ESPN: Big East at a crossroads in Year 2

[stever20]

Dana took some liberties when she wrote this article. She wrote "Syracuse, UConn, Louisville and others..." carried "...the league's banner." But earlier in the same article she gave no Big East name recognition (i.e. "banner carrying") to Marquette and DePaul as if they were more "johnny come lately" than Louisville who entered the Big East in the same year as DePaul and Marquette. I agree that DePaul served almost annually as one of the lower level Big East programs. But Marquette was one of the more successful programs during their 8 years of sharing membership in the Big East with Louisville. And if my research is not too far off, Marquette made the NCAA 7 consecutive years as a member of the Big East and made the Sweet Sixteen three consecutive years (2011, 2012, 2013). During the same time span, Louisville made the NCAA the same number of times and made the Sweet Sixteen the same number of times also. The Cards did do better at Elite 8's and Final 4's and had one National Championship once during that time also and UConn and Syracuse were usually near the top of the pack as well. Who were "the others" about whom Dana speaks as wresting the banner away from Marquette due to their supposedly consistent better performances year after year?

I believe Marquette basketball was far more successful than most other teams who were members of the Hybrid Big East from 2005-2006 through 2012-2013.

By "carrying the banner", I think she's saying that certain teams gave the conference its identity Obviously as long time Big East members, UConn (5 FF, 4 NC) and Syracuse (4 FF, 1 NC) did that big time. Louisville as a 2 time NC already had a high profile coming into the conference, so it was easy for them to step in with a high profile and an immediate high name recognition factor. After joining the conference, they then won 3 conference championships and were obviously one of the schools carrying the conference banner as the league's best team. They took that banner to 4 Elite 8's, 2 Final 4's, and a NC. So we would agree on the Big 3.

But there was more. West Virginia only went to 2 Elite 8's, but they transcended those accomplishments. "Pittsnogle" became a household word during their Elite 8 run in 2005 while Huggins gave them instant credibility when he took over as coach and validated that by taking them to a Final Four. Pitt was always a disappointment in the NCAA tournament but they were always in the tournament (11 bids 2002-13), while 5 conference championships since 2002 and great success during the regular season gave them high visibility and made them recognizable as one of the conference's premier programs. Notre Dame is Notre Dame and doesn't have to do much to gain attention. With them, perception becomes reality. Their 6 NCAA tournament appearances in the conference's last decade were enough to keep them in the public eye.

That's 6 of the 8 football programs that were highly visible, were considered to be premier programs, and were who people thought of when they thought "Big East". All of those schools had classic battles in the BE tournament - the UConn-SU 6 OT game, 3 straight dog fights between UConn and Pitt in the BE tournament, Louisville's runs through the tournament.

No one is counting up appearances and nuancing the number of Elite 8's the way you are. What she's saying, I think, is that when the defections came and the league split, the C7 lost all of that. To the extent that the conference's identity rested so much with those schools in the past decade or two, a lot was lost. There's really no denying that.As she says in the article, that's the challenge that now faces the conference when it looks at what lies ahead, which is to recapture that identity and the magic in the mind of the public that went with being "Big East".

Great post. I'd add to WV they did make a final 4 even(one of the more amazing pictures with that devastating injury in the sf game). Also I would add a 7th fb team in USF made the NCAA tourney in 2012 even. And Cincy was a top 25 team late and made several NCAA's. Really only Rutgers was a dreg- and to a lesser degree USF.

[Bill Marsh]

Dana took some liberties when she wrote this article. She wrote "Syracuse, UConn, Louisville and others..." carried "...the league's banner." But earlier in the same article she gave no Big East name recognition (i.e. "banner carrying") to Marquette and DePaul as if they were more "johnny come lately" than Louisville who entered the Big East in the same year as DePaul and Marquette. I agree that DePaul served almost annually as one of the lower level Big East programs. But Marquette was one of the more successful programs during their 8 years of sharing membership in the Big East with Louisville. And if my research is not too far off, Marquette made the NCAA 7 consecutive years as a member of the Big East and made the Sweet Sixteen three consecutive years (2011, 2012, 2013). During the same time span, Louisville made the NCAA the same number of times and made the Sweet Sixteen the same number of times also. The Cards did do better at Elite 8's and Final 4's and had one National Championship once during that time also and UConn and Syracuse were usually near the top of the pack as well. Who were "the others" about whom Dana speaks as wresting the banner away from Marquette due to their supposedly consistent better performances year after year?

I believe Marquette basketball was far more successful than most other teams who were members of the Hybrid Big East from 2005-2006 through 2012-2013.

By "carrying the banner", I think she's saying that certain teams gave the conference its identity Obviously as long time Big East members, UConn (5 FF, 4 NC) and Syracuse (4 FF, 1 NC) did that big time. Louisville as a 2 time NC already had a high profile coming into the conference, so it was easy for them to step in with a high profile and an immediate high name recognition factor. After joining the conference, they then won 3 conference championships and were obviously one of the schools carrying the conference banner as the league's best team. They took that banner to 4 Elite 8's, 2 Final 4's, and a NC. So we would agree on the Big 3.

But there was more. West Virginia only went to 2 Elite 8's, but they transcended those accomplishments. "Pittsnogle" became a household word during their Elite 8 run in 2005 while Huggins gave them instant credibility when he took over as coach and validated that by taking them to a Final Four. Pitt was always a disappointment in the NCAA tournament but they were always in the tournament (11 bids 2002-13), while 5 conference championships since 2002 and great success during the regular season gave them high visibility and made them recognizable as one of the conference's premier programs. Notre Dame is Notre Dame and doesn't have to do much to gain attention. With them, perception becomes reality. Their 6 NCAA tournament appearances in the conference's last decade were enough to keep them in the public eye.

That's 6 of the 8 football programs that were highly visible, were considered to be premier programs, and were who people thought of when they thought "Big East". All of those schools had classic battles in the BE tournament - the UConn-SU 6 OT game, 3 straight dog fights between UConn and Pitt in the BE tournament, Louisville's runs through the tournament.

No one is counting up appearances and nuancing the number of Elite 8's the way you are. What she's saying, I think, is that when the defections came and the league split, the C7 lost all of that. To the extent that the conference's identity rested so much with those schools in the past decade or two, a lot was lost. There's really no denying that.As she says in the article, that's the challenge that now faces the conference when it looks at what lies ahead, which is to recapture that identity and the magic in the mind of the public that went with being "Big East".

Great post. I'd add to WV they did make a final 4 even(one of the more amazing pictures with that devastating injury in the sf game). Also I would add a 7th fb team in USF made the NCAA tourney in 2012 even. And Cincy was a top 25 team late and made several NCAA's. Really only Rutgers was a dreg- and to a lesser degree USF.

Thank you.

[Boyee]

46.6% of current ACC schools are former Big East Conference members (7 of 15).

[gosports1]

there are valid points in the article. i dont think anyone would argue that the BE of today is stronger than the BE of a few years ago. i also dont think that if one of the 5 "newer" members acheive success that it would detract from the image of the BE, anymore than i believe that any success of the 7 "newer" members of the ACC would detract from the image of that league

[Bill Marsh]

46.6% of current ACC schools are former Big East Conference members (7 of 15).

When you think about it, that's a higher number than the number of founding members still in the ACC, which is 6, or 40% of the current membership.