Big East Will Announce the Death of Football Today at 5 PM

As I'm sure many of you have already heard, the Big East has come to agreements with five teams and is prepared to formally introduce these schools this evening at 5:00. Among these schools are three full members, Houston, Central Florida, and Southern Methodist; and two football-only members, Boise State and San Diego State. While some may see this as a good thing for the conference just to be adding teams, you can't help but imagine this is a pretty big downgrade for the BCS as a whole. Let's look at these teams coming in after the jump.

Welcome, Misplaced UCF Fans!

Recently we installed this application on the site's sidebar that allows us to see where the majority of our readers are accessing our site. It also allows us to see how they accessed the site, whether it be coming to the page directly, coming from a link on another page, or by searching something in Google. I'll be perfectly honest, I am absolutely fascinated with this thing. I can't look away from it or close the tab that has it.

Since I've been able to see what people are actually trying to find when they stumble across our page, I see now that many web surfers are searching "Big East Expansion" on Google or Bing (I actually don't know anyone who uses Bing, but apparently people do use it. That's right, reader in Greenville, North Carolina, I can see you searching "ECU Big East Expansion" on Bing!). Anyway, it's become more and more clear that the internet is cruel and ironic, as it has decided to bring up our site to the people who are searching "UCF Big East Expansion" on whatever search engine they are using. So for you in Orlando who came across this by Googling that very phrase (and I know you're doing it now, don't deny it), welcome! Unfortunately for you, however, I don't work for ESPN, so I am not going to tell you what you want to hear to increase my readership.

If you really have been keeping up with my take on Big East expansion, then you're quite aware by now that I am not a supporter or adding more than one Conference USA team to make the jump up to the BCS level. UCF is not that C-USA team. I'm really twisting my own arm to say that I want even one team from that conference, but if I had to choose one, I'd choose Southern Mississippi. They just seem like a more viable option right now than UCF or East Carolina or Houston. I want to make it very clear that, contrary to what many of you over in the East believe, this IS NOT an anti-UCF blog. I've got better things to do than talk about UCF. I will, however, take whatever opportunity I can to clarify that the Big East is trying to improve themselves by making additions to their league. Adding mediocre mid-level teams is not a prudent move for a conference that is trying to regain the respect of the rest of the BCS leagues in the country.

Big East Expansion: The Subject Everyone Hates to Love

Well, the Big East meetings are over, and as far as we fans are concerned, it seems like not much progress has been made. The meetings were cut a bit short as the Athletic Directors meeting adjourned early (thanks a lot, Holgorsen). So, like any good blogger, I took it upon myself to do nothing but speculate with the vague information I've gathered in the past few days.

First, I would like to emphasize what exactly the purpose of expansion is: Conferences choose colleges as targets for expansion due to the potential assets it could bring the conference. The Big East is looking for several things mostly including a large media market (by which I mean lots of money) and good football and basketball teams (money). Everything revolves around money. TV deals, bowl games, big markets, ticket sales, they all lead to cash. It's clear what the conference officials are after.

The coaches in the league generally agree that it's time to expand, but to how many? Most say 12, but are there really three other teams that are good enough to add to a BCS conference? Of course there are names like East Carolina, Central Florida, and Houston, but do they really add a significant upgrade to the conference?

It looks like I'm not the only person who thinks UCF isn't right to add to the conference right now, as UConn head basketball coach Jim Calhoun doesn't think UCF is a "sexy name right now", saying they'd be "kind of good," but not really an ultimately attractive option. I have to respectfully disagree with Calhoun in his next sentence, where he says "I don't think South Florida will care about that, having them come in so close by." Clearly Calhoun isn't a frequent visitor of The Bull Rush, or else he'd know what was wrong with that statement. It is nice to have someone whose opinion matters to the Big East share a view with those of us in Tampa who no one's listening to.

Someone tossed Army and Navy onto the stage, suggesting that they join as football-only members. Whoever suggested this didn't take into account the fact that Navy is quite happy touring the nation, seeing all the other schools and having their annual Navy-Notre Dame game televised nationally in the middle of the season. They also failed to recognize the fact that Army was a part of Conference USA as the same time that current Big East members Louisville, Cincinnati, USF, and TCU were still around, and scraped together a 13-67 record as a member. So maybe those two aren't truly viable options for football either.

So who is the right choice? Is it one of those regular choices, Houston, UCF, or East Carolina? Or is it someone who hasn't gotten enough attention, like Southern Miss or SMU? Or maybe someone else that no one has really mentioned yet? Tell us what you think in the comments.

I'm going to go on the record right now as saying that Northern Illinois is every bit as qualified to join the Big East as UCF in football standards, so take things like that into account. I seem to be the only supporter of Southern Miss joining the conference, so please, tell me why no one agrees with me. Maybe I'm wrong, but I need someone to tell me why. I also am a big proponent of trying to lure a school or two away from a BCS conference, so keep that in mind as well.

Big East Spring Meetings Today, Expansion May be in the Mix

As I'm writing this, about 215 miles Northeast of here the coaches and officials of the Big East conference are discussing conference expansion among other things. You can imagine my anxiety as the fate of future conference competition may be in the hands of these coaches. Most of the coaches support expansion, but would rather move on to 12 teams instead of stay at 10. USF Coach Skip Holtz said just that:

"There's been a lot of talk about do you go from nine to 10, which I don't know how much sense that really makes, when the Big Ten left the model of 10, the Pac-10 has left the model of 10. Both of them more or less said 'This model doesn't work. Let's go to 12.' I think we have to look hard at it. Having TCU come into the league will add an awful lot of instant energy when you look at the success they've had right now as a program. It gives you a balanced schedule with four (home) and four (road). I think we need to look hard at going to 12."

As USF fans, we should be particularly concerned that we aren't getting updates on the minute, because what happens here has a huge bearing on what our future will look like. Here are some potential candidates, and what they could mean to USF after the jump.

That's Enough, O'Leary

Fool us once, shame on you. Fool us twice, and I'm beginning to see a pattern here. Many know George O'Leary notoriously as the coach who wrote false things on his resume for the head coaching job at Notre Dame by indicating that he was a three-year letter winner at New Hampshire when he in fact did not play at all, and had a Master's degree from a university that doesn't exist. Now, it wouldn't be fair to ostracize him forever for that one incidence, even if i did result in his immediate firing from the most prestigious program in the country, but now it appears O'Leary might just have a knack for bending the truth for his benefit. At a UCF alumni meeting, Old Georgie announced that the UCF-USF series was back on, saying that these two "nut job fan bases" will finally be reunited beginning in 2015. It was discovered soon after that there were in fact no solid plans to resume the rivalry. Athletics representatives from South Florida stated that there was nothing to indicate that the teams would be meeting in 2015 or ever.