Big East: Time To Run With TCU As Full Conference Member

Once again, conventional wisdom proves to be a day late and a dollar short.

Big East football expansion dialogue focused on two schools—TCU and Villanova—once Memphis, Houston and Central Florida were taken out of the equation.

Today TCU athletic director Chris Del Conte, working through a Sports Illustrated spokesman, said what bloggers in the Fort Worth area and TCU fans around the country had been saying all along:

TCU will not accept a football-only invitation to the Big East.

For those fans who have been following this story closely, today's announcement changes the comfort level the Big East hoped to maintain with its modest expansion plans.

According to the Orlando Sentinel, Central Florida fans have also been reluctant to accept a football-only offer if one should come.

Many fans, like myself, love Big East basketball. The league has been a huge factor in the success of Pitt's program.

But we now live in an era where football dominates the discussion and provides the overwhelming amount of revenue to college athletic programs.

Small basketball programs cannot be allowed to dictate the future of BCS conference members.

Congratulations, TCU, for taking a public stand on the issue. You should not accept a football-only invite. You have a first-class athletic program, and you bring fans to games. I know—I saw your fans in action at the Texas Bowl a few years ago.

Del Conte talked about mismatches in the Big East. This season, the TCU football team would dominate the league. The TCU basketball program would fall far short. The TCU baseball program would probably win the conference.

I want TCU to join the Big East. But I want John Marinatto, who has been the most ineffective conference commissioner in generating goodwill and money for his league, to step up and actually demonstrate some forward-thinking leadership.

Today TCU called the Big East out on its arrogance and expansion plans designed to do the least amount of good for the football programs and the least amount of harm to the basketball ones.

If Del Conte is going to bring his program to the Big East, he should insist the Horned Frogs have a Texas travel partner. The Houston Cougars would make the best fit.

Marinatto and the basketball schools have no idea how marketable the Big East will be in Texas. This state has many University of Texas fans and many who wretch at the thought of the Longhorns.

Since Texas has declined to have anything to do with the TCU program, TCU can give the Longhorns all the competition they want through the ensuing recruiting wars.

Texas started to sweat when Texas A&M talked to the SEC. The Big East won't have the same recruiting clout in Texas, but it will carry much more clout and be a greater threat to the Longhorns' monopoly than Conference USA and the Sun Belt.

TCU is being very reasonable today. John Marinatto: Are you listening?