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BIG TEN CONFERENCE BASKETBALL MEDIA DAYS

October 19, 2017

Madison Square Garden - New York, New York

THE MODERATOR: We open with Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany this morning. Delany is in his 29th year as commissioner of the Big Ten Conference. He's led the Big Ten through significant periods of growth that have helped the conference maintain its preeminent position as one of the Nation's leaders in quality, providing quality academic and athletic experiences for young men and women. Jim?

COMMISSIONER DELANY: Good morning. We're excited to be here in New York City at the world's most famous arena, Madison Square Garden. We thought this would be a unique opportunity for our players and our fans and our coaches. And our coaches and administrators evaluated it, made some changes, and we're here today. So I know in being with the coaches last night and seeing some of the players today, it really is a very unique opportunity.

College sports is thriving in New York City, a Gameday has been here. We've got super Saturday for the third year coming up with the hockey basketball doubleheader in later January. There are three college basketball tournaments in the area, and obviously Disney's new deal with Altice signifies even more college sports available in this unique and important city.

We have slightly less than 100,000 Big Ten alums living in the area, slightly less than a million in this corridor, so we'll be serving not only fans from the midwest, but also many of our new fans and many of our legacy fans who have moved into this very important corridor.

In a short period of time, we've really been able to establish a presence out here. We said we wanted to do it, but whether it's the pinstripe at Yankee Stadium, variety of events with marketing partnerships at Madison Square Garden or a variety of other tournaments. Last year we were in DC, this year we're in New York. We've got offices here. We've got lots of reasons to come and live, and it's what we wanted to do, it's what we thought we should do, and I appreciate all of the collaboration with people throughout the Big Ten to make these things possible.

Basketball in the Big Ten is in great shape. Whether you look back one year, five years or ten years. We've got three new coaches in the league with Brad Underwood, Archie Miller, and Chris Holtmann. We welcome them. These are successful coaches before they came here, and we expect them to have success here as well.

We've got a number of returning players on the first, second, and third teams, and we do a great job of not only recruiting players but developing players. In the last eight years we've had five national players of the year, Denzel Valentine in '16, Frank Kaminsky in '15, Oladipo and Trey Burke in '13, Draymond Green in '12, and Evan Turner in '10. So many of our players are able to not only succeed academically but athletically, and in particular I think these players indicate how you can rise to the very top of college basketball by playing in the Big Ten. We've got quality and we've got parity. Seven different teams have shared a Big Ten regular season championship in the last 15 years. Seven different teams have won the Big Ten men's tournament. For the 41st straight year we've led the country in attendance.

Going back -- we're going back to Chicago and Indy. Back to Chicago in '19 and '21, and Indy in '20 and '22. Looking out into the future, as noted earlier, we've got a tremendous fan base in this region of the country. We will be returning to the Midwest as noted, but we'll probably try to aspire to maybe an 80/20 split between Midwestern venues and Eastern venues. So the great majority will be out in the Midwest, but we'll be back here from time to time to reflect where our schools are located as well as where our alumni live.

Going back over the last decade, 13 of our 14 teams have made it to the NCAA Tournament. All time, all 14 with Northwestern qualifying last year which was a great story. All 14 of our schools have played in the NCAA Tournament. In the last decade we've had seven teams in the Final Four, ten teams in the Elite Eight and 28 teams in the Sweet Sixteen. The only conference to qualify multiple teams into the Sweet Sixteen over the last decade. We've averaged over six teams per year, 63 teams in ten years, winning 93 tournament games.

This is amplified by television. This year '17-'18 will be the 11th consecutive season where all games are nationally telecast. And with FOX joining the Big Ten alignment of media partners, we'll have FOX, ESPN, BTN, and CBS. People continue not only to attend our games but also to watch them. Last year CBS was plus-18% year over year in ratings, and BTN was plus 10%.

So we're very excited to have FOX in our partnerships in addition to their joint venture with BTN. And they have had great success in the first six weeks of college football, and we expect them to have great success going into basketball.

So we've got partners with big platforms, big promotions, and we're quite proud of that.

CBS will televise the semifinals and finals for our tournament, and that goes all the way back. They've been doing this since 1998, and a new feature is that BTN will telecast 10 of the 13 events. So they'll have a tremendous presence here, not only on super Saturday, but also with our tournament.

