Good news is coming in bunches for Mountaineer fans today.

First up, West Virginia Metro News is reporting that the University and Head Coach Rich Rodriguez have agreed to a contract extension that will keep the West Virginia native in place through the 2012 season. Among the keys to the new contract:

• $1-million per year guaranteed, with additional bonuses available for attendance, graduation, Big East championships, and bowl appearances.
• an increase in available funds for Rodriguez’s coaching staff.
• renovations to improve the team’s study hall and locker room-area.
• a deferred compensation package.

In fine tuning the spread offense and the 3-3-5 stack defense, the Mountaineers won the 2006 Sugar Bowl title and produced an 11-1 season, allowing Rodriguez to quickly gain the reputation of one of the brightest young minds in college football. He had been considered an attractive option for potential vacancies at places like Michigan, Florida State, and Penn State, where their respective coaches are nearing the ends of their great careers. With this contract extension, Mountaineer fans can now hope that Coach Rodriguez will elevate West Virginia to new highs.

The day’s other big news is that Seton-LaSalle (Pittsburgh) offensive lineman Gino Gradowski has given WVU coaches a verbal commitment to join the Mountaineers following his senior season.  Gradowski, the younger brother of recently drafted Bruce Gradowski of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, chose the Mountaineers over the Pittsburgh Panthers.  He is the ninth verbal commitment for the Mountaineers, and the second from the state of Pennsylvania, joining fellow offensive line recruit Donny Barclay of Harmony.

The recent trend of sports leagues starting their own television channels nationally has spread to the college ranks as the Big Ten, in conjunction with Fox, is starting the Big Ten Channel in the summer of 2007. The conference also extended their long term deals with ABC for football, CBS for basketball, and ESPN for both and women’s hoops and volleyball.

While not having a football championship game to draw extra revenue, due to there being only 11 teams in the conference, the Big Ten has potentially found a way to create a windfall of revenue through advertising and monthly cable fees. They are hoping to be on basic cable packages around the country and will be on DirectTv’s Total Choice pack.

In effect, every Big Ten football game will reach a national audience, they hope of free-spending alumni, completely changing the way college football has been covered. One of the aspects of the new ABC/ESPN deal is that one of the ESPN channels will televise regional ABC games in markets the game is not being carried over the air. No more pay-per-view to see Wisconsin and Iowa when Miami hosts Virginia Tech here on the east coast. How this affects other games on ESPN in that window is uncertain.

Under the deal with Fox, the conference will be the majority owner, while Fox Cable will own a chunk of it and produce programs from Chicago. For the record, there will be a part of the day in which there will be no sports programming on. It will promote the schools themselves.

Winners and Losers

Notre Dame- LOSER The decision to remain independent and reject one of the many overtures to join the Big Ten comes home to roost here. They will always get high ratings for games, but Purdue and Indiana get a full time platform to promote themselves, while Notre Dame falls back in line. They now need the Big East more than ever.

Fans- WINNERS Making the conference available on a basic level ensures that fans can see what they want, wherever they live. If you live in Fairbanks, but live and die on Indiana-Northwestern football, well now you can see it. These schools are big and have big alumni, serving them is smart.

NCAA- LOSER The arcane practice of limiting how many games could be televised a week, that was thrown out over twenty years ago, comes home to roost again. The conferences rebelled and, for football, have become a bigger name than the NCAA them self. How does the NCAA compensate he other big conferences as the Big Ten schools share the windfall from this network. You know it will not lose money. Football is the gravy train, and the NCAA is losing the handle more and more everyday.

SEC, BIG 12, ACC- WINNERS If this flops, they lose nothing. If this works, you know that partners at ESPN and CSTV are waiting to take the call from these conference presidents to start their own channels and tap into the national base of alumni, without sticking their necks out to try first. Bet the farm that one, if not two of these big conferences, have a national channel by 2010.

PAC 10, BIG EAST- LOSERS? They need this to fail. They are strong entities on their own coasts, but are, in football anyway, the two weakest big conferences. You know as well as I do that the Big Ten will turn this into a huge recruiting platform. While the Pac-10 would get stung, the Big East would drown on a national level. They need the exposure of good quality football to recruit. Who would you rather play for, Pitt or Penn State? Thought so.

