Not gonna lie.

While I think the big drag for the BE was the aftermath of missing out on Penn State. But Miami being "back" kinda made up for it football wise. The round robin size was great. It's what a conference should be. Playing everyone every year, and still having schedule space for OOC rivalries (UVa for us) and other OOC games. When bowl season rolled around, I rooted for the BE teams beyond just "conference loyalty".

And the basketball was great. Loved the style and the teams. Being with all those original Big East schools and playing in the greatest conference championship tournament annually in Madison Square Garden was fabulous. I didn't even seem to mind Notre Dame hanging around.

I am strictly speaking from a fan's perspective. And can't speak to the bottom line.

But when the ACC came calling for Miami, it created a prisoner's dilemma of sorts. Everyone needed to act on their own to preserve their self interests.

In the end, we had to sort of back our way into the ACC. And what is sad, most schools involved in the ordeal have seen their stature in football and basketball decrease rather than increase since then (the original ACC teams, the BE football schools and the BE basketball only schools).

I just have to wonder what would have happened if the Big East and the ACC would have thought on a grand scale and did a full merger, including the non-D1A football/basketball only schools. If the collective could have kept northeastern basketball and given BE football schools a place to play, it would have been awesome. I still think the piecemeal way the ACC did expansion set the whole thing up for failure. And don't even get me started on the MIA-SYR-BC, oops, MIA-VT-and later BC thing. Amateur hour.

I'm just lamenting and reminiscing for the most part here. But I think there's a ton of lessons here on how not to do conference realignment.


[Post edited by Maroon Baboon at 04/18/2022 5:30PM]