Big East's Val Ackerman on Expansion: Conference Won't 'Stay at 11 Forever'

Big East commissioner Val Ackerman said the conference is likely to eventually feel the impact of college sports' widespread realignment despite so far holding firm with 11 all-sport members.

Ackerman told Dana O'Neil of The Athletic on Tuesday that two key factors in recruiting potential additions will be a school's basketball prestige and its geography, with the conference's current programs being located exclusively in the Northeast and Midwest.

"I don't think the Big East will stay at 11 forever," Ackerman said. "I can't quantify when, but there's too much going on around us. Maybe it's proactive, or it could be reactive expansion. You'd rather be proactive, but maybe other things helping elsewhere and certain opportunities are presented to us that we didn't see and then we act on those. Either way, it's fine."

The initial wave of realignment, which was jump-started by Oklahoma and Texas announcing their future moves to the SEC in July 2021, was focused mostly around high-profile football programs shifting around to avoid being left out when the dust settled.

Since the Big East, which has existed in its current iteration since 2013—it was formed as members of the original Big East broke off to create the American Athletic Conference—doesn't feature football, it was mostly spared from the chaos.

Ackerman, the former WNBA president and a member of the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame, told O'Neil she doesn't expect that lack of change to remain the case, though.

"You have to be nimble," she said. "This isn't going away anytime soon, not in the landscape we're in right now."

Asked whether Gonzaga, a basketball-centric school based in Washington, would be an ideal addition, the Big East commissioner explained the key question is whether the financial side would make sense for all of the conference's other teams aside from hoops.

"Geography is not unimportant," Ackerman told O'Neil. "If you're bringing in someone as a full member, you're bringing in another 13, 14 or 15 sports, and you to think about that. What's the volleyball team, the baseball team, the softball, what's their experience going to be like? What's the travel like? And can we afford it? It's not insurmountable, but it's on the pecking order."

The Zags currently reside in the West Coast Conference.

As it stands, the Big East's full-time membership features: Butler, Connecticut, Creighton, DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, St. John's, Seton Hall, Villanova and Xavier.

If the conference is going to add more schools, it'll likely happen before February 2024, when its negotiating period with Fox opens for the next television contract, per O'Neil.

That gives the Big East around 16 months to explore options for expansion, which could bolster the size of the TV deal, or opt to stick with its core 11.