Worcester/Holy Cross was the hub of basketball in New England. Many New England basketball ties ran through Worcester, Dave Gavitt among them. Dee Rowe was a prep basketball coaching legend at Worcester Academy and Gavitt was his assistant for awhile. That relationship probably helped UConn in getting an invitation.
How come Holy Cross was invited over UMass? UMass in the Big East would have had the school where they are looking to get.
Hopefully after the virus goes away, you will be able to spend a few days in NYC for the BE tournament. I know it is not the same, but the AAC was just not a fit. Believe me I am not celebrating this turn of events, but UConn did I guess what it had to do to survive.
Which bottom feeders are competing for championships? Name those teams so we can figure out what the heck you are talking about!
Seton Hall, Providence, even St Johns made the tourney. They had all become bottom feeders in the real Big East. De Paul continues to stink though.
Yes, but which bottom feeders competed for league championships? That’s your assertion.
I had totally forgotten about PC in 1987.
It is a solid 6th ranked league. My point is teams that had no prayer of winning, zero are suddenly back in contention. Providence made the Tourney in 2004 then had a 10 year drought that just happened to end shortly after UConn, Syracuse West Virginia Louisville et al finally exited. Same with the Hall. 2006 was there last visit for a decade. The Johnnies? They did manage a bid in 2011. after only 9 years. Returned to futility until 2015 again after the real teams had left.
Not so fast. You talk on your conference mates but you declare only Nova and UConn remain relevant? I’m all for UConn coming home, but you have something to prove. The AAC is a worse conference and you were the bottom feeders. Sweep providence and seton hall this year before you declare what kind of dogs they are.
I ran the last 14 years rankings of NCAA RPI. Here is how the rankings compare for the last 7 years of nBE vs the previous 7 years of oBE.
Who cares. The conference as a whole has done very well - far better than you and me and others thought it would. And oh by the way, they pocketed 2 more national championships while we were gone.
Interesting choice of metric. I ran the last 25 years of national champions, here's what I found:
These are foolish Look at post season performance. That is where you find out where the real measurement comes and the Big East consistently falls short of the power conferences. As I said Villanova is the exception as Gonzaga East. The League is a first weekend wonder. It gets 5-6 bids and high seeds and by the Sweet 16 you look and Villanova is there. Everyone else is watching from home. If the Cats aren’t that good or get upset like in 2017(?) then everyone watches from home. You look at the real power leagues and they have 2,3,4 in the Sweet 16, 2-3 in the Elite 8. Often multiple Final Four teams. Look at Final 4s. Since 2014 the ACC has had teams in every final 4 but 1. 4 different teams. Big 10, Big 12 SEC have all had multiple teams. The Big East is a legacy league or since you are a Villanova guy Who might not know what that means, it is a league of Indianas. Indiana hasn’t been important since the 70s but everybody pretends they are still there. And now that the SEC seems to be taking hoops seriously at more than just Kentucky it will get worse.
Here are some stats.
They're not, but the emphasises of the conference and the history schools have had in athletics cannot hurt going forward. The Big East did start as nothing in 1979.
Pitt sucks! They fell into a deeper trench than UConn and their recovery is less likely. They also never went to a final four as a Big East member and certainly not after, so there is little glory to grasp even in their history. (You were all about Final Fours and Championships, right?)
