Without a doubt, the Big East has been spanked by conference expansion. They lost their flagship program (West Virginia) and their two most historical programs (Syracuse and Pitt) in a matter of a few months. The league, which was taking football expansion slowly, and even considering bolstering up a I-AA Villanova program, was forced to react.
It wasn’t enough that they were down to five teams. They needed a solid 12 just to keep up with the other conferences. That brought on solid additions like Boise State, UCF, Houston, and Navy. You would have thought they would have continued on from there, especially with a football crazy school like ECU sitting out there, or Nevada, or even Fresno State.
Instead, they went full blown durp, adding San Diego State back in December…and yesterday, Memphis.
How can one expect to keep themselves in the arms race, when they go with that? Make no mistake, the Big East was going to have a tough time matching whatever the other conferences threw their way, but to ignore ECU….for Memphis, is just stoning yourself before the media can get ahold of you.
(Memphis has a basketball program, I get it…but expansion to 12 teams is about football, and ECU football means more to that conference than Memphis basketball EVER will)
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