At this juncture, I'd like to bring up Dan Weinberg from CBS. Dan is point person for CBS. Our relationship with them goes back to the early '90s, and as noted, back to 1998 with our tournament. So at our football kickoff luncheon, we brought up ESPN, BTN and FOX, and since CBS's relationship with us is football -- excuse me, is basketball, I wanted to bring Dan up to say a few words on behalf of this partnership. So welcome, and thank you.

DAN WEINBERG: Hi everybody. Good morning. Thank you so much to the commissioner. We're very, very appreciative to be part of the program today for a short bit here. On behalf of all the men and women at CBS Sports, we are extremely pleased and really proud to be continuing this longstanding relationship with the Big Ten. It goes back almost three decades now.

Big Ten basketball has been and continues to be an incredibly important anchor for CBS Sports college basketball coverage for several generations. You all know we eat and breathe college basketball at CBS Sports. It's part of our DNA, and Big Ten basketball has been a corner Stone of that for a long, long time now.

Every year we enjoy telling the stories of the Big Ten student-athletes, the Big Ten institutions, the conference as a whole. We relish the opportunity to cover the league every year from November right on through the NCAA Tournament, and as you mentioned, Jim, we're very proud of the fact that the semifinals and the championship game of your conference tournament have only had one home, CBS Sports, since its inception a couple decades ago.

Overall, CBS Sports, we take a tremendous amount of pride in this partnership. We value it a great deal. It is a priority for us, and we're pleased it will be that way into the next decade. Thanks to you Commissioner Delany and also to the team and league office led by Mark Rudner who we work with so closely all the time. We look forward to many successful seasons of Big Ten basketball on CBS Sports moving forward. We'll see you all on the road to the Final Four.

COMMISSIONER DELANY: Thank you. So I've completed my remarks, and I'll be happy to answer any questions that you may have.

Q. When did the idea of having the conference formally come to Madison Square Garden?
COMMISSIONER DELANY: I can't give you a precise date, but I can tell you that when Rutgers and Maryland, as new members, came into focus, it occurred to me that we needed to be very proactive about developing a presence in the corridor. It led us to make some decisions about locating an office here. It made sense for us to push very hard for a BTN distribution.

So the date is not clear to me, but it was one of maybe the most important of many decisions that we wanted to make to live here not visit here. We moved -- it wasn't easy to move the schedules in the way we did, but we got collaboration. Thanked our coaches last night for that. It was a little challenging because Northwestern's facility is being renovated and with the Super Bowl in Minneapolis, we lost some additional dates.

So we got great cooperation from everybody, and we're very much looking forward to being here.

Q. I just wonder, as commissioner, when you look at the coaches throughout the conference, what role do you feel you play, and what needs to change to create more minority coaches and more opportunities for minority coaches in the league?
COMMISSIONER DELANY: Yeah, of course we've had minority coaches. We don't have them on our roster now, but we have had over many decades. And the role we play is a more general one both in the conference office as well as on our campuses. Equity is important, opportunity is important, fairness is important. So it's pretty much bred into everything we do.

As you may know, we've had five or six people leave our office to run leagues, Division I leagues, a couple women, a couple African-Americans, a couple of Caucasians, and across our coaching, our ADs, our Presidents, as well as minor sports, it's important. It's a meritocracy, and everybody should be provided opportunity to compete. So I think it's in our DNA.

How the actual search comes out is a local decision based on what the institution needs and wants at the that time, and what the pool of candidates is. But we're foursquare for opportunity, for diversity. You know, it's something to talk about regularly at all levels of our governance.

Q. 20-game conference schedule. What are the benefits of that, and what were the challenges of making it happen?
COMMISSIONER DELANY: Yeah, so we've been looking at basketball and took a pretty hard look this year as we were navigating a shorter season, the same number of games. We looked at the place of basketball, not only in the Big Ten but nationally, and really came to a conclusion, which we talked with our coaches, talked with our administrators, that we needed to control the number of quality games. We felt we could add quality games in basketball. We felt we could spread out the games a bit, and therefore there would be a couple games in early December we thought we could experiment over time.

