The Big East Conference: A New Era in Collegiate Athletics
The Big East Conference, stylized as BIG EAST, stands as a prominent collegiate athletic conference competing in NCAA Division I. Headquartered in New York City, the conference comprises 11 full-member schools primarily located in the Northeast and Midwest metropolitan areas. While the Big East has a rich history dating back to 1979, this article focuses on the conference as it exists since its restructuring in 2013.
Formation and Early Years (1979-2013)
The original Big East Conference was founded in 1979. Providence College basketball coach Dave Gavitt spearheaded an effort to assemble an east coast basketball-centric collegiate athletic conference. The core of the Big East formed when Providence, St. John's, Georgetown, and Syracuse invited Seton Hall, Connecticut (UConn), Holy Cross, Rutgers, and Boston College (BC). Holy Cross turned down the invitation, as did Rutgers initially, while BC, Seton Hall, and UConn accepted. Gavitt became the Big East's first commissioner, and Villanova and Pittsburgh joined the conference shortly thereafter. PR firm Duffy & Shanley is credited with the initial branding and naming work for the conference. The "high point" of the original conference is widely considered to be the 1985 NCAA tournament, in which Georgetown, St.
The conference remained largely unchanged until 1991, when it began to sponsor football, adding Miami as a full member, and Rutgers, Temple, Virginia Tech, and West Virginia as football-only members. Rutgers and West Virginia upgraded to full Big East membership in 1995, while Virginia Tech did the same in 2000. Notre Dame also joined as a non-football member effective in 1995. The unusual structure of the Big East, with the "football" and "non-football" schools, led to instability in the conference.
The Big East was one of the most severely impacted conferences during conference realignment of 2005 and the early 2010s. In all, 14 member schools announced their departure for other conferences, and 15 other schools announced plans to join the conference (eight as all-sports members, and four for football only). Three of the latter group later backed out of their plans to join (one for all sports, and the other two for football only).
The 2013 Reconfiguration: A Basketball-Focused Conference
On December 15, 2012, the Big East's seven non-FBS schools - DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, St. Negotiations with the other member schools continued in early 2013, and in March, it was reported that the "Catholic 7" schools would leave the conference on June 30, 2013, but that they would retain the Big East Conference name, logos, $10 million from the old conference's treasury, and the right to hold their Big East Men's Basketball Tournament at Madison Square Garden. At a March 20 news conference in New York City, Georgetown President John J.
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Officially recognized as a Division I multi-sport conference on August 1, 2013, the reconfigured Big East is characterized by its emphasis on basketball and its unique composition of primarily private, Catholic institutions. Nine of the eleven members of the Big East are private, Catholic institutions.
Three more schools, Butler, Creighton, and Xavier, joined the conference on its July 1, 2013, launch date. In June 2019, the Big East invited the University of Connecticut (UConn) to "re-join" the conference from the American, which it did on July 1, 2020. UConn was a charter member of the original Big East but when the conference split in 2013, UConn joined the American with other football-playing schools.
Membership and Sports Sponsorship
The Big East sponsors a wide array of men's and women's sports. Football is not a sponsored sport, and UConn is the only member with a varsity football team in the top-level Division I FBS. Butler, Georgetown, and Villanova do operate football programs in the second-level Division I FCS.
All full Big East member schools field men's soccer teams. Creighton, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, St.
Big East full member schools Butler, Creighton, Georgetown, Seton Hall, St. John's, UConn, Villanova and Xavier all field men's baseball teams.
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Big East men's swimming & diving is made up entirely of charter conference members, with UConn being a charter member of the 1979 incarnation, Xavier a charter member of the 2013 incarnation, and Georgetown, Providence, Seton Hall, and Villanova being charter members of both versions. However, UConn announced shortly before rejoining the Big East that it would cut men's swimming & diving along with men's cross country, men's tennis, and women's rowing effective in July 2021. Butler cut men's swimming & diving in 2007, when they also cut lacrosse. St. John's cut men's swimming & diving in 2003 due to Title IX, when they also cut women's swimming & diving, football, men's cross country, men's indoor track & field, and men's outdoor track & field and added men's lacrosse.
Nine Big East members sponsor softball, with Marquette and Xavier as the exceptions.
Big East women's swimming & diving is made up of charter members Butler, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, Seton Hall, UConn, Villanova and Xavier (UConn was a charter member of the original Big East, but not of its 2013 version). St. John's cut women's swimming & diving in 2003 due to Title IX, when they also cut men's swimming & diving, football, men's cross country, men's indoor track & field, and men's outdoor track & field and added men's lacrosse. It was announced on May 8, 2025 that Marquette would be adding the sport of women's swimming & diving, beginning in the 2026-27 season.
All full members of the Big East sponsor women's volleyball. However, during the first season of the reconfigured Big East in 2013, Providence was an affiliate member of the America East Conference.
