Conference Realignment: Memo to Besieged Big East

• To: The Big East Conference
• From: A Geographer and College Football Fan

Dear Commissioner Marinotto,

It has come to my attention that you have been going through some difficulty recently with your organization; in particular, some internal criticism has arisen about the organization's mission and internal structure.

Apparently this tension has already been exploited by a rival organization, which has employed headhunters to successfully recruit two of your top members, who have given their "two-years" notice.

Might I suggest that before you look into hiring their replacements, you conduct a detailed survey of your organization? If this is not done, you will continue to experience an undesirable level of turnover, despite your rehiring efforts.

As you know, the cost of such a turnover is relatively low internal morale, as well as the formation of internal factions or cliques, each with different goals. If left unattended, these divisions can essentially doom an organization; it rots from the inside.

It is clear that your organization suffers from such rot and unless something is done to fundamentally change the internal workings of your organization, it is likely to become a second-tier competitor in the FBS market. That is what happens when your best talent is repeatedly siphoned away by your first-tier competition.

[Note that due to the ruling in NCAA v. Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma, 468 U.S. 85 (1984), your market is effectively deregulated and the NCAA has no power to come to your assistance when you are subject to predatory action on the part of your competitors. Since quite a few in your organization sided with the plaintiffs in this case, this should not come as a surprise.]

What follows are recommendations for surviving the current hostile climate with the least possible damage.

When Opportunity Came Knocking, You Sent It Away

When you are approached by a very talented prospective member who has a different skill set than most of your current members, do you appreciate what the new member might offer and the potential that member has for making your organization stronger, by shoring up its weak spot(s)?

Or do you turn the prospective member down because they are just "too different," because it would require the existing members to confront the fact that they are weak in that particular skill set and (crucially) require them to accept the new member as a full colleague and equal?

Based on the historical information, it seems that your organization did the latter:

http://nittanywhiteout.com/2009/07/20/the-big-east-regrets-losing-penn-state/

That is an inside view from the prospective member in question. What should be notable in that document is that you yourself admit that your organization would now welcome the spurned applicant with open arms. However, this admission came about 25 years too late.

The spurned applicant has been a successful member of one of your competitors for almost 20 years, and is not likely to relocate due to a belated (almost ridiculously so) change of heart.

Opportunity was knocking at your door. For Pete's sake, JOE PATERNO was knocking at your door. You sent him away with a condescending, haughty response: "We don't want your kind, now please leave us alone."

That one decision would turn out to haunt your organization to this day.

You Had Conflicting Mission Statements

There is nothing worse for an organization than an unclear mission statement; that is, nothing except conflicting mission statements. I suggest that the first mistake your organization made as a football conference was the decision described on the previous page; therein lies the problem.

A few years after that colossal mistake, your existing members finally took a look around and realized what was happening in the college sports market. They decided to pursue the new skill set: The Big East drew up a mission statement to become a powerful football conference.

Three members were already in the organization part time (Boston College, Pittsburgh and Syracuse), but now that their football skill sets were in demand, you brought them on full time. That was a decent start.

You then went head-hunting among the independent contractors and managed to find five of them (Miami, Rutgers, Temple, Virginia Tech and West Virginia) willing to sign on. Everything seemed fine at the time, didn't it?

It wasn't.

One of the new hires in particular was discouraged within a few years of joining. I think you know which one I'm talking about. They were the first to start complaining and the first out the door.

What was the problem?

Well, despite proclamations to the contrary, your organization wasn't really as committed to its new mission statement as the executives liked to think.

In fact, there were clearly separate factions developing. One faction that sought to keep the original mission statement as a priority and another faction that wanted the new mission statement to take priority. As a result, your organization essentially split in two.

It might pain quite a few of your veteran members to hear this, but the new mission statement should have been the over-riding priority from Day 1. The fact that it wasn't is due in part to the already-mentioned "missed opportunity."

It's also due to the failure of the older members to recognize that it was the new skill set that would make your organization truly competitive in the deregulated market.

By the time that recognition finally sunk in, it was too late.

You Alienated Your Dual-Sport Veteran Members

This internal acrimony has not gone away since then. In fact, I would argue that the veteran members can now declare victory for their mission statement. Congratulations, you have a "basketball conference" again—but at a considerable cost.

Given the current state of affairs, the Big East would have been better off had it *never* become a football conference. The three veteran members (two of them charter members) with dual skill sets (FBS football teams) have left. The organization is arguably worse off now than it was before becoming a football conference.

When Miami and Virginia Tech left in 2004, it's probable that some of the non-football playing members of the organization were no doubt thinking "Good riddance, football schools!"

What should have been worrisome was that Boston College and Syracuse, the only two charter members of the Big East that had FBS football programs (albeit playing as independents until 1992), were both considering a move to the ACC as well.

Once Boston College left in 2005, the Big East needed to take a look at itself before proceeding to rebuild its football conference anew. If a founding member was feeling alienated enough by the non-football schools to leave the conference they helped to start, then clearly there was an unaddressed problem.

