TCU's Move To Big East Gives Conference New Recruiting Hope

It was confirmed today that the TCU Horned Frogs, who currently sit at No. 3 in the latest BCS rankings, have made the decision to accept the Big East’s invitation to join the conference as a full member in 2012. The move helps the Big East inch one step closer to their goal of having 10 football schools.

TCU, a team which just got done wrapping up their second consecutive perfect regular season this past Saturday, is one of the winningest programs in America over the last five years and has routinely dominated competition in the Mountain West Conference since joining back in 2005.

Geographically, the fit seems to be a bit of an awkward one seeing as the conference’s main core of schools centers around the Northeastern region of the United States, but there’s no doubt that this looks like a win-win for both sides.

TCU now gets to put a BCS conference’s label on their calling card, which is a huge boost for them as they try to sell their program to the nation. And for the Big East, TCU, a school that is stationed in the Fort Worth area outside of Dallas, gives the conference a chance to expand into one of the largest markets in the country.

Both parties look to benefit financially from the move and that seems to be what's most important in college football these days.

Having a notable post in Texas, a state that is considered to be one of country’s three most significant areas for high school football recruiting along with California and Florida, is also something that's importance and value can’t be underestimated.

The type of talent that comes out of states like New Jersey, Connecticut and West Virginia on a yearly basis isn’t even remotely comparable to the the type of players that Texas produces.

The lack of overall great recruits in the northeast region of the United States as opposed to hotbeds like down south and out west is one of the main reasons the Big East is lagging behind the other five BCS conferences at this point in time. All you have to do is look at the results of the past few NFL Drafts to see that the Big East isn’t churning out the number of great pro prospects like other BCS conferences.

Big East schools have done a good job of compensating for the fact that in-state recruiting just won’t get it done, so you’ve seen many of the conference’s schools such as West Virginia and Rutgers establish pipelines with states like Florida and others that are more talent-heavy.

That’s not to say that Big East schools are about to go into Texas right away and start stealing 5-star, blue chip caliber prospects from the Texas Longhorns and other Big 12 schools. But it definitely helps the conference to have a presence down there now.

For a conference that’s taken some heat in recent years concerning whether they deserve an automatic BCS bid, adding a program like TCU, a team that looks rock solid under head coach Gary Patterson, is a major help to gaining back some legitimacy and respect.