T1B

U-M, Notre Dame Agree to 20-Year Contract Extension



ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- The University of Michigan and University of Notre Dame athletic departments announced jointly on Monday (July 30) a 20-year contract extension in the Michigan-Notre Dame football series, extending the series from 2012-31. With the current contract expiring after the 2011 season, the new contract guarantees that the two winningest football programs in NCAA Division I history will meet every season for the next 25 years.

"We are pleased to have reached a formal agreement with Notre Dame to extend our football series," said U-M director of athletics Bill Martin. "We are thrilled that the series between two premier college football programs will continue uninterrupted for the next 25 years."

"The Notre Dame-Michigan game has been a red-letter date on the football schedule for a long time, so it made perfect sense to make certain the rivalry continues annually long into the future," said Notre Dame director of athletics Kevin White.

The Wolverines and Fighting Irish rank No. 1 and No. 2 all-time, respectively, in Division I victories, winning percentage, television appearances and final composite AP poll rankings. U-M leads the all-time series, 19-14-1. The rivalry dates back to 1877 with an 8-0 Michigan victory at Notre Dame, the first of eight straight U-M wins in the series. After playing nine times between 1887 and 1909, the series went on hiatus before the teams split a pair of games in 1942 and 1943. The teams did not face one another again until 1978, since which time they have played every year except six, taking two-year breaks in 1983-84, 1995-96 and 2000-01.

"I am delighted that Bill Martin and Kevin White were able to work through all of the issues to ensure that we have an uninterrupted continuation of the Notre Dame-Michigan series," said U-M head coach Lloyd Carr. "It is a game our players and alumni, and every college football fan, deserves. I am ecstatic they were able to come to an agreement."

"This is great news that Notre Dame and Michigan will be playing for the next 25 years," said UND head coach Charlie Weis. "As the head coach of Notre Dame and an alumnus of the University, I'm very glad that Kevin White and Bill Martin have maintained this series. This rivalry is good for both schools and college football."



I was looking forward to playing some other big time programs, hopefully this won't get in the way.

I wonder if they came to terms with the home and away stuff. I hope they did.

Wonder if this'll put the kibosh on the UM-UGA series.

i think martin's idea of u-m/uga is a complete PR move to counter the alumni criticism of the appalacian state game and the controversy surrounding the addition to the big house. that said, i hope he follows through. would be a good series.

i was surprised to see the length of the nd/u-m series extension and i like it. nothing like some good rust belt animosity. it's good for college football.

BlindRef wrote:I wonder if they came to terms with the home and away stuff. I hope they did.

The problem is that the current set-up works to ND's benefit, in that Michigan and USC are staggered as home-and-away. So if ND accommodates Michigan, ND needs an accommodation from USC in return. Perhaps the easier solution is for Michigan to adjust its series with tOSU.

Screw_Michigan wrote:i was surprised to see the length of the nd/u-m series extension and i like it. nothing like some good rust belt animosity. it's good for college football.

Agreed, this series is good for college football, although I would prefer that Michigan agree to play it later in the season.

With the recent word about potential Big Ten expansion, some bloggers had suggested a Big Ten boycott of ND if ND refuses to join the Big Ten. I guess that's not going to happen now.

I wonder if this ends Delaney's grousing about expansion? My guess is that it does...

WolverineSteve wrote:I was looking forward to playing some other big time programs, hopefully this won't get in the way.

I'm with you...I was excited by the idea of playing home-and-home series with an SEC or Big XII power. Have different opponents every few years...similar to the Buckeyes. I love how they have different teams on the schedule every two years because admittedly, I get bored with the Notre Dame series and I wouldn't have mind a couple years off from that.

It was funny last night when ESPN was running the story in crawl when I flipped on the TV after work and I saw "Michigan" and "contract extension through 2031"...I was thinking Lllllloyd signed a lifetime deal. I'm glad it was this instead...no offense to him.

Screw_Michigan wrote:i think martin's idea of u-m/uga is a complete PR move to counter the alumni criticism of the appalacian state game and the controversy surrounding the addition to the big house. that said, i hope he follows through. would be a good series.

