Is the time right for the Big East?

This week was the annual Big East media days to kick off, (or should I more correctly say, 'tip off'), the basketball season. The hottest topic among all of the coaches in attendance was the issue of the conference size, strength and schedule.

More and more we are seeing that the BBall coaches are becoming less and less enamoured with the current Big East makeup. One of the biggest topics centered around the Syracuse Orange getting a snub for the NCAA tournament last year with a very good record. That snub, and the imbalance of schedule regarding the strength of who is playing whom is driving a lot of the consternation.

Personally I agree.

So, I am very convinced that some type of changes are in the offing next year during the Big East conference annual meeting in June/July. What those changes are, is anyone's guess. Suggestions have ranged from "dumbing" down the in-conference schedule to even divisional play. As some of you may know I have for quite some time, almost from the start, have my take on what should be done, and once again I offer this as at least one possible solution.

I have never liked the idea of a large mega-conference format where everyone plays everyone. I actually like the idea of divisional play, and I really hope that it gets serious consideration during the off-season by the Big East schools. Divisional play in basketball, (and several other olympic sports that have more that 10 participating members), makes all the sense in the world to me. And for various reasons. In the current Big East configuration, with the BE having 16 member schools, splitting those members up into two 8-team divisions and having a full 14 game round-robin format would be ideal. You can then setup, if they so choose to, 2 to as many as 4, inter-division conference games just to ease the out of conferene scheduling. But I am thinking that with the strength of the BE conferene in bball, most AD's and cosches would opt out for non-conference games. Although I suggest that at 2 games be inter-divisional games just for rivalry sake.

The schools originally that were dead set against divisional play were those that did not participate in football. The thought, so they maintained, was that they needed to play some of those stronger football participating schools, (like UL, UConn, and Syracuse), to keep their conference strength of schedule up an bolster their RPI rating come NCAA selection sunday. They also wanted MORE schools available to play in the BE tournament at MSG, and the thinking was that with all schools playing everyone that would be a more "fair" breakdown. That has not worked out well so far. What has happened is that the league is SO competitive that they end up beating up on each other creating some mediocre in-conference records, which then the NCAA has to try and justify to other conferences. Those non-football schools though rely HEAVILY on the money brought in by the appearance in the NCAA tournament. Every year they miss costs them a lot of money that feeds their other athletic engines. So, I think the time is right for those schools to be finally willing to look at divisional play.

With 2 divisions of 8 teams, it not only allows for a true intra-divisional round-robin format, but also sets up a great bracket breakdown for the BE tournment in MSG every year. How are those divisions to be setup? Which schools would go in which divsions? Well, I have a suggestion, but I think the member schools themselves are better able to determine that. But here is my thought:

Break the schools down by relative geographic dispersion first, but give consideration to long standing rivalries.
For example:

Division A: Marquette, Notre Dame, DePaul, Cincy, UL, WVU, USF, Pitt
Division B: Georgetown, Providence, St. Johns, UConn, Syracuse, Rutgers, Seton Hall, Villanova

Now, given that breakdown, with only 14 intra-divisional games, you could then also setup 2 other inter-divisional games which could cross over and keep some long running rivalries going. And that still only sets up a 16 game in-conference schedule, so OOC scheduling would give you at least 14 games, (and anymore schools play 32 regular season games), to play prior to the conference start.

But how to break down selection for the BE tournament? Here again is my suggestion. First, the top two teams from each division get a "bye" are seeded in the tournment for the 2nd round as the top 4 teams in the conference. That means the 1st round of 4 games includes 8 additional teams from both of the divisions, giving you a total of 12 of the total of 16 schools. Sorry but I do NOT think that EVERY team should be allowed to play in a post-season tournament. Some teams, some years, are just going to be bad, and should not play. And in this scenario, only the bottom 4 teams would be left out. But how to choose those 4? I suggest that be based on the total conference record and not their standing in their division. I understand that in some years one division might be much stronger than the other and due to weaker play the bottom two teams in each division might have better records but not be quite as strong a team. That just happens, that kind of situation though is very cyclical, and that is what MANY schools always seem to forget.

So that is my suggestion. Modest proposal as it may be, if the BE does adopt a divisional format, I think you will see actually MORE schools from the BE getting into the NCAA tournament, only because the paring down of the schools will work in the BE's favor. Right now, I think the NCAA has to work too hard to figure out what are the better schools. In divisional format, I think it makes their job easier.

Also, if the BE does set up that situation, it also sets up a future blog for me about what the BE future makeup might be...(wink)....but that is a future blog.