Higher Calling: Coaches More Concerned With Their Egos Than What is Best for Fans
Shortsighted doesn't begin to describe Kentucky/Indiana and Kansas/Missouri for letting their entertaining rivalries expire. They are simply joining top six conference members DePaul/Illinois, Purdue/Notre Dame, Maryland/Georgetown, Boston College/Connecticut, UCLA/UNLV and Cincinnati/Ohio State as potentially great natural non-league matchups that their fans and players can't enjoy.
If bruised egos heal quickly, perhaps sounder minds will prevail in the near term but don't count on it. IU isn't interested in neutral court-only matchups with UK. Meanwhile, a neutral court might be the only possible venue to keep KU/Mizzou alive; perhaps with the Tigers opposing the Jayhawks in Kansas City much like Mizzou does in St. Louis against Illinois. But Mizzou can't moan and groan if the Jayhawks continue to act like a jilted lover because the self-centered Tigers fail to oppose competent in-state foes such as Missouri State and Saint Louis.
UK's inane quibbling with IU leaves one with the impression that the Wildcats will eventually threaten to leave the SEC unless opposing members play their league home games against them on neutral courts rather than their on-campus arenas (perhaps Alabama and Auburn in Birmingham, Arkansas in Little Rock, Georgia in Atlanta, Mississippi State and Ole Miss in Jackson, Florida in Orlando, Tennessee and Vanderbilt in Memphis, new member Mizzou in St. Louis, etc.).
By almost any measure, KU has a superior program to Mizzou. But Jayhawks coach Bill Self should have reined in his rhetoric as the divorce dialogue intensified or at least take a crash course in college basketball history. When comparing the significance of the Kentucky/Louisville rivalry to the pending termination of KU's home-and-home conference conflicts with the Tigers, Self said: "Well, they've always played every year (out of league). That's all they know." Well, Self needs to "always know" that UK and Louisville went 61 years from 1923 through 1983 without a regular-season matchup before they came to their senses and saw the light.
Speaking of light, UK, IU, KU and Mizzou simply have to shed one lightweight apiece to keep a good thing going for the sport in general and for their fans specifically. By toning down picking on patsies, there is plenty of room on their respective non-league schedules to keep playing each other. For instance, UK feasted on Chattanooga, Loyola (Md.), Marist, Radford, Samford and UALR this season while IU shamelessly dined on Gardner-Webb, Howard University, Maryland-Baltimore County, North Carolina Central, Savannah State, Stetson and Stony Brook. KU had colossal contests with Towson, Florida Atlantic, Howard and North Dakota while Mizzou met mighty Mercer, Niagara, Binghamton, Northwestern State, Navy, Kennesaw State and William & Mary.
UK/IU might have been the nation's premier regular-season game last year. If the century-old KU/Mizzou spectacle remains intact, it could immediately surpass Kentucky/Louisville and go atop the following list of the nation's best 25 nonconference rivalries if only because of longevity:
1. Kentucky/Louisville
2. Illinois/Missouri
3. Cincinnati/Xavier
4. Indiana/Kentucky
5. Indiana/Notre Dame
6. Brigham Young/Utah
7. Iowa/Iowa State
8. Memphis/Tennessee
9. St. Joseph's/Villanova
10. Georgia/Georgia Tech
11. Florida/Florida State
12. Clemson/South Carolina
13. Marquette/Wisconsin
14. New Mexico/New Mexico State
15. Utah/Utah State
16. Temple/Villanova
17. La Salle/Villanova
18. Florida/Miami (FL)
19. Iowa/Northern Iowa
20. Colorado/Colorado State
21. Drake/Iowa
22. Penn/Villanova
23. Providence/Rhode Island
24. Creighton/Nebraska
25. Idaho/Idaho State