PHILADELPHIA - The Big East presidents made a pro-active decision here Tuesday when they unanimously voted to explore expansion, with the goal of increasing the number of football-playing schools from eight to 10.
The league figures this might be the best avenue for survival. The Big East felt burned when the ACC raided the league in 2004, taking Boston College, Miami and Virginia Tech. It then had to live in fear last spring, when the Big Ten was sniffing around. Another defection would have likely diluted the product even more and put the conference's automatic BCS bid in jeopardy.
Now, the Big East is going on the attack.
No specific schools were mentioned, but the football league will likely investigate the possibility of adding a current basketball-only member - Villanova - or a combination of TCU, Houston, Central Florida and Temple.
We like it, provided the schools the league brings in are a good fit. Dave Gavitt, the Big East's first commissioner and one of the smartest people in the history of college sports, once said when referring to his basketball program: "Attack pressure with pressure."
This decision reflects that philosophy and accomplishes three things.
It makes the Big East the aggressor, putting other leagues on guard. It's now clear the Big East is not going to wait around to be a sitting duck and for other leagues to poach its teams.
It puts pressure on Villanova to have a bigger stake in the game and forces the school to act on the invitation that has been extended.
It also pacifies the current membership that the Big East is doing what it can to make it a better football conference.
In a best-case scenario, Villanova would accept the invitation and TCU - currently ranked third in the BCS - would join the league as a football-only member, keeping basketball membership at 16. It would also create momentum for the Big East football schools to merge with the Big 12 - both 10-team conferences - and petition the NCAA for the right to hold a postseason playoff of their own, an idea that would reportedly have the support of the Big Ten and the SEC.
We're assuming Villanova will likely say yes, figuring its chances of maintaining the health of its basketball program are significantly better by playing major college football. Also, the Cats may not want to risk the Big East taking cross-city rival Temple if they turn down this opportunity.
TCU, currently a member of the Mountain West, wants in. The Horned Frogs realize, by joining the Big East, they would reap the benefits of playing in an automatic BCS-qualifying conference in football. The move would give the Horned Frogs an easier passage to the national spotlight they have had trouble getting, despite their success. TCU would then place its other sports in another geographically desirable conference.
TCU has been privately receptive to that idea, feeling it could follow the same path as BYU, which recently announced its intention to go independent in football and was able to find a refuge for its other sports in the West Coast Conference. But the WCC took BYU because it felt the Cougars were a Top-25 caliber basketball program that could upgrade its chances of getting more teams in the NCAA Tournament.
Sources close to the situation suggest a mid-major basketball-only league such as the WCC may be less willing to jump at the chance to take TCU's other sports, because it feels the Frogs' men's basketball program is less attractive. And, in the end, TCU may try to push for entrance as a full-fledged member.
If that happens, travel costs could doom its candidacy, and the Big East likely would then reach out to Central Florida, a huge school in Orlando that has outgrown Conference USA and would give the Big East a warm weather travel partner for South Florida.
Whatever happens, adding new football teams increases the odds the football schools will eventually break away, leaving Catholic colleges such as St. John's and Seton Hall to scramble to form a new league of their own that would not have nearly the same financial clout or prestige with the TV networks.
These are uneasy times in college athletics.
dweiss@nydailynews.com
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