In terms of making the presentation of Big Ten basketball even better. We've sold out -- not sold out, but we've led the country for 41 years. We've had pretty good television ratings. But we're also conscious of the fact that college football has grown tremendously. Part of that, not all of that, but part of that has been by increasing the quality of games going from 8 to 9. The addition of the College Football Playoff. The addition of the major intersectional, and some control on playing schools with fewer scholarships and fewer resources.

So we thought that taking the approach to college basketball, similar to the one we did with college football, would help us lessen compression in January and February with good planning, trying to capture some interest we have with other games. We have an ACC challenge now, we have two additional games in December, and albeit we'll lose two non-conference games. But we think in general, people respond more to the conference game than the non-conference.

We're also able, I think, to build on the historic rivalries. We have three that are in the state, in Indiana and Purdue -- and Indiana-Purdue, Michigan-Michigan State, Illinois-Northwestern. But also to build some regionalization. If you look at the release, you can see that those three will play 100% of the time. That regional rivals and there are four in the east, four in the west, will play ten times in a 12-year period, and all others will play nine times in a 12-year period. So we just thought playing against each other, more was good, and good for the Big Ten, and good for college basketball generally.

Q. With the F.B.I. investigation that came out a week or so ago, I'm wondering what the Big Ten's reaction is to that? Is there anything as a conference moving forward to alleviate some of those issues?
COMMISSIONER DELANY: Yeah, we're all concerned, and we should be. We don't know what we don't know. We sort of know what you know, what we read about in the paper. We've had no contact with the government. We really don't have any facts other than what we've read. I'm sure it will unfold and it we'll learn more as things, as investigations become more public.

I'm not shocked about this. This is the 10th, ninth or tenth intersection between college basketball and the F.B.I. going back to 1950. Southern District of New York uncovered a very wide ranging gambling scandal in 1950. In 1960, same thing. And in the late '70s, a more narrow set of gambling investigations, middle '80s again. Later '80s agents came into the scene. Early 90's, gambling again. Later 90's gambling and agent-related investigations out of Detroit. 2000 in Kansas City and 2017 back in the Southern District of New York. So there have been at least nine intersections between college basketball and the F.B.I. in my life, and I can remember, I grew up across the river in New Jersey, and waking up as a 12-year-old and seeing two individuals being taken out of their dormitory in handcuffs by the F.B.I. for their engagement -- alleged engagement in gambling.

So, we should all be concerned. We don't know what we don't know. Our coaches will coach, and they will do the best they can to get students to class and get them on the right path. But beyond that, the Big Ten does not have any information that you otherwise don't have. Speculation probably doesn't benefit anybody at this juncture.

Q. Good morning. I know it's not in your conference, but it affects college sports and it's related to a school that you have a close relationship with. Any reaction of the NCAA's decision on North Carolina to essentially not punish them for the academic issue?
COMMISSIONER DELANY: Not really. I mean the story is the story. The NCAA concluded that it didn't have jurisdiction. So no matter how much someone may view the merits of those, those were not good practices that occurred there. They were not good practices for students. They were not good practices for the university or its athletes, they've taken a lot of collective action. And the NCAA simply concluded they didn't have jurisdiction. So beyond that, I can't really say much. I don't think it was a win or a loss. I think it was NCAA has some limitations in terms of the applications of its by laws. And listening to Commissioner Sankey, that's what I took away.

Q. Getting back to the F.B.I. investigation. What are the things that you would do to try to clean up college basketball right now?
COMMISSIONER DELANY: Yeah, well, we've talked to our coaches. I've given them Gene Smith's phone number, and encouraged them. I know he's encouraged them. He'd like to hear from them. I think internally we'll have some discussions and pass on our recommendations to the commission. I think President Emmert put it well, half steps are not sufficient.

There are obviously a number of things that could be done structurally, but also one of the things that stands out to me is is that in the first investigations it was external people working with players to fix games. In the last three or four there's been more engagement on the agent side, the advisor side, still some, perhaps gambling. And in these most recent cases, there are people inside of our programs. That's a big difference between being inside and outside.

But different kinds of federal laws apply. There is an NCAA side to this a Federal government side, and there is also a value side to this. So I think we have to be very honest, once we know what's going on, to address it the best we can. I don't have a list of five reforms I'd like to see. But I do think it starts with abiding by the rules that we all agree to. You may disagree with the rules and their methods for changing those both at the NCAA, some people go to court. But until rules are changed, you abide by the rules, period.

