Les Carpenter weighs in: Big East's tumultuous run doomed from the get-go

[huskyjawz]

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/ncaab-...-run-doomed-from-the-beginning-211516936.html

 

[SubbaBub]

Revisionist dreck. If not for coining yhe term, "the real Big East," it wouldn't be worth a thing.

Sent from my MB860 using Tapatalk 2

 

[djct1999]

In line 2, he writes, "Even through its best years, the whole thing felt like an arranged marriage made for network boardrooms." Lmao......Really? So what does he think about Syracuse and BC in the ACC or WVU in the Big 12. What made college sports were regional rivalries. The Big East, especially in hoops, had that!!!!​

 

[junglehusky]

Good read. And from a UConn perspective no less! Though he could have got a quote from Hartley on UConn's future, but the historical look back was interesting, I didn't know the catholic schools were anti-ND. (Maybe some of the were pro-ND and others anti-ND).

 

[upstater]

The article is right on. The football issues were there at the beginning. And Mike Tranghese recently validated everything Carpenter and Hartley said. The bballs wanted to bolt in the early 1990s when Rutgers and VT were added.

 

[djct1999]

Only time will tell how viable the C-7 will be without the football schools. The football schools brought a ton of value and the depth of the big east kept many of these hoops teams far more relevant than they deserved.

 

[freescooter]

I think this is pretty accurate, too. I know that when football began there was a lot of resentment among the basketball schools. And I've always said that there were widely divergent interests among the various parties. I'm surprised about the Notre Dame thing, though. I always thought the Catholics pushed that move. I think it was clear when the Big East expanded after the first ACC raid to add Marquette and DePaul as well as the 3 football schools that this league was doomed, and I really thought that it would split around 2010 after the 5 years together thing. It should have. By the way, I htink the "New Big East" is not going to work well. I seriously doubt Georgetown is happy long term in a league with Seton Hall and Creighton and so on. They view themselves as on a higher level than those schools. In the old conference they could offset that by saying well we also play Notre Dame, Pitt, more recently UConn, Rutgers...schools that were viewed as having some degree of academic heft. And further, i don't think they have much long term interest in being part of what is essentially a CYO league. Villanova will have similar issues, though they are neither as well respected nor as concerned about the CYO aspects so they will have fewer options. Georgetown in the Catholic 7 conference is like imagining Harvard in America East. They could probably do it, but would they really want to be seen at the bar afterward with those guys? We complain that memphis is a community college, and it is, but Seton Hall and St Johns are not much more than that.

 

[noeynox]

Where exactly is Georgetown going? What basketball only conference is going top pay them what the Big East is? No other basketball only conference is even in the ballpark.

Its always about the money.

 

[freescooter]

That's a good point, and I don't know where they will or could go. I've heard that they were the last of the C-7 to agree to leave and the one it most needed to go. And that makes sense. In a sensed they might be stuck, too.

 

[upstater]

Where exactly is Georgetown going? What basketball only conference is going top pay them what the Big East is? No other basketball only conference is even in the ballpark.

Its always about the money.

Just as an FYI, I think Carpenter leaves out that G'town was the Catholic school that most wanted to keep with the football schools, the ear most willing to listen as UConn broached a peace pact.

It's ironic that Notre Dame saved the bball schools' bacon in 2004 when it voted against the football schools--the deciding vote!

 

[noeynox]

I mean I hardly think Georgetown needs the money, so in essence, they could always Deemphasize, and downgrade to the patriot league if they wanted.

 

[noeynox]

Upstater, if you're insinuating that they could play in our league, scooter is saying that they would be turned off by the less prestigious academic schools in the big east, what would they think of some of the schools in our league?

If that's not what you mean, then my fault.

 

[HuskyHawk]

I mean I hardly think Georgetown needs the money, so in essence, they could always Deemphasize, and downgrade to the patriot league if they wanted.

They aren't going anywhere, unless the Ivy expands and takes them.

As for the article, I don't have many complaints, except omission of the Penn State decision, which would have changed everything. The Catholics would have broken off, but BC would still be around and we would have had leverage to add more football schools.

 

[The Funster]

Hey, there was a reason Gavitt was offering the FB schools around in the early 90s. He knew there was a schism developing between FB and BB. It's ironic that the three water carriers in the BE were FB schools upon the conference's collapse, those being UConn, Cuse and Pitt. For sure, Nova, Gtown and to a lesser extent Marquette have helped up the BB only end of the deal but all three of those have the lacked consistency of UConn, Cuse and Pitt.

It also has to be said that UConn's eventual commitment to FB may have never happened if the two sides had split earlier.

 

[upstater]

Upstater, if you're insinuating that they could play in our league, scooter is saying that they would be turned off by the less prestigious academic schools in the big east, what would they think of some of the schools in our league?

If that's not what you mean, then my fault.

I was saying that G'town preferred the former football schools, most of whom have left.

Look, I have no doubt that if Memphis and Tulane and SMU and Houston were world-beaters in basketball, then G'town would have preferred to stay too. Academics play little role. I've always said this. After all, it was Louisville leaving that caused the Catholics to take a hike.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

Declining Penn State and then inviting Miami were much bigger factors in whar ultimately happened than anything else. Adding Miami was a deal with the devil.

