Correction: I meant to say USF.
While I’m at it, let’s be clear about something, the C7 has the ability in 2013 to dissolve the conference if they wanted to. With Louisville having already given notice of withdrawal and therefore having lost its voting privileges and with Notre Dame doing the same in March, the C7 had the 2/3 votes needed to simply dissolve the conference. Cincy, USF, and UConn needed the the pre-nup to survive as much as the C7 needed it to continue as a conference.
So in summary:
1. A conference called the Big East (OBE) formed in 1979. To clarify and avoid semantics crap. There were original members of the OBE, like UConn and St. John’s, and members of the OBE like UConn, St. John’s, WVa, and Virginia Tech.
2. A lot of stuff happened between 1979 and 2013. This includes identity, football vs. non-football, being gutted by the ACC, etc.
3. In 2013 seven schools, including original members of the OBE, decided to break away from the OBE and form a new conference, whose formation was approved by the NCAA as a new conference.
4. There were agreements regarding this breakaway. One was that the OBE agreed to let the new conference to be called the Big East (NBE). The OBE then became known as the American Athletic Conference (AAC). Both conferences were allowed to maintain the records of the OBE.
5. The C7 maybe could have done things differently, so that they would be regarded as the legal successor of the OBE, but didn’t.
6. UConn eventually decided to leave the OBE, then and now known as the AAC, and join this new conference then and now known by as the Big East (NBE). In order to do so, they had to go through the normal processes of leaving a conference and joining a new one.
7. People are free to believe that the NBE is really the continuation of the OBE, just as people are allowed to call margarine butter, if they really believe the margarine tastes more buttery than butter.