Q. To follow-up on that, do you see a conflict between the constitutions right against self-incrimination, versus the NCAA's requirement to report?
COMMISSIONER DELANY: I hadn't thought about the right against -- one is a criminal standard, the other is an administrative standard created by a voluntary association. So I don't think there is any conflict. I've never heard that argued at NCAA. You could belong to it, not belong to it. You could subscribe to its rules or not. You could try to change its rules. In any organization, whether it's private or public, you're expected to follow the rules of the organization. I've never seen anyone challenge it under a Fifth Amendment basis.

Q. Can you discuss about having the conference championship tournament games at Madison Square on the week before championship week?
COMMISSIONER DELANY: Yeah, I mean, that was a known variable when the decision was made. We had a lot of discussion. It's not where we've been in the 20 or so years that we've had in the tournament. I know that the coaches had some discussion about how they would use that last week. Most of them coached at the mid-major level before coming here, and they've experienced that there. I have as well when I was in the Ohio Valley Conference. So most people have had some experience with it.

I mean, with the two sides, you get more of an opportunity to rest, and on the other hand you get more opportunity to maybe get a little rusty. So I think each of them have had an experience. I think all of them have concluded that they don't want to play a scrimmage or competition to my knowledge. So they'll rest up a little bit. I know the way it will play out if we have a successful tournament, they'll probably attribute it to playing well. If they probably don't have it, they'll probably attribute it to the layoff.

We won't know until it happens, but it happens for a good 10, 15 of the conferences, and you still see teams playing well with the time off, but we'll see what happens.

Q. You mentioned earlier an 80/20 potential split as far as for down the road with tournaments. Are you thinking New York City or other strategic spots on the east coast? And had there been other cities that have reached out?
COMMISSIONER DELANY: Yeah, my thought would be that over time we'd be out here a couple of times. Where we would go and when we would go is subject to discussions. I don't have any preconceived notions. Obviously New York and D.C. are really important venues, but there are other important venues, so we'd be open to that. But we went to D.C. and New York first because we thought those were the two best fits for us in the early stages.

So what I wanted to signal as much as anything else is that it most of our institutions and most of our fan base is in the Midwest, and we will be there a good bit, but we'll also be living here and trying to bring those two regions together from the standpoint of competition, fan exposure, television exposure, marketing exposure. Because I think it's an incredibly important area for us, and we want to be here. So it's just a signal that we'll be back.

Q. Obviously, there is a lot going on with the sport. If you had to give college basketball a grade, A, B, C, D or F right now, what grade would you give it?
COMMISSIONER DELANY: Well, fortunately, I don't have to give anybody a grade. I'm not a teacher. I'm very concerned, yet I'm not shocked. You hear things, you don't have facts. If you did have facts, you would share them with the appropriate people. We've always encouraged our coaches to abide by the rules. We've always encouraged our coaches to help young people move towards education. There are some very good things going on in college basketball, and obviously by recent reports, there are some things that are very wrong. But I would be reluctant to give it a grade.

Q. In terms of you sort of addressed the whole timing of the Big Ten tournament coming the week before the Big East is here. To the layperson, who is just a hard core, Big Ten fan, can you explain why New York is so important that you possibly put these teams that are going to make the tournament at the disadvantage of having all that time off?
COMMISSIONER DELANY: Yeah, well, I would disagree that it's a disadvantage. You won't know if it's an advantage or disadvantage until you have results. We've had years where we've had tremendous success in the tournament. We've had years where we've been less successful.

So, I think that it's important to us, because I've noticed from time to time when you see expansion, you don't see a proactive follow-up on it. You add institutions, but you don't embrace them. You add geography, but you don't live there. You don't make significant or sufficient effort to become part of communities that are new to you.

So while the Big Ten has been around for 122 years and we have the largest alumni base and probably the most disparate Big Ten distribution, we want it to be more than clear. We wanted to actively compete and participate in this corridor. Why this corridor? I think it's probably the most important corridor in the country. Maybe the world, if you look at media, if you look at politics, if you look at banking, if you look at finance. So it was important for us to be here, to live here, participate, and to do everything we could to facilitate integration athletically, competitively, culturally, and that's why we're here.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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