The Big East began sponsoring women's lacrosse in the 2001 season with Boston College, UConn, Georgetown, Notre Dame, Rutgers, Syracuse, and Virginia Tech. The original lineup stayed in place until Virginia Tech and BC left for the ACC, respectively in 2004 and 2005. The conference replaced BC with Loyola (Maryland) for the 2006 season, and the Greyhounds remained an associate member until the school joined the Patriot League, which already sponsored women's lacrosse, in 2013. Originally, the conference championship was decided solely by league play; a postseason tournament was added starting in the 2007 season with the top four teams qualifying, a format that exists to this day. The next changes in women's lacrosse membership came in the 2009 season, when Cincinnati and Louisville (both of which had only added varsity lacrosse for the 2008 season) brought their teams into the Big East. As in the case of field hockey, the 2013 conference split left the Big East and The American with too few lacrosse teams for an automatic NCAA bid. Also in a parallel with field hockey, the two conferences agreed that only the reconfigured Big East would sponsor the sport, with all women's lacrosse teams from The American becoming associate members.
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Associate Memberships
Due to the specialized nature of some sports, the Big East maintains associate memberships with schools from other conferences. This is particularly evident in sports like field hockey and lacrosse, where the conference needed to meet the minimum number of teams required by the NCAA for an automatic tournament bid.
Because the American Conference did not sponsor lacrosse or field hockey immediately after the Big East split, several schools from The American joined the reconfigured Big East as associate members in those sports. UConn, Louisville, Rutgers, and Temple joined in both women's lacrosse and field hockey, with Rutgers also joining in men's lacrosse, while Cincinnati joined only in women's lacrosse. Among these schools, Louisville and Rutgers were associates only for one season, as both became full members of conferences that sponsored their remaining Big East sports in 2014-respectively the Atlantic Coast Conference and Big Ten Conference. UConn's women lacrosse team rejoined the Big East two years later as a full member in 2020.
The launch of a women's lacrosse league in the Big Ten for the 2015 season caused the American Lacrosse Conference (ALC) to dissolve after the 2014 season; two Southeastern Conference teams that had been ALC members, Florida and Vanderbilt, joined the Big East as associate members in that sport. The next changes to Big East associate membership came during the 2015-16 school year.
Big East men's lacrosse is made up of charter members Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, St. John's, and Villanova, as well as Denver. NCAA regulations state that there must be six teams for a league to receive an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament, and since Butler, Creighton, DePaul, Seton Hall, and Xavier only field club teams, the Big East had to look elsewhere. Both Denver and Johns Hopkins were rumored as targets for potential invitation and Denver was ultimately invited to join the Big East as a lacrosse-only member. Denver joined the Big East as one of the hottest teams in the country; at the time of the relaunch of the Big East in July 2013, the Pioneers had made six NCAA Tournament appearances in the previous eight seasons and had appeared in two Final Fours in the previous three seasons. The University of Denver houses most of its other sports in The Summit League; most of that league's other teams are closer to that school's Denver campus than the bulk of the Big East.
The Big East began sponsoring field hockey in 1989, but conference records only indicate that a postseason tournament was held; the first recorded season of full league play was 1993, with Boston College, UConn, Georgetown, Providence, Syracuse, and Villanova participating. Georgetown left Big East field hockey after the 1994 season, and was replaced by incoming Big East member Rutgers. The next change in field hockey membership came in 2005, when BC left for the ACC and was replaced by Louisville. Georgetown returned its field hockey program to the Big East the next year, after which the conference's field hockey membership remained unchanged until the 2013 conference split. The conference split left both successor leagues-the reconfigured Big East and The American-with too few field hockey members to qualify for an automatic NCAA tournament berth. As a result, both leagues agreed that only the "new" Big East would sponsor the sport, and that all American members with field hockey programs would become associates. Accordingly, the Big East field hockey conference would now be made up of Big East full members Georgetown, Providence, and Villanova; American members UConn, Louisville, Rutgers, and Temple; and Old Dominion, otherwise a member of Conference USA. The only honors listed here are those earned by Big East field hockey members while playing the sport in the conference.
Successes and Recognition
Despite the reconfiguration of the conference, the Big East has still been widely considered as one of the "Power 5" basketball conferences. Since then conference members have won NCAA national championships in men's basketball, women's basketball, women's cross country, field hockey, men's lacrosse, and men's soccer. In 2014-15, the Big East had four schools ranked in the top-20 and six schools in the top-30 recruiting classes nationally according to ESPN, Scout, and Rivals rankings. Villanova won the conference's first national championship since realignment in 2016. One year later, in the 2016-17 season, seven of the ten schools (70%) received bids to that year's NCAA Tournament, a record for the highest percentage of members ever sent to one tournament from a single conference.
The Big East Men's Basketball Tournament is considered by some to be the most prestigious conference tournament in NCAA Division I. The Tournament has been played at Madison Square Garden, "The World's Most Famous Arena," since 1983, the longest-running conference tournament at any one site in all of college basketball.
Media Coverage
Beginning with the inaugural 2013-14 season, the conference signed a 12-year deal with Fox Sports to televise Big East Conference games, with CBS Sports also sublicensing select games from Fox.
A Legacy of Excellence
The Big East Conference has a storied history marked by competitive excellence and a commitment to academic values. From its early days as a basketball powerhouse to its current form as a multi-sport conference, the Big East continues to be a significant force in collegiate athletics. The conference's emphasis on basketball, combined with its strong academic institutions and passionate fan base, ensures that the Big East will remain a prominent fixture in the landscape of college sports for years to come.
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