While the future configuration of the Big East football conference had been an ongoing debate since the announcement last month that Syracuse and Pittsburgh were leaving for the Atlantic Coast Conference, the Big East's spot as a conference with an automatic bid is secure through at least the 2013 season and probably through the 2015 season. ""There's been a lot of talk about the Big East losing its bid,'' said one highly placed college official with knowledge of the BCS requirements."But as long as the conference maintains at least an 8 team membership for football the contract is iron clad for two years and there is also a two-year grace period which extends it through the 2015 season. If the Big East can field an 8 team league it's secure with its BCS bid until at least 2016.'' During that period, the Big East must meet the minimum performance requirements like the other BCS conferences which have automatic BCS bids (Big 12, Big Ten, SEC, Pac-12, Southeastern Conference and Atlantic Coast Conference), but if a school such as Boise State which has been in the Top 10 the past several years can be added to current members such as Cincinnati and West Virginia who have finished in the Top 25 in the BCS ranking the past few years, meeting the minimum standards should not be an overwhelming obstacle. The other key to the Big East security is the 27 month transition period which the Big East requires for any team wishing to leave. Big East officials have said that it will hold all schools to the agreement, meaning that both Syracuse and Pittsburgh and any other teams that might want to leave can not do so before the 2014 season. Such security might be enough to assure teams under consideration such as Boise State, Central Florida, Air Force, Navy and Houston that the Big East will still be able to offer the carrot of a BCS bid for the immediate future.
Nobody knows for sure whether or not the Big East conference will even exist in a few years, let alone what the status of the conference could be. ESPN Big East blogger Andrea Adelson took a look at what the future might hold for the Big East, trying to determine what they needed to do to maintain automatic qualifier status in the BCS.
Adelson talked to ESPN BCS guru Brad Edwards. "If all 11 conferences are held to the the three criteria to get an automatic bid, Edwards believes the Big East would fall short no matter the teams that are added," Adelson writes. "In its current configuration, the Big East meets one of the standards -- the cumulative ranking of all the teams in the conference. It falls short in the other two -- average ranking of the highest-ranked team each year; and the number of teams ranked in the Top 25.
"Edwards believes that outside of Boise State, there are no teams available that would boost the Big East numbers in the two criteria where it falls short. Boise State alone would not be enough. What the Big East needs are Top-25 teams. But the likelihood of getting Top-25 teams outside of Boise is remote. Air Force, Navy, UCF and Temple would allow the Big East to continue to meet the one criteria it already holds. But they do not have consistent Top-25 rankings."
I don't really care what happens to the BE because we are going to the SEC. they will announce it at the end of the season after we have run the table, finished in the top 20 and proven our worth.
If Pitt and Syracuse leave, they have to replace them to maintain 8 teams. Unless they can show that there is a commitment to stay together from the other teams, no teams are going to join them. So, both articles are correct in a sense. Unless the BE hoops teams approve new entries, then they'll never get to 8 teams and lose their autobid status.
That ESPN blog post mentions at the end that there is no process for taking away a BCS AQ bid, they simply used the formula to obtain it for a conference that already has it. Their is no proof that the formula to have it revoked is the same.
