New American Frontier - Baseball Regionals

Day one of regionals is in the books.  Four AAC teams made the baseball dance.  Houston, South Florida, East Carolina and Tulane carried the American banner.

So how did our teams fare?

For reference, Houston, the regular season champs, hosts the Houston regional.  #1 Houston opened up against #4 Houston Baptist.  The Coogs fell down early 4-0 but rallied for a 6-4 win.  UH will face Louisiana-Lafayette in the winners bracket game 2.  Some insignificant team named rice blew a big lead to UL-Lafayette.

In the Coral Gables Regional, East Carolina, the AAC Tournament Champ and #2 seed, was upended by #3 seed Columbia.  ECU will face FIU in an elimination game.

In the Gaineville Regional, USF beat Florida Atlantic 5-3 and set up a showdown with #1 seed Florida.  Florida defeated Florida A&M 19-0.  USF has it's work cut for it but they are American and will pull it off.

As of this writing, it's not looking so good for Tulane in the Baton Rouge Regional.  The Green Wave trail UNC-W 9-1 in the 6th.

D1baseball.com, a favorite of mine, chimes in on both UH and UL-La's win in Dispatches from Houston.

Late Update: Tulane falls 10-1...ugh

New American Frontier - Links Covering the AAC

Been a busy week at work and mix in the holiday weekend and I've haven't had time to keep up with the blog.

The AAC placed four teams in the NCAA baseball tourney.  Houston will serve as a regional host.

Commish Aresco hopes to negotiate a new TV deal within three years.

New Austin Bowl will wait until 2016 hoping for P5 tie in.

Underdog Dynasty Story on Austin Bowl

UMass Needs Naval Support - this blogger believes Navy should bolt from AAC and AAC should pick up UMass.

Getting To Know Our New Coaches - a profile of the three new head football coaches from the official site.

Memphis non-conference 2015-16 basketball schedule release.

AAC TV start times were announced for some 2015 football games on ESPN family.

American's East Contenders Can Change Way We Think About AAC

American West Can Help Shape Conference Image Too

AAC Imposes New Concussion Policy

Houston Lands Two More Top Recruits - the Htown Takeover Continues

Cincy on the Prowl Looks at why the Bearcats need P5 access.
Who in the AAC doesn't?

Cincy on the Prowl: Bearcat and AAC Links 5/26/15

Updates 5-29-15

Houston Baseball Benefits from California Pipeline
Houston Chronicle

5Dimes Released Over/Under for Total Wins in College Football
They don't think to highly of AAC.  Memphis and Houston highest O/U at 8.5

AAC Official Site Highlights Some Key Football Matchups

Underdog Dynasty Examines the AAC Over/Unders

Underdog Dynasty: Examining the Financial Independence of the Underdogs

Today's U Ranks Top 3 Potential Biggest Upsets of Season
Memphis over Ole Miss is #2 on the list.


Other College News
C-USA Refuses to Change By-laws for UAB

Big 12 Splits $252 Million

Updates 5-30-15
From the Maroon Report: Houston Poses Major Threat To Aggie Recruiting 
Nice to see some P5 fans quake a little at the #HtownTakeover

UConn Blog's Projected Men's Basketball Starting Line Up

Also from UConn Blog, VCU transfer Terry Larrier Chooses UConn

Voodoo Five recap of USF's win over FAU in baseball.
Voodoo Five story on former Badger safety transfers to South Florida. 

Down The Drive takes a look at 2016 AAC Basketball Pairings

New American Frontier - Following the AAC 5-18-15

American News Links for Week of 5-18-15
Updated 5-19-2015

In tragic news, former Temple player Adrian Robinson, Jr. passes away at age 25.

Houston and LSU Schedule Home and Home in Basketball

Houston Cougars Tom Herman A Perfect Fit

I didn't even notice that ESPN.com has an AAC blog until now.
New Coaches Bound By Texas Roots

Temple Names New AD

Underdog Dynasty Analyze's ESPN's Early Bowl Predictions

Freshman QB Bo Schneider Officially UCF Student

From Rantsports.com, 5 Must Watch AAC Opening Weekend Games

AAC Baseball Tournament
AAC Baseball Tournament Has Wide Open Feel

The AAC Baseball Tourney schedule is set

Pirates Ride Momentum Into Tourney

Only Houston chimes in at #19 in D1baseball.com's baseball poll.

