How Expansion of Big East May Have Hurt For The Future

The Big East is the only major conference where there are different schools for football and other sports like basketball.

The major conferences, Big 10, Big XII, ACC, SEC, and Pac 10 all have the same schools for the major sports like basketball and football.

The Big East on the other hand has eight football schools and 16 for basketball including Notre Dame. Why Notre Dame is allowed to be independent for football while in the Big East for every other sport has always been a question without a good answer.

There is no denying the Big East is a powerful basketball conference. In the current rankings, Pitt and Connecticut are ranked one and two. Including these two, there are five Big East teams in the top 10.

On the other hand, there are eight teams for football in the FBS. Also, Notre Dame is an FBS school, but as an independent.

There are also two more schools that play football, but at the FCS level. Georgetown competes in the Patriot League while Villanova plays in the Colonial Athletic Association.

I have read ideas for the Big East to expand to 10 or even 12 teams and adopting a conference championship game on various message boards.

I think the way the expansion went last time, hurt the conferences ability to expand for football again if it were something they wanted to do.

The first team to be mentioned is naturally Notre Dame who is already affiliated with the conference. Notre Dame football still loves to think they are special and deserve their own special deals. Unfortunately, they keep getting their special deals therefore reinforcing the belief they are still something special.

A few other suggestions I have heard are Army and Navy who are both independent in football but play in the Patriot League for other sports. I suppose they could play football with the Big East and stay with the Patriot for other sports but that just makes things more confusing.

Another raid of Conference USA has been suggested. Schools like East Carolina and Central Florida have demonstrated success on the field much the same way Louisville and Cincinnati had prior to their joining the Big East.

I think the best option would be to get Notre Dame in on football. They may be having some down years right now, but would still add a certain prestige to the conference.

This would push the number to nine conference teams. Having another conference game would eliminate the struggle they have in finding five non-conference games each year.

If more expansion were wanted, there is also the option of bolstering the programs at Georgetown and/or Villanova. These are already established programs and could become competitive if moved up to FBS level. Connecticut is proof that a program can make the jump and have success.

By promoting from within the conference there is no need for restructuring. I highly doubt the conference would want to change the way Big East basketball is, which would be necessary if football were to change by bringing in outside teams.

Of course the question would remain, does Big East football even need to expand?