Pitt Post: Reinvented Big East is ahead of schedule

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The demise of the Big East as a football conference was predicted when Miami, Virginia Tech and Boston College defected and joined the Atlantic Coast Conference, but the Big East has persevered and appears to be on the verge of a renaissance.

Pitt athletic director Jeff Long conceded that he was concerned about the conference's future and how it would affect the Panthers' football program, but said he always had faith in the league's leadership.

The Big East reinvented its football program after the ACC defections.

Perennial doormat Temple was forced out, and Connecticut, Louisville, Cincinnati and South Florida were added, joining Pitt, West Virginia, Syracuse and Rutgers.

Heading into the new Big East's second season, Long is pleased with the progress he's seen.

"I think if you look at what was accomplished last year, by almost every measure we are ahead of our projected schedule," Long said Tuesday at Big East media day in Newport Rhode Island.

"Way ahead in some instances. It took our conference all of one year to win a BCS bowl, for instance. But there are a lot of positive signs and so much to be excited about for all of us. There is no question our league will continue to grow and get better and better."

Long cited several other examples of how the conference has gotten off to a great start. All eight Big East teams have been to a bowl game in the past two seasons.

The league has six possible bowl slots this season which, he said, shows that Big East teams are in demand. Football television contracts that are about to be signed are better than anticipated.

The Big East added the International Bowl (in Toronto), the Birmingham Bowl and the Houston Bowl this year, but of the new bowls, only the Houston Bowl matches the Big East with an opponent from another BCS conference, the Big 12.

Other affiliations are a BCS bowl, the Gator Bowl or Sun Bowl, and the Meineke Car Care Bowl.

"We are excited about all of our bowl partners and really we are already starting to look ahead to the next round of bowl contracts to see who might be interested in the Big East," Long said. "The Toronto Bowl is really important because we as a conference are trying to brand ourselves in Canada and I know for Pitt, we have a lot of licensed products in Canada and this will only reinforce our brand as a football program.

"But I think one of the main reasons we've had some changes in our bowl lineup is that we felt like we had to play some BCS conferences more than just the ACC for a lot of reasons. As we go along we'd like to get more bowl games against the Big 12, the SEC and the Big Ten because those are the games that are the most attractive and they are all a part of our strategy as we go forward."

The conference also made another change when it passed a rule barring its members from accepting non-qualifying freshmen athletes, a move that was met by some resistance but has been applauded by the majority of its members.

Pitt had a policy against accepting such freshmen. Long said the rule evens the playing field in recruiting.

He said he would next like to see all of the BCS conferences adopt a similar rule because, as it is now, the Southeastern Conference, which is the only conference that still accepts them, has an unfair advantage over the other five.

"This rule makes us a better conference, absolutely," Long said. "As we move forward, do we want to do things the right way or do we want to do the wrong thing? We are a new conference and we should ask, [academically] do we want to be more like the ACC, Big Ten or the Pac 10 and the conferences that have non-qualifier rules or do we want to be like [the SEC]?

"The way I see it, the non-qualifier rule is a very minimum standard. And if you can't meet that standard, you shouldn't have an opportunity to play college football. We don't want to be viewed as a conference that isn't committed to academics."



Link: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06204/707943-233.stm

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