From AAC Football Fever:

AAC Football Fever continues its post-spring games power break downs of 9-12.

Cincinnati vs UCLA: Is This A Good Idea?

Other College Sports News

Follow all of college baseball tournament results from D1baseball.com

5-20-15
D1Baseball's Latest PRI through 5-19 Results
Houston is #15, South Florida #23

Official AAC Baseball Tournament Website

AAC Football Fever
Words of Wisdom For Houston: Alright, Alright, Alright
7 Signs SMU Will Have a Winning Season

New American Frontier - Tulane to Big 12, SB Nation AAC Count Up, Orlando Sentinel Count Up, Houston vs Central Florda baseball, AAC Blogs

Tulane to Big 12
I came across an interesting blog entry on the College Expansion blog I follow.  Under the entry titled Neaux Tigers, blogger kclifton makes out a very hypothetical situation where LSU leaves the SEC for the Big 12.  kclifton even states it is a highly unlikely scenario.

LSU feels slighted that the SEC will establish permanent cross division games.  LSU is stuck with Florida.  LSU's AD Joe Alleva feels that set up is unfair and biased.

Alleva has a valid point.  To be fair, the SEC, like other conferences, should rotate cross division games.  It makes no sense to tie two teams together.  It already happens with in division.  Mix up the competition with the other division. 

How does this relate the AAC?  In the article, kclifton writes that the Big 12 should go ahead and sweep up Tulane also just to lock up the state of Louisiana.  In case he hasn't notice, LSU has the state of Louisiana locked already.  They don't fear Tulane. Nor should they.

SB Nation Count Up

SB Nation continues its count up of college football by conference.  Right now they are on the AAC.  So far previewed are

• UConn
• South Florida
• East Carolina
• Temple
• SMU
• Tulane
• Memphis

Orlando Sentinel Count Up

The Orlando Sentinel does a count up ranking all FBS teams from 128-1.  Currently the count is on #120 Purdue.  So far only one AAC team has cracked the list:

• #116 South Florida

AAC Baseball - #18 Central Florida @ #13 Houston

Another big series in AAC baseball as Houston hosts UCF for a three game series.  The Coogs were a top ten team flirting with a national seed but a sweep at the hands of Louisville and a few losses along the way have brought down the Cougars.  Houston is still looking at hosting regional and a win in this series will go a long way in bolstering their chances.

 

UCF comes in leading the AAC standings and as the hottest team, in my opinion, in the Conference. 

 

AAC Blogs

One of the reasons I started the New American Frontier blog is that I'm AAC news starved.  ESPN.com gave pretty good coverage of Big East football in its College Football Nation Big East blog.  With the death of Big East football, ESPN let coverage of the remaining teams die.  Gone were correspondents dedicated to AAC football or the lunch time links. 

 

Aside from ESPN, SB Nation had a pretty active Big East page called Big East Coast Bias.  Obviously it is no longer covering the remnants of Big East football or the additions.

 

So I've been scouring the web for dedicated AAC coverage. Right now about my only good source for gathering AAC news is on various message boards.  I finally book marked several message boards dedicated to either the conference or schools.  My hope is to go through them and when I find links and news, to post here.

 

Eventually I'd love to have more people from other schools involved to write articles, previews and opinion pieces.  My dream is to get coverage on SB Nation and have a place where all AAC fans can congregate for news and opinions.

 

While not on the level of ESPN or SB Nation for resources, the one consistent blog for AAC coverage I enjoy is from The Best College Sports Network aka BCSNN.  BCSNN's AAC Blog is actually updated unlike other websites that contain a dedicated AAC blog.  It is run by C. Austin Cox and he appears to enjoy covering the AAC.  He's also quiet witty and funny.  The blog is worth a follow.

 

Another good follow is Sean OLeary over at Quora.  While not a dedicated AAC blog, OLeary is a UConn fan, I believe he is, and a general supporter of the AAC.  He also writes good insightful articles on other sports too.  He writes good opinions supported by facts. I enjoy his works.

 

Signing off for the night...

CoogR4Life

#AmericanRising