Stop me if you've heard this one before: the ACC is set to expand, and the Big East is scrambling to fill sudden vacancies.
Syracuse and Pittsburgh were accepted as the newest members of the Atlantic Coast Conference over the weekend, giving the ACC a 14-team conference that will include some of college basketball's brightest lights. But Big East hoops fans are considerably less enthused about the move; the Orange have been a mainstay of Big East basketball since the conference was founded, and Pittsburgh has been a member since 1982.
Miami, Virginia Tech and Boston College left the Big East for the ACC before the 2004 season. Those moves touched off the Big East's expansion to its current size: sixteen teams for hoops and eight for football. TCU is set to join the conference next season, bringing those numbers to 17 and 9, but the Horned Frogs seem like less of a sure thing given the events of this weekend.
It's possible the ACC isn't finished; Texas and Notre Dame are reportedly next on John Swofford's hit list, with the Connecticut Huskies hoping they won't get left out.
The Big East most likely respond by looking to snap up the schools that are left over from the upcoming implosion of the Big 12 - the Kansas Jayhawks would be the biggest prize. But there's a also chance that the Big East's basketball-only members - who have been burned before by football-related manoeuvrings - could look to form their own league; one in which basketball is the top priority.
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