latest in the fall," MEAC commissioner Dennis Thomas said today regarding the MEAC's decision during the conference's football media day.
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