Today marks the one-year anniversary of the Univ. of Maryland's "switch to the Big Ten," and there is a "collective confidence that the Terps have benefited financially and flourished competitively since the move," according to Don Markus of the Baltimore SUN. Since its move, UMd leads the conference with "seven regular-season and conference tournament championships; three final four appearances; and, in women's lacrosse, a national championship." Perhaps even more important "is the success of the Terps' marquee sports, men's basketball and football, which had better-than-expected inaugural seasons in the league and helped generate" much of the department's $15M in ticket sales and "spur the largest increase in attendance" in the Big Ten at 14%. Three years after eliminating seven sports to reduce a reported $21M deficit, AD Kevin Anderson said the athletic program is "meeting our projections" for the current fiscal year and is starting to near the day when it will be "totally solvent." Anderson said that he "expects the department's deficit to be gone 'by 2018 or 2019, and we can move forward from there.'" UMd Board of Regents Chair Tom McMillen said that his biggest reason for being critical of leaving the ACC "had to do with the secretive nature of the process." McMillen: "As I look back on it, this has been a positive decision. The revenue side is so compelling, I think if they would have showed us in a little greater deliberation, I think it would have put away a lot of concerns right away." Markus noted the Big Ten Network "has made it easier, too." Coaches and players "have raved about the added exposure Maryland teams, particularly those playing Olympic sports, have received on the cable channel." UMd football coach Randy Edsall said, "We've become more of a national school because of the Big Ten Network. We didn't have that before" (Baltimore SUN, 6/27).
SATURDAY NIGHT'S ALRIGHT: In Newark, Dan Duggan wrote to "gauge how far the Rutgers football program has come" since its move to the Big Ten before the '14 season, "one only has to look" at the team's '15 schedule. Games against Temple, UConn and South Florida "have been replaced by Penn State, Ohio State and Michigan State." Furthermore, games against those three "will kick-off in prime time on Saturday nights." The days when the "only way Rutgers could get on prime time was to play on a weeknight" are "long gone." Now, Rutgers is "looking at an 8 p.m. matchup with defending national champion Ohio State that could be broadcast nationally by ABC." The benefits of that type of exposure "can't be calculated." The potential positives of playing high-ranking teams in prime time "far outweigh the drawbacks" (Newark STAR-LEDGER, 6/28).