Although the Big East can claim one BCS championship (Miami 2001), the fact that it could have potentially claimed members with a collective total of 10 national titles in the poll era (Miami 5, Penn State 2, Pitt 2, Syracuse 1), as well as five Heisman winners (including the three players *not* pictured above), speaks to the amount of football potential wasted by the Big East through internal dissension and disagreement about the importance of football.

With the departure of Pitt and Syracuse, the Big East has now lost the three dual-skill-set members present before it became a football conference.

The damage has been done and it will be extremely hard to fix.

Every Team from the Original Big East Football Conference Will Soon Be Gone

The process of collapse is not yet finished, and whether the organization is salvageable as a football conference remains in question.

The imminent departure of two more members is almost a certainty; this means that six of the original eight members of your "Big East 1.0" football conference have left, while a seventh (Temple) was involuntarily expelled. In addition, one of the "Big East 2.0" additions (UConn) is set to leave soon.

UConn's football program is relatively recent on the FBS stage, but it is also a charter member of the Big East and a basketball powerhouse. For its part, Rutgers is a middling program in both football and basketball, but is considered to be "the birthplace of college football."

Commissioner Marinotto, the fact that UConn is now attempting to leave for the ACC primarily for football reasons, despite having an FBS-level football program for only a decade, should be the final sign you need that your organization is so troubled that it may be beyond rescue.

The lone remnant of "Big East Football 1.0" will be West Virginia. There's no concrete information as I write this memo, but rumors (this stuff always starts with rumors, doesn't it?) have it that another one of your competitors—your strongest competitor—is about to tender your Mountaineers an offer they can't refuse.

What then? Are you going to admit the football conference experiment has failed and go back to the original mission statement?

That would please quite a few of your current members—the ones who don't have football programs. But again, this has come at the cost of losing three core members of the original group.

Or are you going to do what you've already done twice: Piece together what can only be called a Frankenstein of a football conference (which would likely be an insult to Frankenstein)?

Do You Build a 3rd Frankenstein?

So, what now, Commissioner? Will you and your remaining members attempt to piece together a football conference for the third time?

Keep in mind that Penn State is still off the table, just as it was off the table in 1991 and 2003.

Doesn't it kind of sting to build your "Big East 3.0" around the core of Cincinnati, Louisville, South Florida and (perhaps—nothing's certain now) TCU?

I know that you're considering merging with the five schools likely to be orphaned by the Big 12's collapse: Baylor, Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State and Missouri.

But will they want to merge with you?

Let's say they do and you have nine schools, all notable more for basketball than football (with the exception of TCU).

What then?

You've essentially refilled your basketball conference. The veteran basketball schools will be pleased, no doubt. The Big East identity as a basketball conference is preserved!

But how long will those nine programs be content to play second fiddle in a conference that may not be able to maintain an automatic qualification berth for the BCS?

How long before some of them become dissatisfied and prove to be low-hanging fruit for the Big "Ten" to pick in the same way that Miami was for the ACC?

For example, Kansas and Missouri, in particular, are AAU members with school profiles closer to Iowa and Minnesota (also AAU members) than to Arkansas or Ole Miss (not AAU members).

They would also appreciate being reunited with former Big Eight colleague Nebraska (whose beef was with Texas, not the Big 12 North).

However, what if the Big 12 schools refuse your invitation, or you refuse theirs, due to disagreements about (what else) revenue sharing and tournaments? Do you try raiding Conference USA again?

There's one plus to that, actually: Louisville, Cincinnati, South Florida and TCU would be reunited with colleagues from the "old" days, all those *cough...SIX...cough* years ago in that mid-major conference—ah, the good old days.

Just keep in mind that C-USA has 12 schools and *it* might be looking to take advantage of *your* misfortune this time. What if C-USA invites your four remaining members to create their *own* super conference and then lays claim to your automatic qualification berth?

I know, you're saying to yourself, "That's not going to happen."

Well, a short few weeks ago, you didn't think Pitt and Syracuse were leaving either.

Is It Time To Walk Away from FBS Football?

Short of landing Notre Dame as a football member (the proverbial snowball in Hades), the Big East's prospects as a BCS football conference are all but dead (yes, even with the addition of the previously mentioned Big 12 refugees or C-USA imports).

It would be to the betterment of both the Big East as a basketball conference and to the stability of the conference as a whole if you directed your focus to preserving the remaining members as a basketball conference.

You might lose USF and TCU by focusing on basketball, but Cincinnati and Louisville might be persuaded to stay and become independents in football. Or they could become associate members of the MAC for football only, similar to the status Temple has now (and which UMass will have in 2012).

That would leave 10 members: Cincinnati, DePaul, Georgetown, Louisville, Marquette, Notre Dame, Providence, St. John's, Seton Hall and Villanova.

It might be possible to tempt Temple and UMass away from the Atlantic-10 to bring your total to 12 (and the A-10's down to 12), but perhaps it's best to stay at 10 for a while and try to build some conference stability before you go out recruiting programs again.

Go back to your roots. Defend your house (Madison Square Garden). Forget about the BCS and focus on basketball. The remaining charter members (Georgetown, Providence, St. John's and Seton Hall) would want it that way.

Best of luck. You'll need it.