By then we had known for years that the Big East didn't really want us or care about us. That stupid conference could not get basketball out of their heads and wasted an opportunity with some elite level football teams. Prior to this move in 2003, the last time there was major conference movement was in the early and mid-90's. 1991 Big East football formed (VT didn't get full membership until 2000) 1992 FSU to ACC, Ark and USC to SEC 1993 PSU to Big10 1996 Big 12 formed So to our credit, we knew that this was a big deal. And we knew that being left behind in the BE after 19 years of being treated as an afterthought was likely not going to end well. Nobody had expanded like the ACC was doing in decades so it was a complete unknown what would happen to those left behind. And we do know now that the ACC raid had a huge ripple effect across almost every conference. So we were probably right to be worried. But I do suspect we had a tunnel vision for the ACC at the time (possibly because of UVA, but also the proximity of the NC schools).