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ESPN BE Blogger

February, 28, 2013

By Andrea Adelson | ESPN.com

One of the biggest mysteries remaining surrounding the Big East is what to do about its name.

Though commissioner Mike Aresco has said repeatedly the league wants to remain known as the Big East, the departing basketball-only schools want the name, too.

The New York Times reported Thursday that the league is considering selling the name to the Catholic 7, and an announcement could come in a few weeks, though it cited no sources in the report.

As for a timetable for an eventual split, the separation agreement could be in place by the time the men's basketball tournament begins in two weeks. But it remains unclear when the schools would actually leave. Andy Katz of ESPN.com reports:

The seven non-FBS Big East schools have always wanted to exit for the 2013-14 season if they could get out in time and the TV deal -- with Fox -- was done. The problem is they can’t and don’t want to leave, according to a high-level source within the seven, until they have secured the other three schools to be a 10-team league. The seven are confident, though, that they can extract three schools (likely Butler, Xavier and one other) on short notice. The Atlantic 10 confirmed that it would cost each school $2 million to get out early, money that won’t be an issue for the seven and Fox to offset. The logistics of setting up a league, including soccer in August, are what could keep the seven in the Big East until the fall of 2014.

Lots of discussions in the hopper, so stay tuned to see how it is all going to work out

I hope we keep the name. Despite the defections, it is an established brand which fans have heard of before. Being in the "Great American Conference" or something dumb like that would make us seem even more bush league.

Why don't the Catholic Seven just call themsleves the "Catholic League?"

How about The (fill in the number) Duomos Of Dribble. Or, The (fill in the number) Sees of Holy Hoops. Or, The (fill in the number) Dunkin Pontificators.

NYTimes Article:

Still Big but No Longer East, League May Sell Its Name

By RICHARD SANDOMIR
Published: February 27, 2013

The Big East Conference that will emerge from a punishing course of realignment will soon have a new name.


http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/28/sport ... .html?_r=0

How about CUSA V2

The BEAST conference. Anyway, the Catholic 7, plus 3 probably would pay good money for that name plus MSG tourney game rights (personally, I'd rather see the new conference rotate the tourney game to Dallas, Houston, Tampa, Philly, Memphis, and Hartford). We don' t need the name Big East.

I'm still pedaling conference Hands Across America...although it's lost some luster w/o BYU, Boise, SDSU, and AFA.

How aobut the Pan American conference adn we could just go by the PAC.

Sloppy Seconds Conference

WBC...Wannabe Big Conference

Not For Long Conference (the "NFL") or perhaps (the "nfl") to avoid trademark litigation

This makes me want to vomit. We basically joined C-USA 1996-2004. Why would you let them abandon the conference AND take the name? We got punked. Underwear pulled over our head, face put in the toilet bowl, locked inside our own locker punked.

Should sell it for $100M which they declined

Just so we're clear, we're punked if we don't want the name, can get more money, have almost no schools that were in the original big east, and from a FB standpoint it's a name that represents being torn apart again and again by multiple conferences in realignment and losing it's spot at the big kids table? Okay, then. Who gives a damn. Sell it and use the cash to fund an IPF. Then win and join a better conference.

GiddyUp wrote:Should sell it for $100M which they declined

Better than that, we should keep ownership but license it to them, for say $10 million/year + a cut of any merchandise carrying the name/logo. There's no reason to believe that the basketball conference won't be going 30 years from now.