 

[upstater]

Declining Penn State and then inviting Miami were much bigger factors in whar ultimately happened than anything else. Adding Miami was a deal with the devil.

At the very end, they offered Miami the same deal they refused to offer to Penn State.

 

[B1GEast]

Declining Penn State and then inviting Miami were much bigger factors in whar ultimately happened than anything else. Adding Miami was a deal with the devil.

Penn St would have bolted if given the chance, the B1G would have poached them long ago. I don't blame any school for leaving this mess. Uconn is no different than Louisville, Pitt or Cuse, we would have jumped too.

 

[John Greene]

In keeping with this topic, I had a conversation with my friend from the SEC office this Saturday after golf and he made some interesting comments.

The recent C7 action was totally understandable to him since it had almost happened three times before. They were not getting paid enough for their BB product to offfset the higher costs of operating in a broader conference.

With the exception of Georgetown, the Catholic schools always resented both ND and BC. They were seen as rich, pushy relatives who looked down their noses at their poor relations.

BE should never have given in to Cuse, BC by forming a FB branch. If they had refused from the start he claims that BC would have droped FB to Div2 (claims they almost did it in both the 60's and 70's) doesn't know about Cuse. Another alternative would have been an "arrangement" with the ACC for FB. This almost happened in the 90's.

 

[RS9999X]

Well known stuff. The decision to add football schools was not unaminous. The only football schools were SU, BC, and Pitt. Then the 95 decision left them with more than 12 teams (unlucky 13) in basketball. There was a 6/6 split in basketball at that point before ND. Then the politics over ND and V Tech and pressure for Nova and UConn to upgrade with Miami seeking inducements to prevent an ACC raid.

 

[RS9999X]

What doomed the BE was the decision for football conferences to expand beyond 12 after seeing the BE model in basketball.

Leave Missouri and Texas A&M in the Big-12 and Rutgers in the BE along with Louisville, Pitt and SU and there was a viable splinter football conference with UConn, Cincy and USF. Targets then were Boise, Houston, UCF, SMU and ECU and let the C-7 plus ND go on their own or skim the best 4 as basketball onlies.

It was the major conference expansion beyond 12 that made this inevitable.

 

[HuskyHawk]

Rehashing the various decisions that doomed the league, and there were multiple instances that would have changed the present result, is pointless. Unless we have some Fringe like access to the past, what's done is done.

 

[CL82]

Penn St would have bolted if given the chance, the B1G would have poached them long ago. I don't blame any school for leaving this mess. Uconn is no different than Louisville, Pitt or Cuse, we would have jumped too.

I'm not so sure. Breaking with a successful East Coast based conference would have been a hard sale. Part of the problem with BE football is that it was always a marriage of convenience.

 

[freescooter]

In keeping with this topic, I had a conversation with my friend from the SEC office this Saturday after golf and he made some interesting comments.

The recent C7 action was totally understandable to him since it had almost happened three times before. They were not getting paid enough for their BB product to offfset the higher costs of operating in a broader conference.

With the exception of Georgetown, the Catholic schools always resented both ND and BC. They were seen as rich, pushy relatives who looked down their noses at their poor relations.

BE should never have given in to Cuse, BC by forming a FB branch. If they had refused from the start he claims that BC would have droped FB to Div2 (claims they almost did it in both the 60's and 70's) doesn't know about Cuse. Another alternative would have been an "arrangement" with the ACC for FB. This almost happened in the 90's.

BC was never downgrading to D2. Wasn't going to happen in the 1960s or in the 1970s. In the 60s they started to replace some of the old Catholic teams, Detroit, Marquette, and BU who WAS downgrading and replaced them with better known programs like Army and Air Force, Navy, Syracuse. By the 1970s, they really upgraded their schedule. They played Texas. They played Notre Dame. They played Tennessee. heck in 1977 they played Texas and Tennessee in back to back weeks. By the time the Big East was formed for basketball they were firmly established as a D1 program. Not a power by any means, but a solid football program. And you realize that your source's comments were that BC would have downgraded its program after Flutie's Heisman, and what had become a pretty regular string of bowl appearances... Whoever told you they "almost downgraded to D2" is totally clueless about what BC was doing and what was happening in eastern football at the time. As far as the possible break up of the Big East, I do believe that. clearly it almost happened in 2004 or so when Miami, VT and BC left and I think it almost happened when the Big East added football. Probably would have been better off if it had. I'm not sure what any of that would have meant for UConn football, but I tend to think we would have made the move anyway. I think there was always some level of interest at UConn. And Lew Perkins always believed that you either had football or you were going ot be relegated to some lesser status in the NCAA eventually.

 

[upstater]

Penn St would have bolted if given the chance, the B1G would have poached them long ago. I don't blame any school for leaving this mess. Uconn is no different than Louisville, Pitt or Cuse, we would have jumped too.

No. It's not a fait accompli. The money wouldn't have been as big in the B10, and Penn State said numerous times that it had Maryland in its back pocket, with Florida St. possibly joining as well (Florida St. wasn't in the ACC yet). Who knows, maybe Notre Dame would as well!

But if you take teams like Miami, Penn State and Maryland and add them to Virginia Tech and the rest of the BE schools at the time, you build a conference worth much much more than the ACC, and it would likely be on par with the B1G if not bigger. Remember, Miami, Penn State and Virginia Tech were 3 of the best teams of this era.