Add UCiF, or disband Big East?

[callmesuperman]

If they do add c-usa teams. Kiss the BCS membership goodbye. The BE is none as a weak football conference. It's like using tape to mend two metal pieces together. Instead of using a weld. The BE has been disrespected for years since the Bulls, Louisville, and Cincy joined. How much respect do you see the BE would get as c-usa II THE SEQUEL?

Which is why the Big East needs to:

(1). Split the Football and Basketball schools apart with Football keeping the name and BCS spot.

(2). Divide the remaining teams into Big East North and South.

(3). Add Army, Navy, and TCU to add immediate prestige.

(4). Add Tulane, Memphis, and a few others as fillers that have potential to improve under the reigns of the BCS and a can bring a  bonus to the table...

For example Memphis has the Liberty Bowl rights which they sign over to the Big East as terms for admission and Tulane, well Tulane would make for a killer road trip to the big easy every other year  :drinkup

Of course the Big East is too stupid to ever do this because we are under the heal of a bunch of basketball schools.

To answer the question of this thread... I would add UCiF rather then see the BEast go away...

I would hate to lose the rest of the big east basketball only schools its the best basketball league by far and very fun to watch.

To be honest though:  Pitt, SU, WVU are in the top of the conference this year. Louisville and Cincy were mid-pack. Uconn had a down year, but is usually strong, and USF had alot of improvement for once. The "basketball only" schools weren't the top teams this year, other than Villanova and Georgetown. MQ and ND were mid pack (but ND may be gone anyways), but the other 3 teams were average at best (but still competitive).

Losing Villanova and Georgetown and possibly Marquette may hurt some, but if we picked up Memphis, that's at least one good replacement, and Houston could be another, as they're not too shabby. UCF has the ability to be better (new coach pending), though I'm not sure how TCU fares...usually not so well. They may make up for it in baseball and football though, and they'll have more access to northeastern recruiting if they joined up.

Temple would be another good basketball replacement; and would work even better in this scenario where we lose Villanova since we would maintain the Philly market!

[usf97]

I just want to add all of this "disband the Big East" talk is ridiculous. The ACC and SEC are not expanding to 14 or 16 teams any time soon. Does anyone out there even understand why the conferences would do that? How would that be in their interests? I feel like I am listening to the "Underpants gnomes" with all of these crazy blogs and articles about superconferences.

Step 1: Expand to 16 teams

Step 2: ?

Step 3: Profit

[Cow Pie]

1. Current BE commish is from Providence. Providence and the other Catholic bball schools will not give up the BE name. If they do, everyone else is high and dry.

2. The possibility of splitting puts teams like WVU, Pitt, Syracuse, and UConn on the fence. Do they leave their basketball brethren? If all 4 of them left and stayed together, especially if they can take Louisville and Cincinnati with them...it might be feasible since they would still have a strong nucleus of football and basketball.

3. If the 8 football teams broke off, and ND left. They'd have 7 teams left (MQ, DP, GTown, SH, St.J, Villy, & Prov), 4-5 of which are pretty strong every year. They couldn't poach Temple unless Villy was cool with the whole getup, and perhaps they add some teams like Rhode Island, UMass, Northeastern, and maybe poach a team like Butler from Indiana to replace the void that ND leaves between the 2 midwest teams. That could give the Big East 12 teams, and they can go their own way.

4. Set up a "classic" tournament against the BE and the former BE football schools, so that SU/WVU/Pitt/UC/UL can still face the BE schools as OOC games in the early season.

5. Assuming Notre Dame goes to the Big 10 because they're greedy little jerks, we get to keep Rutgers (nonchalant 'woo' and 'yay'). Come up with a new name and start our own stuff. We get to keep all of the football bowls obviously, and we'll just have to find a new site for the basketball tourney...which, until money is raised, can just be played at a host member school each year, or have the first round played at the home of the team with the better record. Bam, that's taken care of.

6. Then the 8 football schools just have to figure out the never ending question of who to add to this new conference, and being that the 8 football schools can travel alot easier with larger budgets and all the schools are fairly large, we can disregard geography of the "Big East" and go after TCU, Houston, Memphis, and UCF. Adding those schools are the biggest and best TV markets, bowl tie-in locations, fanbases, and athletics we can find, and the academics are decent enough to fall in line with the rest of the schools.

Ensures every team has at least 1 natural rival.

Houston - TCU

SU - Rutgers - UConn

Pitt - WVU

USF - UCF

UC - UL - Memphis

as well as other rivalries like the Memphis - UCF - Houston rivalries from CUSA.

:clap

[lotsofbull99]

If the Big East loses only one team, consider adding Middle Tennessee State, they have their own stadium, have the highest attendance in the Sunbelt, located in a small college town, but still only 30 miles from the Nashville area.

[2000bull]

I just want to add all of this "disband the Big East" talk is ridiculous. The ACC and SEC are not expanding to 14 or 16 teams any time soon. Does anyone out there even understand why the conferences would do that? How would that be in their interests? I feel like I am listening to the "Underpants gnomes" with all of these crazy blogs and articles about superconferences.

Step 1: Expand to 16 teams

Step 2: ?

Step 3: Profit

...so that's what happened to my underpants?!?

[bulldozier1]

Back to the topic. How do bringing c-usa teams to the Big East strengthen the conference?? The Big East has been FIGHTING for years the stigma of "THE WEAKESS BCS CONFERENCE." Do you guys feel that would change?

[Cow Pie]

Back to the topic. How do bringing c-usa teams to the Big East strengthen the conference?? The Big East has been FIGHTING for years the stigma of "THE WEAKESS BCS CONFERENCE." Do you guys feel that would change?

CDOA teams should only be added as regional filler to build new regional rivalries... adding CDOA teams will not make us any stronger right away but over time could possibly give us some strength.

In the interim we need to add Army, Navy, and TCU and then some CDOA teams... Army, Navy, and TCU would make us a tougher conference and increase our prestige.

[hightechbull]

You people keep forgetting the strength of BE basketball.

That alone is a hugh barganing chip for the conference.  They hold a lot of power in the NCAA because of basketball, and those non-football schools are a major part of the BE's basketball strength.

The BE will not lose BCS membership no matter how much a wimpy sportswriter or some fat unemployed 40-something year old blogger putz living in his mom's basement says they will.

:flush

[bulldozier1]

The Big East holds a lot of power in the NCAA because of basketball??? Really? That power help them with the defection of Miami, VTech, and BC? In these United States, football is king. Like it or not, the media does hold a lot of weight. Thats why Coach Skip has been on media tour since being name coach. He knows how to play the game. And I'm not 40. But if I were. I'd rather be old and wise, then young and dumb.

[usf97]

I agree that I think USF will be okay and the Big East is not going to lose it's BCS membership. Where the Big East has a problem is revenue streams. We will be seriously outspent by the Big 10 and SEC. If the Big East wants to keep up they are going to need to do more than just re-up another TV contract in 4 years.

I think we will lose Rutgers. Possibly, SU and UConn but I doubt that. I think the Big 12 will be more affected if the Big Ten expands to 14 or 16 than the Big East. So more than likely we will have to replace Rutgers. Replace them with any of the usual suspects it really doesn't matter.

The Big East needs to see about starting their own network with a West Coast League (i.e. Moutain West or Pac-10). I think we should also consider seeing if we can set up a end of the season game against the Mountain West Champ. Not a championship game, just the Big East-Mtwn West Classic. The game is a home game for one of the teams, just rotate it each year. Big East even years, Mwtn West odd years. Helps strength of schedule and adds a revenue stream.