9th Team Not in the Cards For the Big East

Back in May, I threw out an idea to help the Big East with its scheduling problem. I suggested that Army and Navy could partner up with the Big East to help solve their problems of only having seven conference games in a twelve game schedule. The other option, that seems to be very popular on Big East messageboards, is to add a ninth team to the Big East.  The candidates usually thrown around are, in an ideal world: Notre Dame, Penn State, Boston College, or Maryland OR, in a realistic scenario, Memphis, East Carolina, or Central Florida. Well, all of that talk can now come to an end. At today's Big East Media Day event, commissioner Mike Tranghese advised that adding a ninth team is not likely right now.  Tranghese went on to say that, "There just isn't any school out there that makes sense and fits academically, geographically, athletically -- I just don't see any schools out there that fit what we are looking for. We are not just going to add someone to solve our football scheduling problem." I agree with Tranghese.  At the present time, the Big East has little incentive, beyond the scheduling problem, to add a new team.  No available team would bring in a large enough television market, fan following, or a prestigious bowl to justify splitting up the league's current revenues.  In addition, giving another team BCS conference status (which carries a considerable amount of weight for high school recruits) could retard the progress of developing programs like South Florida, UConn, and Cincinnati. The Big East, with only eight football-playing schools, is the smallest of the six BCS conferences and many, including me, think that the size of the conference is a great selling point for the league. Tranghese holding tight with the Big East's current roster of teams is a smart move as the conference re-establishes itself. Now, if he would just look into my Army/Navy scheduling proposal....