Michigan has an open date next season so they need to add someone to the slate. Boise State has been a team that could play in that open date. I think they're limited to which school has an open date the same weekend Michigan has available.

Screw_Michigan wrote:...controversy surrounding the addition to the big house...

I've seen preliminary designs and it looks like UM is just doing the same thing that tOSU & Wisky (to name a few) did by adding luxury suites.

Blind, Shoalzie, Steve, M Club-- what's your guys' take on the expansion? Are most UM fans pissed about it? Most Michigan fans I know are pretty conservative regarding tradition & change, I'd be interested to hear what you think about this.

L45B wrote:Blind, Shoalzie, Steve, M Club-- what's your guys' take on the expansion? Are most UM fans pissed about it? Most Michigan fans I know are pretty conservative regarding tradition & change, I'd be interested to hear what you think about this.

I think most fans are mad because ticket prices go up when they build an expansion like this. Then you schedule teams like App. State or any MAC team and expect the fans to pay top dollar, there is going to be some griping. Michigan Stadium has been renovated and fixed so often...I can't imagine people bitching about that as much as they would about having to pay more for going to games.

L45B wrote:

Screw_Michigan wrote:..

Blind, Shoalzie, Steve, M Club-- what's your guys' take on the expansion? Are most UM fans pissed about it? Most Michigan fans I know are pretty conservative regarding tradition & change, I'd be interested to hear what you think about this.

As a season ticket holder I am excited about the changes. I think it will make the stadium louder, make the atmosphere more fun. The University has gotten very good at doing the right things while making money. I am looking forward to it.

BlindRef wrote:

L45B wrote:

Screw_Michigan wrote:..

Blind, Shoalzie, Steve, M Club-- what's your guys' take on the expansion? Are most UM fans pissed about it? Most Michigan fans I know are pretty conservative regarding tradition & change, I'd be interested to hear what you think about this.

As a season ticket holder I am excited about the changes. I think it will make the stadium louder, make the atmosphere more fun. The University has gotten very good at doing the right things while making money. I am looking forward to it.

What has the changes done to the ticket prices?

PSUFAN wrote:I wonder if this ends Delaney's grousing about expansion? My guess is that it does...

Delaney's now saying that his expansion talk was "taken out of context"...

from what i read, a lot of the grumbling about the stadium expansion had to do with the quality of people's seat locations and how they would be affected by the new shit. i.e., some ticket holders who finally got seats that are not sitting directly in the afternoon sun during those hot, august and september games, are worried they might be back where they started. also, the school had to fight off the ADA over the proposed renovations. i'm not sure what the status of that is. and, last but not least, spending public tax dollars on a football stadium that could be spent in other areas of the university, etc.

BF, glad your happy. scu-m could use a real home field advantage for once.

Shoalzie wrote:

BlindRef wrote:

L45B wrote: As a season ticket holder I am excited about the changes. I think it will make the stadium louder, make the atmosphere more fun. The University has gotten very good at doing the right things while making money. I am looking forward to it.

What has the changes done to the ticket prices?

Nothing yet.

The old farts never embrace change. Alot of what I love about Michigan Football is the rich history and traditions. I'm ok with the plans I've seen. As blind eluded to, the addition of the boxes is supposed to change the accoustics of the bowl shaped stadium and trap in more crowd noise, this I will be thankful for.

As for pricing, I think the plan was for the revenue from the suites to pay for themselves. In the future there will be these damn PSL's and premium game pricing. If I'm not mistaken, I believe only the OSU game is priced differently. I can see MSU, ND, PSU, and perhaps Wisky joining the Buckeyes, giving the school 2 or 3 premium games per year.

Shoalzie wrote:I'm with you...I was excited by the idea of playing home-and-home series with an SEC or Big XII power. Have different opponents every few years...similar to the Buckeyes. I love how they have different teams on the schedule every two years because admittedly, I get bored with the Notre Dame series and I wouldn't have mind a couple years off from that.

I will admit, the rare non-conference matchup (ala tOSU-Texas) really helps with national exposure. The media really ate it up the past couple years. I'm sure Michigan will not back down in its attempts to get a big name on the slate even with the Notre Dame series continuing forward.

