Big East should reconsider adding ‘Nova

The Big East Conference announced last week that the vote on Villanova joining the conference in football has been delayed.

Instead of just delaying the voting, the Big East needs to begin looking at other options to join its conference other than an FCS Villanova team that the Big East would like to add mostly because of the fact that the Wildcats are in the league for basketball.

The Big East should do what it did in the past when looking for teams – steal one from Conference USA.

It worked in the past with teams like Cincinnati, Louisville and South Florida in football and basketball and a couple of teams in the league for basketball only, like Marquette, have had some success since joining the Big East.

Taking another team from Conference USA would give the Big East another team which could offer good competition in football and basketball, because, even though it has been good over the last few years at the FCS level, I don't know how well Villanova would be able to adjust to playing in the Big East.

Sure, it would make sense to add 'Nova, because it would give an opportunity to add another team into the football conference without adding another member to the already huge basketball conference that the league has.

But, the conference could take this opportunity to, instead, add a solid team in football and basketball like Central Florida.

UCF proved this season in football it has what it takes to compete with teams in a conference like the Big East when the Knights finished the year in the top 25 with an 11-3 record and a win over Georgia in the Liberty Bowl.

Likewise, their basketball team started off the year strong, winning their first 15 games – with victories over Florida and Miami (Fla.) – before a tough losing streak in conference play caused them to miss the NCAA Tournament. Central Florida would bring to basketball a player like Marcus Jordan and a great young coach in Donnie Jones, who could bring notoriety to the program if it joined with the Big East.

Even if they didn't add UCF, it would make sense for the league to add teams like

Houston or Memphis who have shown in the past that they can contend at a high level and could improve the overall level of competition in the Big East.

The only problem with adding a team that doesn't already have an association with the conference would be that it would give it an unprecedented 18 teams in basketball.

While some have said adding a team like that would mean that the Big East would have to kick a team out for basketball, it's just not true.

Giving the league 18 teams would allow it to split up into a North and South division with nine teams in each. Doing this would allow everyone to play each team in their division twice to make the 18 conference games that are played each year.

The Big East is already among one of the most respected conferences in the country when it comes to basketball. Unfortunately, the same can't be said about the league's reputation in football.

I don't know what the league is thinking, but adding an FCS team like Villanova to the football conference won't help much. What other BCS conference can say that it has not just one, but two teams that weren't at the FBS level in 2004?

That's not something that will make this conference look better, and it won't help the competition in the league that much either.

Adding a team that has already had success will do that, though, and there are plenty of options.

I just hope the Big East does this and doesn't make the mistake of adding Villanova for football.