One thing I will say about the ACC is that this league is incredibly loyal to each other. The ACC just got b-slapped publicly by ESPN, has been rumored to be getting raided for months now, and there is not a flight to the exit. UNC and UVa could join the SEC or the Big 10 by lunch time if they called either commissioner right now, but there is no indication they want to leave despite the opportunity to make millions more every year in either league. Virginia Tech is rumored to have politely declined the SEC a year ago. Even FSU seems to be moving slowly to the exits with the greatest reluctance, with all the FSU leaks making it seem like they want to work it out with the ACC but may have no choice but to leave.
FSU will make $10 to $15 million more per year in the Big 12. Those are facts. But most of the national and even local media still think the odds of them staying in the ACC are pretty good. UNC and UVA would make almost 2x their current contract if they jumped to the Big 10, yet there is not a whiff of such a move. That is simply incredible loyalty.
The Big East, on the other hand, has always hated each other. Pitt and Syracuse left for what may have been less money than they would have gotten if they had stayed. We will never no for sure, but financially, it was not a slam dunk. WVU was scrambling to get out long before they got a lifeline from the Big 12, despite having been very successful in the Big East. UConn has been as much a part of the problem as anyone. There isn't a single Big East school that would stick around if they could make an extra $1MM a year somewhere else.
Establishing that bond of trust and loyalty in working toward a common goal, has been priority #1 for Marinatto since last September. I think it's working. That bond was there in the beginning and for a long time in teh bigeast. There's nothing wrong with competiting interests in a group, as long as the bond of working toward a common goal exists - it's actually beneficial. It takes a leader that will direct that goal though, and we didn't have it, and Marinatto is too little, too late, and he recognized it. Mike Tranghese is still in the media talking about how he thinks the basketball schools should split from football....I wish I knew what it was about that guy that makes him despise football so much, because if he had been the leader the conference needed, the big east would be by far the most powerful athletic confernce in the country, a long time running, but in turn - again, UConn would probably still be in the same football league with Villanova. Good with the bad.
That bond started eroding in the Big EAs was lost, sometime in 2002, when Miami decided that they would be better off with a southern league, right after they won a national championship and the media dumped on it, and the big east leadership was more concerned about St. John's putting names on the back of their basketball jerseys. In 2003, the league members were still talking openly and honestly with each other, and the AD at Syracuse was completely sincere in his distain for the direction the big east was taking in meetings, and said that he would resign if expansion went the way the others wanted - and he was good to his word. Leahy at BC openly talked to the other leaders about his desire to move south.
By 2011, the concept of workign together toward a common goal and trust was irrelevant to certain membership in the big east when it came to meeting together and discussing future plans - not UConn though.
AFter that though? UConn was completely open in that the time had come for us to pursue our best interests on our own, whether that would be with the big east or not after that time was TBD, and I believe - my belief only - that presiden'ts herbst actions and statements, last fall, all completely honest and front line, and her actions in pursuing other interests....was the shot across the bow, that finally set the membership of this league in line.
I don't know if anyone is a religious person or not, but I am, in my own way, and I was brought up Catholic, so it's what I know. I did my thing, and it's funny thing about the bible, or whatever you read if you're a religious person, there's always a line in there that sets everything straight.
For me it - was Luke 10:30-37. The story of the beaten and robbed man, and the good samaritan. The appropriateness of that short little story, and the entire history of the big east, astounded me when opened the book and read it. BUt that's just me.
The big east will be loyal to each other, and htey will be honest with each other, and they've got very good leadership to set this thing right.
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