Post by dex on Oct 17, 2013 12:08:33 GMT -5
www.nydailynews.com/sports/college/rubin-success-new-big-east-won-march-article-1.1488433
excerpts
The new Big East is under a lot of pressure to prove it is still a power conference out of the gate and end all speculation.
The best way to accomplish that is for it to place at least five schools in the 68-team draw for the NCAAs. The second best way would be to make the conference tournament – again to be held at Madison Square Garden – the spectacular sporting event that it was for the three decades until the breakup after last season.
Val Ackerman, the conference's new commissioner, invoked the mission of a Big East founder when she said "we are going to do everything that Dave Gavitt set out to do when he brought this league into being in 1979 – we're going to make this basketball conference a force" in her opening remarks.
She pointed out that five of the 10 schools in the remodeled Big East were in the NCAA Tournament last season and added "our sights are set just as high, if not higher, this year."
But as one Big East coach told me "we can't have two or three schools in the tournament at the end of this season, it's got to be five. Some people might be happy with four, but it's got to be five for people to feel right about the move."
Who does he mean? It starts with the presidents from the so-called Catholic seven – the seven universities that peeled away from a conference that would have included defending national champion Louisville and perennial power Connecticut; they did so and left some $100 million to football-playing schools to be in one where basketball dictates policy and there's a richer television deal. Also there are the coaches, who all gave the move full-throated endorsements. And of course there are the executives at FOX, who committed between $500 million and $600 million to televise this new conference, hoping to reap big cable profits for a desirable product.
"If they're looking at two of our teams and they split their games for a (NCAA) spot, do they end up going back to who we played out of league in November or December?" Williams asked. "I don't think we'll be able to know how it works until we've gone through it once."
"It sets up very nicely for the Big East on a regular basis to have seven or eight teams in the hunt for the NCAA Tournament. You can get five or six teams in consistently," Lavin said. "A down year was four, a good year was six ... Half the league was going to the NCAA Tournament, and not only did they get in, they were making runs. The Big East should be able to do the same thing with the quality of the coaching, the recruiting centers the schools are in, operating out of the Garden and the TV exposure."
excerpts
The new Big East is under a lot of pressure to prove it is still a power conference out of the gate and end all speculation.
The best way to accomplish that is for it to place at least five schools in the 68-team draw for the NCAAs. The second best way would be to make the conference tournament – again to be held at Madison Square Garden – the spectacular sporting event that it was for the three decades until the breakup after last season.
Val Ackerman, the conference's new commissioner, invoked the mission of a Big East founder when she said "we are going to do everything that Dave Gavitt set out to do when he brought this league into being in 1979 – we're going to make this basketball conference a force" in her opening remarks.
She pointed out that five of the 10 schools in the remodeled Big East were in the NCAA Tournament last season and added "our sights are set just as high, if not higher, this year."
But as one Big East coach told me "we can't have two or three schools in the tournament at the end of this season, it's got to be five. Some people might be happy with four, but it's got to be five for people to feel right about the move."
Who does he mean? It starts with the presidents from the so-called Catholic seven – the seven universities that peeled away from a conference that would have included defending national champion Louisville and perennial power Connecticut; they did so and left some $100 million to football-playing schools to be in one where basketball dictates policy and there's a richer television deal. Also there are the coaches, who all gave the move full-throated endorsements. And of course there are the executives at FOX, who committed between $500 million and $600 million to televise this new conference, hoping to reap big cable profits for a desirable product.
"If they're looking at two of our teams and they split their games for a (NCAA) spot, do they end up going back to who we played out of league in November or December?" Williams asked. "I don't think we'll be able to know how it works until we've gone through it once."
"It sets up very nicely for the Big East on a regular basis to have seven or eight teams in the hunt for the NCAA Tournament. You can get five or six teams in consistently," Lavin said. "A down year was four, a good year was six ... Half the league was going to the NCAA Tournament, and not only did they get in, they were making runs. The Big East should be able to do the same thing with the quality of the coaching, the recruiting centers the schools are in, operating out of the Garden and the TV exposure."