Looks Like Seattle U Basketball Will Go Division One Again, And Soon

In a surprising move the WCC turned down Seattle for membership and said they weren't interested in expanding now or in the immediate future.

The surprise of course comes from East of the mountains. Gonzaga is the dog that wags the WAC's tail, and they want no part of a revived Seattle U competing against them in recruiting. They also don't want to play four extra conference games because it would take away from their premier non conference schedule.

Seattle U will have to go independent if they want to get back to Division One, and that isn't as big a hurdle as it seems, and it might make it more interesting during the provisional years they would have to go through anyway.

Hopefully Seattle U forges ahead and decides to go division one.

Denver, and Pacific would be likely candidates if Seattle U goes Div One to join the WCC. Seattle U is going to do it, it is going to happen.

If Seattle U goes d-1, it would seem like a natural fit for them to aim for the WCC. U of the Pacific (CA) has been rumored to be looking at the WCC, except that the WCC supposedly hasn't been looking to end up with an odd number.

Seattle U might not get in right away -- especially given that they'll have several years of transition time ahead of them before they're completely offficial. But to me the odds are better for Seattle in the WCC if UoP is still interested, and if Seattle does jump, it only helps UoP.

Seattle and UoP are the last two colleges on the west coast that fit the WCC's academic profile, and that conference is the only one where either of these two schools won't be stuck with a bunch of dissimilar monster public intitutions. The WCC is a clear match for SU and UoP, and their odds are better together.

The real question is one for the WCC: why not add them? Facilities? UoP is improving theirs, and I wonder if conference affiliation might not help SU to do so with the extra stability. To me the only real question is whether the incumbents will think they'll gain enough from the two extra programs to to compensate for the extra spreading around of the conference's shared revenues.

The main problem that I see is that they won't be able to find a league that will take them. Maybe the Big Sky would be interested, but I doubt the WCC, already with an even number of teams and trying to get the rest of their school's facilities to get in line with Gonzaga, will want to bring them back on. I too would love to see it, but I doubt it will happen too soon.

If Seattle U goes D1, then it would be great if Seattle Pacific followed. That would then turn into a genuinely great rivalry. Personally, I would like to see Western and Central go D1 at some point. I think both of those schools could make a name for themselves at a higher level.

I wouldn't count your chickens before they hatch. While they are exploring the idea, SU has many challenges that it needs to overcome before they could even consider going D1. Most critically, infrastructure.

Before they can even *think* about going D1 they will need to completely rebuild their facilities (See this Spectator article).

Also, the problem with the premise of this post is that they already have more students than they know what to do with. They had a record enrollment this year of over 7000 UG and GR students, with 700+ first-time freshmen. They have some freshmen living in the lounges of dorms (4 to a lounge!). Recruitment isn't a problem for them.

It was very smart of them to get out of D1 when they did, because at the time the university was facing very dire circumstances. It wasn't really an option, but I think that by focusing on their core values (education), getting rid of what was, at the time, a heavy weight was the right thing to do.

This said, I'm all for them forming a "task force", however I'm not sure I really see it being a sure thing by any stretch. If you calculated a ratio of the total number of "task forces" SU has had in it's history and compare it to the number of concrete projects actually seen through to fruition, you'd need a calculator that handles decimals.

BobH, you are absolutely right--thanks for catching that. It takes a village, you know.

At the risk of being called a grammar nazi that should be an alumnus, not alumni.