By SEAN BRENNAN
Special to BIGEAST.com
 
You wouldn’t know it to see the BIG EAST now, but 10 years ago the conference that brought you Chris Mullin, Patrick Ewing, Ray Allen, Pearl Washington, Josh Hart and so many more, was going through a very uncertain period. It was a time when one of the nation’s premier basketball leagues was in a battle to remain relevant. 
 
The conference which was born a basketball-centric entity in 1979 and which had ballooned to a bloated league consisting of the original smaller, private schools along with much larger football powerhouses was going through a divorce. Heading out the door were schools such as Notre Dame, Syracuse, Louisville, Pittsburgh and UConn among others. What would remain would, for a short time, be known simply as the Catholic 7.
 
The good news? Those seven schools - Villanova, Seton Hall, Providence, Georgetown, St. John’s, DePaul and Marquette - would retain the BIG EAST name and the annual tournament would remain in its Madison Square Garden home. Also, three new basketball-centric programs, Creighton, Butler and Xavier, would be joining the BIG EAST to swell the ranks to 10 teams.
 
The bad news? The departure of the football schools was not the only daunting problem facing the newly-reformed BIG EAST as new commissioner Val Ackerman was about to find out.
 
“I was very intrigued when I was approached about this position because I was familiar with the league’s history and very respectful of the basketball piece of that history,” Ackerman said. “It just seemed like a winning proposition. But I completely underestimated the amount of work that would be needed to relaunch the conference. I had nothing. When I was hired there was no staff. We had no office, we had no website, we had no office email system and our finances were being managed by Georgetown. So everything had to be done anew to get the organization of the BIG EAST off the ground again. It was a tremendous amount of work that I did not foresee.”
 
When the larger football schools formed the new American Athletic Conference, their part of the separation deal gave them the keys to the old conference offices as well as the staff. It was a tradeoff for the Catholic 7 keeping the BIG EAST name and the Garden as its springtime tournament home.
 
So while she was gearing up for her first year as new commissioner, Ackerman was tasked with so much more off the court than on it.
 
“It was all from scratch. All the infrastructure stayed with what is now the American Athletic Conference,” Ackerman said. “They had the office that was in Providence, they had the staff but they had to change their name because the deal was the BIG EAST got to keep the BIG EAST name. But all the startup stuff fell to us. So my memories of those early years are mostly about that. But we held it together. Our schools were helpful in terms of managing and it was up to us to manage the new FOX (TV) relationship and find sponsors. We had zero sponsors at that time and we had a TV network that was not all that familiar with basketball.”
 
At the same time Greg McDermott was preparing for his first season in the BIG EAST as head coach of the Creighton Bluejays. The Jays had enjoyed enormous success as a member of the Missouri Valley Conference but McDermott, too, knew he was walking into a conference surrounded by uncertainty. 
 
“I think everyone was concerned,” McDermott said. “I remember back to the first spring meeting that year and I think (former Villanova coach) Jay Wright's leadership at the time was incredible. His vision for the league and what it needed to become as a new version of itself was spot on. He was adamant that we as coaches should stick together, that we had to have each other’s back and put the league first with the decisions we made. So I think Jay’s leadership was critical in getting the league off to a great start with the success that Villanova had over those first five or six years. That certainly helped the rest of us raise our level.”
 
Providence head coach Ed Cooley was not as concerned about the league’s future. In fact, the self-described optimist thought the breakup was long overdue.
 
“I was the happiest coach in America, quite frankly,” Cooley said. “I’m the wrong person to ask about doubt. I’m always incredibly optimistic and honest with you. So when the other schools left it was an opportunity for us to prove that we were still worthy and show that we don’t need those schools. So I never doubted that the BIG EAST was going to be a powerful figure just because of our name, Madison Square Garden and the media markets in which we play. I was born and raised in the BIG EAST and being a Northeast guy it wasn’t a matter of can we survive. When it first happened the first thing was, who else can be brought in?”
 
Creighton, Butler and Xavier became the new kids on the block and each was coming off a fair amount of basketball success when they arrived in 2013. Creighton was coming off a second straight MVC tournament title. Xavier, which was coming over from the Atlantic 10, missed the NCAA tournament in 2013, but was one of only eight teams to reach the previous seven straight NCAA tourneys. And Butler, also coming from the A-10, was not far removed from back-to-back NCAA Tournament championship games. 
 
And while Butler struggled some in its first season, Xavier posted 10 conference wins. And Creighton? Well, that was the year the Jays not only reached the conference tournament final, but they introduced BIG EAST fans to Greg McDermott’s son, Doug, who would go on to capture the conference’s Player of the Year award in 2014 and would be the consensus National Player of the Year.
 
Creighton’s move to the BIG EAST helped create a very memorable father-son season.
 
“First of all, if we don’t go to the BIG EAST, I don’t think Doug comes back for his senior year,” McDermott said. “I think that was part of his motivation, that I’m going to have an opportunity to play against some of these storied programs. I’m going to play in the BIG EAST Tournament in Madison Square Garden and at the same time I can improve my game and I can prove to people that I can be successful against players at the highest level. So that was one thing. The other was to make your first tour through the BIG EAST and to the BIG EAST Tournament for the first time and have your son on the team, those are things most dads would dream of and I got to experience it.”
 
The BIG EAST landed four teams in the NCAA Tournament that year. Still without its own offices and with very little staff. Yet the basketball side of things continued to flourish. The 2014-15 season saw the BIG EAST send six of 10 teams to the Big Dance with Xavier reaching the Sweet 16. It was also the year the conference finally found its new home offices on the east side of Manhattan.
 
