Quote:
Originally Posted by Raymond
It's creeping down in this region of the country. Two of the D3 conferences in the heart of ACC country are part of the Alliance training system now, plus a D2 farther up north. Also there's another D2 conference in the heart of ACC country that is basically, but not officially, tied to the Alliance also.
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I work for the football "Alliance" under the Big Ten. The Big Ten uses in my area 4 Division III Conferences. This has been the case for probably 8 or 9 years now. I mention this because there was no basketball relationship until this year. The Big Ten brought into their "Consortium" two of those Division III on the basketball side. I personally work for two other assignors that are not apart of the consortium from an official relationship, but the assignors are D1 officials that assign multiple lower-level college Men's Conferences between them. So even if you are not in the "Consortium", you are likely being considered or could easily be considered for the Big Ten Consortium because of their very close relationship with the Big Ten already. The Big Ten already had 6 conferences under their umbrella before this year. They might add more in the future. But the reason is to get officials more experience to work games. We were told that if someone is working they have a shot at the other levels. And if you are officially assigned to the D1 side, that you would work to get guys multiple games at that level. The lower levels are also used to give those newly hired D1 officials or not full-time D1 officials the opportunity to work a lot of college ball.
My point is they are using younger guys and older guys to give some opportunities. But like anything, younger is definitely in.
Peace