MORGANTOWN - The Big East can probably rest easy for a while andnot have to worry about looking over its shoulder to see doom, gloomand the Big Ten approaching.
Whether or not the league should rest easy, well, that's anothermatter entirely.
It is, after all, only a matter of time. It always is and for theforeseeable future always will be. As the BCS league with the mostto lose and the least to gain in any sort of shuffling andrealignment of the 64 current college football power brokers, theBig East as it is currently constituted will always be vulnerable.
So why can the league rest easy for the time being? Well, thereare those who will argue that it cannot. Look at how rapidly theconference landscape changed just in the last week. One day the BigTen was sticking to its 12- to 18-month expansion timetable and thePac-10 wasn't even considered a player, at least in the short term.Within a week, the Pac-10 had added Colorado, the Big Ten hadplucked Nebraska, the Big 12 was - in a span of just 48 hours - leftfor roadkill and then revived in an even stronger form, and the Pac-10 - in that same two-day time frame - went from college sports'potential Goliath right back to David in a sense, having lost thechance to add Texas and Oklahoma and being left to debate therelative merits of Utah.
Shoot, look even at the Big East, which one day was salivatingover the prospect of adding Kansas and Missouri and the next wasback to perhaps foraging for Conference USA's best.
Whew.
Those who will argue that no one knows when the same sort ofrapid-fire, mind-boggling shifts might occur are right, but only toa point. It could very well happen and probably will. But not thisweek or next, not this month and probably not this year. Truth betold, college football may be safe from such upheaval for at least afew years.
The reason? Presidents, purely and simply.
No one can deny that all of this maneuvering is simply an armsrace. There is absolutely no other reason for the Big Ten or the Pac-10 or any other league to begin recruiting members other than tomake themselves bigger and badder. The bigger and badder they get,the more money they reap from television. The more money they have,the bigger and badder they can continue to get.
University presidents, though, will sully themselves only to apoint in such a battle for pigskin preeminence. Big Ten commissionerJim Delany talked in the weeks leading up to those recent eventsabout how his league didn't want to be seen as igniting some sort ofcollegiate athletics Armageddon. You can trust that the message camestraight from the Big Ten presidents for whom he works.
Each and every one of them is loathe to be painted as anythingother than an academician first. Yes, they all understand thesignificance of college athletics and the branding it brings totheir universities, but to be responsible for orchestrating thecalamity that would befall victims of conference expansion (i.e.,the member institutions of the Big East, Big 12, etc.), well, thatis so against the very principles they stand for as to be positivelyrepulsive.
And guess what? Nothing that happened last week painted a singlecollege president in a light other than that of looking out for thebest interests of his university while treading not the slightest onanyone else. Talk about your sighs of relief. The Big Ten addedtelevision value and got to the 12-school level needed to stage afootball championship game, the Pac-10 did the same with Coloradoand Utah, the Big 12 not only survived but will now thrive with muchthe same value and fewer spoons in the pot, and the Big East (aswell as the SEC and ACC) were not affected in the slightest.
Don't think for a moment that every Big Ten president isn'tabsolutely thrilled with that outcome. They have a stronger, soon-to-be richer conference, and in order to get there they sacrificedno other institutions. Plus, they have perhaps staved offcongressional intervention, which was certain to be an issue hadmultiple institutions been adversely affected (and still looms inregard to the BCS itself, although Utah's move to the Pac-10 mightget Orrin Hatch off their collective backs). And so now, if anyonehas the temerity to go to those presidents asking that they furtherexpand by raiding the Big East or the ACC, the answer is simple:We've already won. Let's leave it at that for now.
Will the landscape eventually change again? Sure. But not thisyear and probably not next if the presidents have their way, whichthey will. And by the time those same presidents are receptive tohearing further arguments, who knows what else will have happened toreshape the playing field and alter the participants?
All of which brings us back to the original question: While theBig East can afford to relax, should it?
The answer, of course, is easy: No. Whether it be in a year ortwo years or whenever, the same issues are going to arise. Asinarguably the smallest and most vulnerable of the six BCSconferences (vulnerable precisely because it is the smallest andwithout much football star power, and because of its location woveninto the Northeastern media markets), it will be a target. In fact,it will be a much more exposed target should the Big 12, asexpected, come out of this round of expansion even stronger.
How to strengthen the Big East, though, is the tricky part, andnot only from the perspective of its presidents, who also are loatheto disrupt and adversely affect other institutions. But hasn't thatalways been the case? No one wants to destroy what the league hasgoing for it on the basketball side, but that is at odds with what'sbest for the more lucrative football side. Everyone seems to havewhat they think is the logical solution, but those are usuallysimplistic formulas that fail to address all the issues.
Sure, adding football members seems smart, but how much wouldEast Carolina or Memphis or Central Florida really add? Perhaps anyor all or those schools (or any others that would seem available;Army, Navy, luring back Boston College) might add value, but enoughto increase per-school revenues? Doubtful, and certainly notsignificantly, if at all. And while it would help the schedulingside of football, would any of those schools make the Big East anyless vulnerable the next time the Big Ten comes calling? Not likely.
How about tossing Notre Dame to the curb if it doesn't sign upfor football? That does absolutely nothing for the football side ofthe league (which is the issue) and diminishes (although to whatdegree is arguable) the basketball side. Kicking out Notre Damemight be wise if it forces the Irish to then join the Big Ten andsatisfy that league's hunger, but for how long?
Oh, and convincing Notre Dame to simply become more involved inthe football side (perhaps by increasing the number of games itplays against league schools) is questionable, too. The Irish havealready agreed to do that once and the most significant result was apower play to try and get Connecticut and Rutgers to play seriesthat included no games at Connecticut or Rutgers, but instead inSouth Bend and at neutral sites. Gee, thanks.
Of course, there is always talk of a split between the footballand basketball schools in the Big East (and then forming some sortof alliance between the two), an idea which seems to be picking upsteam. Perhaps that is ultimately what is going to have to happen.After all, adding schools to the football side makes the basketballside even more unwieldy than it currently is.
But again, is it worth potentially destroying what is arguablythe best basketball league in the country in order to add to thefootball side schools whose value (both financially and certainly interms of fortifying the league against future raids) is suspect atbest?
These and others are the questions with which the Big East has tograpple. Fortunately, though, recent events seem to have bought themat least a little more time.
They would be well advised not to relax, but to use that timewisely.
Reach Dave Hickman at 304-348-1734 or dphickman1@aol.com.
