It’s official. The Big East is going to do the stupidest thing possible.

The Big East will not split into two conferences, remaining instead a mixture of Division I-A football programs and so-called basketball-only schools.
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A subcommittee of Big East officials and member school representatives met yesterday in Newark, N.J., and finalized the decision to stay together. The conference can now begin to focus on how many and which schools it will invite, a configuration for its basketball conference (one division or two) and stabilizing or renegotiating its television contracts.

There also is the matter of the conference’s Bowl Championship Series berth, which officials are confident is not in jeopardy.

That makes one of us. The BCS berth won’t be immediate jeopardy, but it is in future jeopardy.

But according to Pitt athletic director Jeff Long, the object has always been to find a way to stay together.

“I’ve always been consistent in any discussions that the goal was to make the strongest conference possible,” Long said. “We believe [staying together] is the best thing for us to become stronger as conference and it benefits everyone involved. Now that we’re past this hurdle, we can focus on what is the best way to go about getting it done.”
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Although no formal announcement has been made, the two football schools likely to be invited are Louisville and Cincinnati. Marquette and DePaul likely will be the basketball-only schools.

That would give the Big East 16 members and eight Division I-A football schools, provided the ACC doesn’t pluck Boston College or Notre Dame out from underneath them. The ACC has 11 schools but needs one more to have a football conference championship game. Both schools have been on the wish list.

“Boston College has been with us and has been a party at all the meetings,” Long said. “We certainly believe they are in this with us for the long haul, and Notre Dame has been a part of our discussions as well. We have made a commitment to stay together and, as part of that, a higher [conference] exit fee is something we have also discussed as part of this.”

As a great philosopher once said, “It’s deja vu all over again.”

As for that other conference to the south, well they still have plans.

According to sources in the ACC and the Big East, the ACC presidents have made BC their No. 1 choice to be the league’s 12th team, joining for the 2005 athletic season, or perhaps as early as next season.

An invitation is contingent on the pending litigation filed against the ACC and the University of Miami by several Big East schools, which contend that the ACC and Miami were involved in a conspiracy to weaken if not destroy the Big East.

Connecticut Superior Court Judge Samuel J. Sferrazza listened to arguments yesterday in Hartford on whether to dismiss the case or allow it to go to trial. He is expected to make a decision in 7-10 days.

If Sferrazza dismisses the case, the consensus in the ACC and Big East is that the ACC would focus on BC sooner rather than later. And while no one at BC was saying anything officially yesterday, the feeling among many in the Big East is that the Eagles — who seemed on the verge of receiving an invitation to join the ACC over the summer but were blindsided when the conference instead invited Miami and Virginia Tech — would accept.

Suddenly the Big East reconfiguration looks to be built on a swamp.

The ACC’s sense of urgency is based in part on financial realities. In negotiations with ESPN on a new football contract, the ACC learned that the package being offered for an 11-team league is several million dollars short of the $24 million for the last deal, with nine teams.

In addition, the television money for a new basketball contract will be down significantly, because the consensus is that adding Miami and Virginia Tech dilutes the package rather than enhancing it. So the $8 million-$10 million the league can generate with a conference championship game in football becomes more of a necessity than a luxury. To hold such a game, the league needs a minimum of 12 teams.

I shudder to think what that means for the next Big East TV contract.

Why would BC want to leave a league losing its best teams — Virginia Tech, Miami — and join one with not only those BCS powers but also Florida State and Maryland?

The reason is that this is more than an athletic issue. BC has maintained that it wants to expand its potential student population (and alumni base) beyond the Northeast, into the Mid-Atlantic states.

And it wants to develop an academic consortium with schools such as Duke, North Carolina, Georgia Tech, and Virginia.

Whatever happens, the Eagles’ future is likely to be determined in a matter of weeks, not months.

The article also noted that the exit fees will be raised. Further incentive for BC to bolt sooner, rather than later.

It also appears that the Big East will hold off on any “official” announcements of expansion until BC tells them its plans, when it hears from the ACC.

he Big East can’t move forward with expansion until it knows whether Boston College is staying or going to the ACC, multiple sources told ESPN.com Wednesday. And BC is waiting to hear from the ACC if it’s going to be the 12th team or if the issue is dead for the foreseeable future.

Sinking ship. At this rate, the best the Big East can hope to be is a “Conference USA bock” — bigger and a little stronger than C-USA, but still in that range.