The mini-matchup between 4 Big East teams and 4 SEC teams will happen starting in the 2007-08 season.
The Big East and SEC will put together two doubleheaders each season for three years – with one doubleheader in SEC territory and the other within the Big East’s geographical footprint. Teams will play just one game in the event’s three-year run.
Unlike the ACC/Big Ten Challenge, which uses on-campus arenas, the SEC-Big East event will be played only on neutral courts.
“I don’t want to use the word challenge,” Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese said Wednesday. “I’d refer to it as a shootout. Teams are only going to play once, instead of each and every year, and we’re going to use big arenas in neutral sites.”
All games in the event will be on ESPN or ESPN2.
The three-year run will allow each of the SEC’s 12 teams to play one game in the series, while only 12 of the Big East’s 16 teams will participate. However, Tranghese said the event would be extended once the SEC signs a new deal with ESPN.
The SEC’s current agreement runs out after the 2009-10 season.
No word yet on which teams will play. Obviously if ESPN is broadcasting them, they will have more than a little say in which teams meet. I don’t expect Pitt to be included in the first year.
Still the question remains as to why only 4 teams at a time. Why not 12 or even 8? Why has the Big East so fiercely resisted doing a conference challenge?
“I’m opposed to that,” Tranghese said. “I think it’s the job of the individual schools to put together their own schedules. If a Syracuse, for instance, wants to play a Michigan, it should have the ability to schedule a home-and-home series on its own.”
The dates for the SEC/Big East games are Dec. 5-6, 2007; Dec. 10-11, 2008, and Dec. 9-10, 2009.
The sites of the games have yet to be determined. Potential Big East sites are Boston, Chicago, Buffalo and Indianapolis. In the SEC’s region, sites could include Orlando, Atlanta, Nashville and New Orleans.
I have to agree with Big East Basketball Report.
In other words, I think Tranghese is taking the bullet here, the Big East coaches opted out of the original ACC/Big East challenge because of scheduling concerns and with many smaller institutions and non-public schools that are not the large land-grant universities, most Big East schools are very careful in scheduling thier non-conference games to maximize their revenue. Sharing the pot with the league and locking in to a game, with the impending 18-game league schedule, probably is something most schools would resist.
Tranghese has always been much more of a consensus builder and manipulating the situation. He has never been much for forcing schools to comply with an edict unless he is absolutely convinced it is in the best interest of the full league (such as limiting the Big East Tournament to 12 teams).
Have to figure that in the next week or two the Big East will finally announce the conference schedule and most of the TV dates now that Gray is coming back and Pitt will be presumed to be one of the conference favorites.
