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Message: [QUOTE="CL82, post: 3593043, member: 44"] Apparently Dave Garett must not have seen that documentation. [URL='https://sportslifer.wordpress.com/2009/03/14/once-upon-a-time-holy-cross-was-king-of-hoops/'][B][I]HC and the Big East[/I][/B][/URL] [I]When the Big East was founded in 1979, Holy Cross could have been a charter member. Providence, St. John’s, Georgetown, Syracuse and Seton Hall, all teams that HC once played on a regular basis, agreed to start the Big East, but the league needed more New England representation However, athletic directors at Holy Cross, Boston College, Rhode Island and Connecticut agreed all four schools would remain a block. Take `em all or get none. If they couldn’t be separated, and the conference wanted the Boston market, which, of course, it needed, there would be a big league. [B]“Connecticut had been very good in the Yankee Conference. Boston College and Holy Cross was a toss up; [/B]actually, Holy Cross had the better basketball tradition. But their president couldn’t be convinced,”[B] said the first Big East commissioner, Dave Gavitt, about the league’s founding.[/B] Former St. John’s coach Lou Carnesecca spoke to me, about these inside Big East formative dealings during a talk at the 2007 East Regionals at the Meadowlands. He told me that Holy Cross was supposed to join the Big East, but the school’s president, the Rev. John E. Brooks, S.J., vetoed the move for academic reasons. Eventually, both BC and UConn agreed to join, making the Big East a seven-team league in the inaugural 1979-80 campaign. Villanova joined a year later in 1980. and Pittsburgh joined in 1982. [/I] [/QUOTE]

Verification: First name of men's bb coach