If the Ivy League had to expand, who'd join?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Since everybody says the the Ivy League is nothing more than a sports league, Alabama is the logical answer.

Roll Tide!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Certain schools have surpassed any potential benefit they would get from joining the Ivy League anyways. Stanford has built an incredible brand that is recognized globally on its own thanks to the emergence of tech and Silicon Valley. At this point, Stanford is more desirable than the entire Ivy League outside of Harvard so in many ways joining the Ivy League would be a disservice to Stanford. Plus, if their football becomes truly elite again, that brings a lot of culture and revenue that being in the Ivy League would ruin.

Duke is already probably better than most of the Ivy League schools academically, and it has become the basketball school in the country. Basketball is a growing sport both domestically and internationally, so Duke likely gets more benefit from having a globally recognized team than it would from being in the Ivy League. Plus its surrounding area, the Research Triangle Park, has the potential to become a new hotbed for innovation as high prices continue to cause discontent in SF. North Carolina just needs to continue growing economically and not shoot itself in the foot with bad policies.

MIT is also better than most of the Ivy Leagues anyways, and some of their major traits would make them at odds with the standard Ivy League practices. For example, they don’t admit based on legacy or major donors, which every Ivy League school does, so MIT likely doesn’t want to change that. The MIT experience is meant to be highly rigorous and quantitative - it wouldn’t make sense for them to change their standards to fit into the Ivy mold. Additionally, it has an Ivy League compatriot just a 15 minute drive away - why would it need the redundancy of two Ivy League schools in such close proximity? I think the current setup for Harvard and MIT is much better, as they complement each other well.

That leaves a few options left: Northwestern, Rice, UChicago, Johns Hopkins, Vanderbilt, and WashU. Vanderbilt would benefit from being Ivy probably, but its strong baseball program makes it likely they’d refuse to join. Northwestern is probably already academically as strong as middle-of-the-pack Ivies, so they don’t stand to gain much by joining, and their football program is solid enough to prioritize over being Ivy. So that leaves 3 schools that would be a good fit for joining the Ivy League: Johns Hopkins, UChicago, and WashU. I think Hopkins would make the most sense since it’s fairly close in proximity to the Ivy League, and it would fit in nicely with what the Ivy League already offers.

LOL, do you have any idea how much the new SEC media deal will be worth?

I meant academically/name recognition-wise, notice that I refer to athletics right after.

You refer to a non-revenue sport that would have absolutely zero consideration in a realignment

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Stanford is not leaving the Pac12 and is a possible B1G candidate, so that is out. Northwestern isn't giving up a billion dollars in athletcs money for the Ivys.

I would agree with MIT, Hopkins and Georgetown.

+1

Queue the Georgetown hater.

Also, MIT won’t join.

[Anonymous]

According to Wikipedia:
“ The first known instance of the term Ivy League appeared in The Christian Science Monitor on February 7, 1935.[7][53][54] Several sportswriters and other journalists used the term shortly later to refer to the older colleges, those along the northeastern seaboard of the United States, chiefly the nine institutions with origins dating from the colonial era, together with the United States Military Academy (West Point), the United States Naval Academy, and a few others. These schools were known for their long-standing traditions in intercollegiate athletics, often being the first schools to participate in such activities. At this time, however, none of these institutions made efforts to form an athletic league.” From an athletic competition standpoint, the USMA and USNA would make sense. Like the Ivy’s they have good athletes who are not at a level that they have pro aspirations, and the geography is perfect. Doubt that this would ever happen, though.

[Anonymous]

The only thing keeping Georgetown relevant is their basketball program. They aren't sacrificing that

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Northwestern was the frontrunner when the Ivy League was actually considering to expand back in the '80s.

Realistically, the only schools that would merit consideration are Stanford, UChicago, MIT, Duke, Northwestern, and Hopkins.

Northwestern would never leave the Big10 (or whatever it's currently called). Financially there is no reason. And in the last 20 years, they have competed well in Football (not this year), despite being 8K undergrads vs over 20K everywhere else.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Northwestern was the frontrunner when the Ivy League was actually considering to expand back in the '80s.

Realistically, the only schools that would merit consideration are Stanford, UChicago, MIT, Duke, Northwestern, and Hopkins.

Northwestern would never leave the Big10 (or whatever it's currently called). Financially there is no reason. And in the last 20 years, they have competed well in Football (not this year), despite being 8K undergrads vs over 20K everywhere else.

I love my NW football but it's annoying that we keep losing to Duke. Football isn't even their specialty and it would be even more annoying if they became a top football school as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The only thing keeping Georgetown relevant is their basketball program. They aren't sacrificing that

Lol-there he is! What took you so long???

[Anonymous]

The Ivy League would probably love to have Stanford or Duke join but they get that sports $$$ that would be too good to say no to.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is no reason why the Ivies need to expand in 2022.

There’s also no reason why parents need to destroy childhoods in a desperate attempt to have their kids admitted to an Ivy. As an Ivy grad, I can tell you — it ain’t worth it. There’s a plethora of good schools out there that can give students the education and networks they need to establish a strong career and live a comfortable life.

You are missing the point of the conversation.

What is the point if this conversation, exactly?

Not academics. Not making more college seats for smart kids.

[Anonymous]

It cracks me up that there are people on this thread who cannot think of the ivy league without focusing solely on academic prestige.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The Ivy League would probably love to have Stanford or Duke join but they get that sports $$$ that would be too good to say no to.

Why would Ivy League schools want to foot the bill for putting their athletes on planes to the West Coast?

The Ivy League does fine as it is.

[Anonymous]

I believe UChicago was offered a spot back in the day.

None of the schools in big NCAA power 5 conferences would leave them; there’s too much money at stake.

[Anonymous]

Northeastern

[Anonymous]

Seriously as the term Ivy League only applies to a sports conference and not to the prestige some of these moms think it has, it only makes sense to bring UGA into the IVY!