I am definitely excited about future h&h with USC, Miami, Oklahoma and VaTech but I am skeptical about some of our other non-conference games. In the next couple seasons, we have games lined up with Troy, New Mexico State, Youngstown State & Army. Ughhhh, not a fan at all. I'd much prefer lower-tier BCS schools that D-1AA opponents and service academies. I know this is becoming more common now with some of the traditional powers, but I really wish tOSU's AD would step up and grow some bigger nads.

^^^^^^^^^

not everyone is USC...



I like the schedule in future years...especially with KAL and OU on the docket...I would like to see them mix in:

(no particular order or preference)

Colorado
LSU (2 classics they played in the late 80's)
WVU again just because we pounded the shit out of those inbreds in 1998 and they squak to me like they won
Notre Dame - outside of Michigan last year I don't think I ever saw campus that electric than in 1995
Tennessee - just because I want to beat those fuckers fair and square with not cheating cleats
A&M or Texas again...
UF or FSU - already got Miami but playing a home and home...helps recruiting...

just some thoughts...

I admit I was skeptical when they re-did the Shoe...but damn if it isn't awesome...

buckeye_in_sc wrote: FSU

The noles love playing in the shoe

Michigan and Utah will meet up in the opener next year...

http://mgoblue.com/document_display.cfm ... t_id=25071

Since it's been done by others, my thoughts on ND's scheduling:

First, the 7-4-1 model is a disaster waiting to happen. It has to go. It only guarantees us a significant run of bottom-feeders who don't care about a return date.

Locking up Michigan for the long-term was nice, but it was a deal that had to get done. There are more deals that have to be made with powers, although none for that duration other than USC.

I was excited about the barnstorming idea when it first came out, but the results that have come in so far have been less than overwhelming. Washington State isn't that bad an opponent, but it makes no sense to play them in San Antonio. Baylor in Dallas makes more sense geographically, but we're playing fugging Baylor. There are rumors that Duke will be one of the Orlando games. At this point, I'd scrap the barnstorming idea altogether, or relegate it to east coast games vs. Big East teams and games vs. service academies. We could play the service academies in cities where that branch of the service has an important presence, e.g., Navy in Jacksonville or San Diego. As long as we didn't play Army and Air Force in the same season that would be all right.

I don't mind playing three Big East games per season. We have a vested interest in seeing that conference succeed, and three games per year is a painless way of helping out. But given that we have long-term, home-and-home deals with both Pitt and Rutgers, and the model is one home, one away and one neutral field game per year, I'm unclear as to how the math works out. Again, trying to stuff 50 pounds of shit into a 10-pound bag.

The Stanford contract expires after the '10 season. A lot of posters on the ND homer boards want to see Stanford go. I'm not so sure that's a good idea. Stanford has the right idea when it comes to student-athlete ideals. Also, Stanford guarantees us a California road trip every season. That's important given the fact that California is recruit-rich, as well as the fact that there is a fairly substantial number of both alumni and subway alumni in California.

I'm in favor of a middle ground here. What I would do is rotate this game among a number of western schools: Cal, Arizona State, Hawaii, UCLA and Stanford. Each of these teams would play us twice a decade. With one exception, described below, each series would be a home-and-home, with the home game played in mid-October and the away game played on Thanksgiving weekend, in opposite years from USC.

The one exception would be Hawaii. We'd play both games vs. Hawaii on the road, which would allow us to schedule a 13th game, presumably at home, in those seasons. In the year that USC was a road game, Hawaii would be played the following week (first week of December).

This would guarantee us a road game out west, in a warmer climate than ND, every year at Thanksgiving. We'd play a Pac-10 team on the road every year but once per decade, and a road game in California 8 out of every 10 years. We'd also get more variety in our schedule, without completely cutting our ties with Stanford.

i wouldn't like the barnstorming thing much the ways it's played out.

Baylor will try and leghump that it's a match-up of "elite" religious/private schools....when the fact is Baylor is just expensive and maybe the 4th or 5th best school in the Big XII, if that. but, Baylor alums strut like BU is N'Western or Stanford. and it ain't.