Big East Bound: What Does It Mean Beyond Athletics?

The worst kept secret in Louisville was revealed Nov. 4—Election Day—when, at the conclusion of its annual meeting of university presidents and directors of athletics, the Big East Conference formally asked the University of Louisville to join.

From the Grand Hyatt Hotel in New York City, Michael Tranghese, Big East commissioner for the past 13 years, officially made the invitation to U of L and four other Conference USA schools—the University of Cincinnati, the University of South Florida, Marquette University and DePaul University.

In Louisville, university officials along with the media watched the news conference on a live satellite feed at the recruiting lounge in Papa John's Cardinal Stadium.

"I can't express to you how excited we are about our future, and in particular, the five new schools that our presidents unanimously voted to extend invitations to," Tranghese gleamed from the large video screen.

While it was certainly welcome news, it wasn't exactly earth shaking in Derby City. Since earlier in the year when Boston College, Miami and Virginia Tech announced they were bolting from the Big East for the Atlanta Coast Conference, most Cards fans were confident that U of L would factor into the Big East's new configuration.

And in the months leading up to the announcement, some coaches spoke about the future with tongues firmly pressed to cheeks. During the U of L basketball kick-off luncheon in October, coach Rick Pitino spoke at length about entry into the Big East Conference without ever saying the words.

But now it's official. Beginning competition in 2005–2006, U of L's 21 teams will be members of an athletic conference that boasts 22 national titles in six different sports and supports championships in 23 different sports.

Athletics director Tom Jurich has worked hard to make his department attractive to a major conference.

The new 16-team Big East will include eight members for all sports, including Cincinnati, Connecticut, Louisville, Pittsburgh, Rutgers, South Florida, Syracuse and West Virginia. The additional eight schools—DePaul, Georgetown , Marquette , Notre Dame, Providence , St. John's , Seton Hall and Villanova—will compete in all sports except football.

Featuring universities from such prominent cities as New York , Chic-ago, Philadelphia and Washington , D.C. , the conference certainly will not suffer a lack of visibility. The geographic reach of the conference will stretch from the Great Lakes through the Mid Atlantic region to the great cities of the East Coast and the west coast of Florida and to all of the major media markets.

"These 16 schools represent well over 25 percent of all television households in America and in excess of 27 percent of the population of America ," Tranghese says.

The positive effects for U of L athletics are clear. The football program enters a Bowl Championship Series, or BCS, conference and will be able to compete on college football's biggest stage. The men's basketball team will "compete in maybe the strongest and deepest men's basketball conference in the history of the game," says Pitino, who coached Providence University in the Big East from 1985–1987.

"It's unbelievable for the fans, who are now going to see competition like they've never witnessed before in the great tradition of Louisville basketball.

"And for me personally, the Big East Conference is where it all got started. It's so nostalgic."

Women's basketball enters a conference that is already considered the strongest in the game. "This league has produced the last four NCAA champions, unprecedented by any conference," says Tom Collen, U of L's new women's basketball coach.

Karen Ferguson, U of L women's soccer coach, knows all about the Big East after playing collegiate soccer at the University of Connecticut .

"I know firsthand that it's one of the premier women's soccer conferences in the country," she says.

Across the board—from track and field to rowing—entry into the Big East "will provide us the national stage that we all desire," says U of L athletics director Tom Jurich. Since arriving at the university six years ago he has worked to make his department attractive to a big-time conference.

But Big East officials made it clear that prowess on the playing field was not all they considered when scouting new members.

"We wanted to make sure our schools were a comfortable fit academically," Tranghese says.

The new Big East will be "the most unique conference in my opinion, the best conference in the country," he says. "We're not all the same. We have schools with different academic missions. But what we have in common is that our schools abide by the rules and graduate their student athletes."

University of Pittsburgh Chancellor Mark Nordenberg , chair of Big East presidents, described U of L and its fellow new members as "five academically ambitious universities with the potential to compete at the very highest levels of intercollegiate athletics."

Beyond Athletics

U of L President James Ramsey says that being affiliated with many of the nation's most renowned institutions is right in line with the university's goal of earning national recognition for academic and research achievement.

"In the outstanding company of the Big East, we will continue to raise our national educational profile on our way to becoming a preeminent metropolitan research institution," Ramsey says. "In the classroom, the laboratories and the fields of competition, we make this move with great pride on behalf of our students, faculty, staff, alumni, fans and the many friends of the University of Louisville."

The academic profile of the schools in the Big East fits the trajectory that U of L is taking, Ramsey says.

"Through the Challenge for Excellence, we have been working to improve the quality of our undergraduate programs and attract top-notch undergraduate, graduate and professional students. We've been building our research agenda to the extent that we are now nationally and internationally recognized in a number of disciplines.

"When you look at the company we're going to be keeping in the Big East, you're seeing schools that are academically aggressive. And that fits our goal and profile as well."

The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching classifies nearly all of the schools in the Big East as "Doctoral/Research—Extensive." U of L shares classification with only 3.8 percent (148 of 3,856) of American colleges and universities—a reflection of the depth and range of its undergraduate and graduate programs, Ramsey points out.

"The Big East aligns us with many institutions that are also research-oriented," he says. "That can only be good for us because we're known by the company we keep."

And while in some cases the schools are similar—as Michael Tranghese pointed out—Ramsey recognizes that the Big East is comprised of a mix of public and private schools, many with different goals.

"Every institution within the conference is unique," he says.

One of the biggest advantages of being in the Big East will be visibility both athletically and academically in some of the country's largest media markets.

"It's also going to expose us to whole groups of people who have never known much about the University of Louisville before but may be interested in supporting some of the kinds of research that are taking place here," Ramsey says.

Ramsey points to other indicators that show U of L belongs with the Big East's elite schools including the fact that the university is one of the 20 fastest growing institutions in the country in terms of federal grants. It also has increased its admissions standards three times since 2000, has a Truman Scholar as well as finalists for Rhodes and other significant scholarships, and has built several nationally recognized programs.

"That speaks to the academic direction of the institution that, again, puts us in good company when you're looking at Notre Dame and Georgetown and Rutgers," he says. "So we're really showing both academically and athletically that we can be in a tier of schools that are respected."