Stop the madness — please!

It is incredible what college sports have become, all in the name of the almighty buck.

It’s downright pitiful.

Within two-plus hours of each other are Division I universities Pitt, Penn State and West Virginia.

All three should be in the same league, playing each other in every sport, every year. Common sense dictates such a thing.

But common sense left the NCAA and the world of major college athletics a long time ago.

That’s why you have Penn State in the Big Ten, Pitt heading to the Atlantic Coast Conference and WVU beginning play in the Big 12 next year.

The Penn State-Pitt rivalry will be renewed for a couple of years here soon, but don’t hold your breath about it sticking around. Pitt and WVU played each other in football for more than 100 years and that’s going away.

The Mountaineers’ nearest conference foe in the Big 12 is Iowa State — a mere 900 miles away.

Why waste your time maintaining a rivalry with somebody 75 miles up the road when you can venture halfway across the country to play?

Makes sense to me.

It’s that same logic that is bringing Boise State and San Diego State into the Big East in 2013.

Geography teachers must be going nuts over this stuff.

Maybe high school athletic conferences should follow the NCAA’s lead and expand their horizons. The WPIAL could welcome in the Philadelphia schools. Erie McDowell could look to join the Ohio Valley Athletic Conference.

Consider all geographic barriers broken down.

The collateral damage in all of this is, of course, the loss of local rivalries.

College athletics should be all about rivalries and the tradition that goes with them. Sadly, that’s not true anymore.

Even though Pittsburgh is a pro sports town, Pitt could always count on selling out Heinz Field when WVU came to town. Plenty of Mountaineer fans helped make those sellouts happen.

No opponent in the ACC — Virginia Tech, Florida State, Boston College, none of them — is going to guarantee the Panthers a home sellout.

Things are a bit different in Morgantown. That is a college town and Mountaineer Field is a packed house for any opponent. The same can be said for Penn State’s Beaver Stadium.

All three of these universities will end up lining their pockets with these shifts in conferences.

The fans wind up on the short end.

West Virginia will log many miles, Pitt will befriend opponents down south and Penn State will continue its treks across the midwest.

It’s almost like three rich neighbors who have stopped talking to each other.

And that silence is a shame.

John Enrietto is sports editor of the Butler Eagle