The Nebraska Cornhuskers have been quite busy lately on the scheduling front. Before you say it, no I am not going to write an article on how Nebraska signed a deal to play Utah State or Valley State. But the Cornhuskers did strike a deal to play UCLA, Tennessee, and Virginia Tech each in a home and home series.

Virginia Tech will head to Lincoln in 2008 and with the 2009 match up taking place in Blacksburg. The UCLA-Nebraska contest will occur in 2012-13 and it will start in Pasadena. Finally the Tennessee-Nebraska match up will be in 2016-17 and that one will start in Lincoln.

It is great to see Nebraska setting up opponents like the ones above. Too many times teams are looking for a few easy wins and schedule lower tier programs to home games. Last year we had one of the most exciting games of the years when Ohio State and Texas clash and we get part two this year. Also this year we get to see old rivals Penn State and Notre Dame start a home and home series.

School will complain that if you play a tough non-conference schedule and lose it knocks you out of the National Title race but that is not always the case. If a team is going to lose it is best for it to happen in the beginning of the season because, whom are we kidding, the voters have a very short memory. Plus your team gets accustom to playing a tough team in a possible hostile environment. It also could get your foot in the door for recruiting. Make a good showing in another part of the country and recruits that might not have normally watched your program play might tune in to check you out.

Hopefully the NCAA will realize the fact that Top 25 non-conference matchups are good for the sport and will step in to do something so that more of them occur. Why not set a limit of only 1 division 1aa opponent every 5 years? If I am correct there are 117 Division 1a programs, and there is no excuse for teams to be playing division 1aa opponents as often as it happens.

ESPN’s Bruce Feldman is reporting that the University of Maryland has dismissed one of its top incoming recruits for violating the terms of his financial aid agreement.  Melvin Alaeze, a defensive end prospect and one of the more heralded recruits in recent Maryland history, was released from his letter of intent by the university today.  Today’s Baltimore Sun indicates that, in March, Alaeze was charged with several drug related charges.

 Alaeze first committed to play for the Terps in 2005, but failed to qualify academically.  He spent a prep season at Hargrave Academy and re-committed to Maryland this past February.

Alaeze’s future is now up in the air and he will, presumably, re-open his recruitment and look to join a school in time to play this season. Virginia Tech and Penn State were the other finalists for Alaeze before he decided to attend Maryland.

A four star (scout.com & rivals.com) rated WR/S from Greensburg Central Catholic in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, Nick Sukay will announce his intentions for college as early as today. Sukay has great speed (4.5 40 yd dash) for his 6 foot 3 inch 200 lb frame. In his two seasons at varsity level he has caught 49 passes for over 1050 yards and 12 touchdowns. On defense he has 16 interceptions, 10 of them coming in one season. As a junior, Sukay was selected to the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review’s Terrific 25 and their All-Class AA team. He boasts over 20 offers but has narrowed his choices down to Notre Dame, Pitt, and Penn State. It is to my understanding that he will choose Penn State and enroll in January.

Sukay’s fellow defensive backfield mate, Max Suter, has decided to play football at Syracuse. As a junior Suter amassed 81 tackles and 3 interceptions and offensively rushed for 1,420 yards with 24 touchdowns.

Xavier Carter went to LSU as a two-sport star and today he will choose that his future will be in Track and Field. Carter was a wide receiver for the Tigers and in his two years he 9 passes for a little over 200 yards with two touchdowns. If he had stayed this year he would have been a more integral part of a LSU squad that looks to challenge for a National Championship.

Carter became the first man since Jesse Owens to win four events at the NCAA Championships. Many think that Carter could be the fastest man on the planet and he looks win that title by training for the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, China. At the NCAA Championships he won the 100 meters (after a slow start) and 400 meters and relay events of 1,600 and 400 meters. He will begin his pro career in Paris on July 8th.

No matter where you go or what you do, it is always good to have choices. That is exactly what Jeff Samardzija has, choices. The 21-year-old wide receiver for Notre Dame recently signed a deal that places him in the Chicago Cubs organization. The deal is reportedly up to 5 years and is worth upwards of $7.25 million. He was a fifth round selection by the Chicago Cubs in the recent MLB draft but don’t worry Fighting Irish fans; he’ll be back in time for fall practice.

