ESPN.com is reporting that seven Catholic basketball powers are talking about leaving the Big East. It’s a little late for that, since the Big East left them years ago, opting for football bowl money and damaging the heritage of the conference.
There’s nothing left – a bunch of strangers in a cuckoo conference, sending softball players and soccer players on long plane rides for conference matches, spending fortunes to justify incoming fortunes from the football television pool. It’s all gone wrong. The presidents of the seven schools should take a deep breath and get out. The original partners slipped out the door years ago, leaving a bunch of strangers lounging around the premises with more strangers on the way. Have a little pride. Get out. The survivors cannot leave out of sheer nostalgia. Eddie Pinckney and Patrick Ewing and Chris Mullin are not coming back to play in one of the most amazing Final Fours ever – 1985. In less than a decade, they created one of the great basketball conferences ever, but then television football loot made everybody crazy. They need a new model. They could call it the Northeast Quadrant Catholic Basketball We-Know-Who-We-Are Conference. Stick to the business of offering a focused education on essentially urban campuses. Big-time hoops are still a risky business for St. John’s, Seton Hall, Georgetown, Providence, Villanova, DePaul and Marquette, but at least they can get back to a more clear self-image and not get over their heads in football, with its gigantic rosters, bowl shenanigans, concussion legacies and recruiting frenzies. Know thyself. The Ivy League has been stable forever. New York University gave up the big time, all for the better. City College educates New Yorkers rather than entertain gamblers and strangers. Nobody’s ever persuaded me what big-time sports have to do with education, anyway. Big-time basketball is still something of a dance with, you should pardon the expression, the devil. But the football arrangement was blatantly Faustian. If the survivors turn out the lights on the Big East as they go out the door, it doesn’t matter. The party’s over. The ESPN story: http://espn.go.com/new-york/college-sports/story/_/id/8742607/seven-catholic-schools-leaning-leaving-big-east-sources-say
Charley
12/13/2012 04:03:51 am
Big East basketball provided me many, many thrilling moments. I will miss it greatly. Fie on college football, greed and corrupt college presidents. 8/29/2013 06:18:57 am
We don't get a chance to do that many things, and every one should be really excellent. Because this is our life. Life is brief, and then you die, you know? So this is what we've chosen to do with our life. 5/8/2014 03:48:47 pm
There’s practically nothing remaining – lots of unknown people in a cuckoo seminar, giving softball gamers along with little league gamers with prolonged jet trips regarding seminar complements, wasting fortunes for you to make a case for inward bound fortunes in the soccer television pool area. 12/13/2012 04:22:31 am
George
Ed Martin
12/13/2012 05:18:05 am
Charley says it for me. Who could forget Bg John Thompson wearing a "Louie" sweater? Who could forget Walter Berry blocking the little Pearl's last second layup to win the Big East title.
John McDermott
12/13/2012 08:30:45 am
One of the things I've struggled to explain to my wife, who graduated from a top German university, is why US institutions of higher learning have sports teams-which look like professional teams to hear, imagine that-that play games in front of huge crowds and on television. "What does all that have to do with getting an education?", she asked. It all started out innocently enough, I explain, but then money came into it...The whole recent Penn State scandal really kind defied any kind of rational explanation, or understanding. For her, and also for me. 8/5/2013 05:38:29 am
Who wants a stylus. You have to get em and put em away, and you lose em. Yuck. Nobody wants a stylus.
George Vecsey
12/14/2012 01:17:35 am
John, I imagine you've already told her how it started with mostly students, who attended university for the usual reasons, but teams began slipping in athletes, coaches, paid admissions, etc. It just happened. Even as craven as big-time sports university presidents are today -- check out Harvey Araton's comments on the hypocrisy of UConn -- their ancestors probably never imagine a cast of characters today -- recruiters, tramp athletes, coaches, compliant admissions directors etc., to say nothing of the NCAA. Now it's too late. Individual schools can do something - Uof Chicago, NYU. It does look bizrre from the outside. Regards, GV
John McDermott
12/14/2012 01:40:51 pm
George, to me the best of college sports will always be stuff like Haverford vs. Swarthmore soccer or track and Philadelphia Big Five basketball in the 60's. The rot came in with the big money and some of the alumni who never grew up. Sorry, but when the football coach earns ten times more than the university president and 20 to 30 times more than a professor then you know something is seriously out of order. 12/16/2012 11:31:20 am
Altenir Silva
12/15/2012 04:03:28 am
Dear George, 12/15/2012 11:58:57 am
Altiner
Altenir Silva
12/15/2012 01:51:55 pm
Alan, thank you! Happy Holidays for you too!
Brian Savin
12/16/2012 04:25:39 pm
Well, they did it! But it looks to me the idea is simply to not share basketball revenue and try to make basketball the new football. An argument can be made they are the same. In both sports the college kids serve as the principal "unpaid" minor leaguers. Different in baseball. 7/19/2013 09:20:08 pm
Before purchasing a vehicle should examine. The best way is to check the VIN number of the vehicle using instavin. 8/5/2013 11:14:17 pm
You have no interest in diversity. You just want the whole city to be exactly the same. 8/20/2013 05:41:25 am
Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn't matter to me. Going to bed at night saying we've done something wonderful, that's what matters to me. 9/13/2013 11:29:54 pm
This post is great deal with the topic recruitment.I personally agree with these question.It is helpful for the beginner also for finding the deep sense about blogging.I just found blog comment technique which has a great deal for increasing traffic.But there are other method too.This post is good for beginner.But there are no explanation about the exact way. 9/26/2013 06:34:25 pm
This list will showcase 10 talented voice actors that you can always count on in bringing their A game to the recording, motion capture, or in some cases both studios. We are going to be discussing the best of the best that consistently get work, so unfortunately if someone is famous for one particular role without much else on their resume I am excluding them. Yes, that means David Hayter is excluded (he just hasn’t done enough outside of Metal Gear Solid). There will definitely be more articles from me though celebrating voice acting so don’t get too rustled if someone you are thinking of misses the cut. 10/3/2013 09:29:12 pm
Oh my God! This is so amazing! You guys are so damn lucky... I wish I were there. 12/2/2013 06:00:11 pm
This is just the information I am finding everywhere. I and my friend were arguing about an issue similar to this! Now I know that I was right. Thanks for the information you post. 12/8/2013 02:34:42 pm
Wow..Impressive work guys!I am very fond of fishing since childhood...I still remember I use to go with my Grandfather to a nearby lake for fishing! Comments are closed.
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From the great Maureen Dowd: As I write this, I’m in a deserted newsroom in The Times’s D.C. office. After working at home for two years during Covid, I was elated to get back, so I could wander around and pick up the latest scoop. But in the last year, there has been only a smattering of people whenever I’m here, with row upon row of empty desks. Sometimes a larger group gets lured in for a meeting with a platter of bagels." --- Dowd writes about the lost world of journalists clustered in newsrooms at all hours, smoking, drinking, gossipping, making phone calls, typing, editing. *** "Putting out the paper," we called it. Much more than nostalgia. ---https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/29/opinion/journalism-newsroom.html Categories
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