Samardzija got the red carpet treatment by the Cubs as they took him out to dinner, allowed him to have a 45 minute bullpen session, and to top it all off he got to throw out the first pitch before the Tigers-Cubs game. Let’s not forget he got a few pointers from future Hall of Famer Greg Maddux. The plan is for Jeff to play in the Cubs’ farm system until Notre Dame opens football camp this season.

The decision process that Samardzija will not have to go through will not have to occur right away. He already knows that in the fall he will wear #83, catching touchdown passes in Notre Dame Stadium, but what does the future hold for him after that? As of now he would like to try to play both sports, but that is going to be really hard to do. It takes a special athlete to be able to play two professional sports. Bo Jackson did it, as did Deion Sanders, but Michael Jordan struggled when he tried his hand at baseball.

Samardzija’s college coach, Charlie Weis thinks that his future is in football and I would have to agree with him. There is nothing wrong with him striving to play both but if he truly wants to be a star, he is going to have to pick one and concentrate on it, but what a luxury to have that choice.

So explain to me again how not paying halfsies on rent will lose you your eligibility? In the latest example of the long running NCAA reality show, “How We Are Out of Touch.”, they strip USC wide receiver Dwayne Jarrett’s eligibility, until he applies for reinstatement, because records show he paid less then half of the nearly $4k a month bill.

Now, if you will forgive the sidebar here, what mansion was Jarrett and former QB Matt Leinart living in that cost the princely sum of $3,866 a month to begin with? These kids could not work, under the current rule and that would be one hell of a work study job to earn that much. Landscaper at a sorority perhaps?

So we bust a kid instead for not coming up with the not so cheap share of the rent money. That makes sense now, doesn’t it. If we aren’t going to pay these boys beyond a scholarship, then should room and board be fully covered? Is USC the only program that has their athletes not stay on campus? Why cannot there be a block grant that pays for housing, food, and some pocket money for these kids. If you are going to micromanage every nickel and dime these kids can or cannot get, lets give them some legal leeway and move away from the evil booster “wink, wink” money that has been around forever.

The aspiration of amateur athletics is indeed very noble, and yes, most that play will never play for a paycheck. But, if you insist on keeping these archaic rules in a time when college sports are big money and none of the $80 I would spend on a USC jersey would go into that players pocket, then lets give these kids the breathing room that a med student has at 21.

USC’s All American Wide Receiver Dwayne Jarrett is suspended until futher noticed for not paying enough rent when he shared an apartment with former teammate Matt Leinart. Jarrett still might be able to play this season if he applies for reinstatement with the NCAA. Jarrett paid less than half of what Leinart’s father said was a $3,866-per-month lease and that is the issue the NCAA has with the situation. The NCAA issued this statement…”The information submitted by the University of Southern California regarding the living arrangements of the two football student-athletes represents a violation of NCAA extra benefit rules.” The NCAA will handle this situation in a timely manner.

The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and various scouting services have confirmed that Jared Williams, who had previously announced his intent to attend Pittsburgh, has de-committed and will be visiting some other college camps this Summer.  Williams is a speedy defensive back prospect from Perry Traditional Academy. Curiously, Williams does not have any other scholarship offers at this time. According to Chris Dokish of Panther Rants advises that Pitt has revoked his scholarship offer. 

NJ.com confirms that Rutgers, coming off their first bowl appearance in 30-years, has received a verbal commitment from lineman Keith Newell. The 6′5, 300-pounder had offers from Maryland, Michigan State, and Syracuse, among others. He is the second in-state lineman to verbal to the Scarlet Knights this season, joining DT Wayne Thomas.

West Virginia continues to see the rewards for its Sugar Bowl win, as Roanoke.com reports that Osbourn High School quarterback Brandon Hogan gave the team a verbal commitment on Thursday. Hogan is the third quarterback and the seventh player to give WVU a verbal this season. At 5′11 and 170 pounds, his size may hinder him from becoming a DI quarterback, but with 4.4 speed, he will also get looks at receiver, running back, kick returner, and/or defensive back.