“There were now 14 employees, a website and email addresses,” Ackerman said. “We got a checking account set up at J.P Morgan Chase. We had benefit packages. We had been hiring staff without benefit packages and I was telling them, ‘Just trust me, you’ll have a benefit package.’ And they trusted me. So I was doing all that while I was trying to run a conference.”
 
Still there were some doubters, but Ackerman and her cadre of coaches remained steadfast in their belief the BIG EAST would not only survive, but thrive.
 
“There were naysayers in the wings still questioning whether this was going to work,” Ackerman said. “Here we were, a small group of private Catholic schools with proud basketball histories, but without the wherewithal of the conferences we wanted to compete against and had competed successfully against. So I think there were a lot of people questioning whether the new BIG EAST could even begin to rival what the old BIG EAST had become. But I wasn’t in that camp or I wouldn’t have taken the job.”
 
The doubting, no doubt, ended the following year, during the 2015-16 season. Half the league once again qualified for the NCAA Tournament and when the Big Dance dust settled, Villanova was crowned national champions. If that victory didn’t cement the BIG EAST as a national power conference, Nova’s second national title in 2018 certainly did.
 
“Give Jay Wright a lot of credit,” Cooley said. “Jay took the bull by the horns and Villanova really carried the BIG EAST, winning those two national championships. You know, fifty percent of our league is making the tournament year in and year out. That’s pretty good.
 
Ackerman, though, felt the BIG EAST’s reputation had already been re-established.
 
“That very first year (when the league landed four bids) it demonstrated that the BIG EAST was going to remain a force to be reckoned with and it’s held firm ever since,” Ackerman said. “Our hats go off to Villanova, especially, because a number of those bids and units and the wins were because of them. And the real validation was winning the national championships. So I think if there was any doubt about what the BIG EAST was all about and what it was capable of, those doubts were completely dispelled.”
 
Since the BIG EAST realignment, the conference has earned 42 bids to the NCAA Tournament. From there the conference has logged nine Sweet 16 appearances, four Elite Eights, three Final Fours and, of course, those two national championships. A proven postseason pedigree for sure.
 
“At the end of the day you can talk about what happens in the regular season all you want, but if you want to legitimize a conference you have to get multiple teams into the NCAA Tournament and then you have to have some success when you get there,” McDermott said. “Fortunately, we were able to do both.”
 
And the 12-year TV deal the conference struck with FOX Sports 10 years ago has not only helped chronicle the BIG EAST’s successes on a nightly basis, but showed the rest of the college basketball world what the conference is made of.
 
“That deal made this move possible for the original seven who pulled away from the old BIG EAST,” Ackerman said. “They needed revenue, they needed exposure and they needed credibility to make the move and FOX provided everything. And the timing was fortuitous because at that time FOX was launching FS1 so they needed programming and they took the chance that the new BIG EAST would offer quality basketball programming.  It was a 12-year deal where every men’s basketball game was promised to be on.”
 
The BIG EAST, 10 years removed from all the upheaval, from the temporary offices, from not owning a working website, from its original staff of 14 brave souls, has firmly entrenched itself as - still - one of the premier conferences in the nation. It’s a credit to Ackerman and her staff, and to the coaches who saw the promise of what could be again.
 
“I credit our coaches, and Jay Wright especially, and JT III (former Georgetown coach John Thompson III),” Ackerman said. “They were the fiercest advocates for the authenticity of the new BIG EAST and how we all needed to come together. They were instrumental in rallying the coaches around the new league. Their optimism was infectious, and I relied on their consul heavily in the early years. We knew we had a tough assignment but within there was optimism. And now look where we are today.”
 
McDermott looked at those early days as a unique challenge and one that needed to be met head on.
 
“As coaches we’re competitive so try and tell us that we’re not going to be able to do something and we’ll get to work on proving you wrong,” McDermott said. “I think there was a group of coaches at that time that were very connected and we just followed the lead of Jay who had been in the league a long time and understood where it needed to go. The rest is history. The league has done really, really well. I think we’ve done everything we’ve set out to do and more. Certainly Val’s and (Executive Associate Commissioner) Stu’s (Jackson) leadership has been instrumental in making that happen. But I think also, at least on the men’s basketball side, as coaches have come and gone in our league, we’ve maintained what Jay talked about at the very beginning. That we have to put the league first and I think the new coaches in the league have continued to buy into that. As a result we’ve developed a league that is very consistent and is still a national brand like it once was.”
 
Cooley, too, has witnessed the league’s incredible rebirth since those anxiety-filled early days.
 
“I think the league has definitely grown,” Cooley said. “Obviously winning two national championships and three Final Fours, which was all of Villanova’s doing, I think that has given credibility to the league. And I think we can get stronger if we get more teams to that second and obviously that third weekend, which is the joy of all joys. But honestly, it’s an honor to work in the BIG EAST. It really is and I don’t take it for granted. And I’m always optimistic about our future.”
 
As is Ackerman, the commissioner who helped build the league back from scratch.
 
“I would not have made the leap, personally, if I didn’t share the vision of our presidents at that time,” Ackerman said. “I shared the vision that the BIG EAST could remain relevant and competitive nationally in college basketball. It just made sense to me. But I was really inspired by our coaches, too. Greg McDermott and Ed Cooley and Jay Wright and JTIII and (former Seton Hall coach) Kevin Willard. I look at that group of coaches and I credit them. They were the ones on the ground, bringing in the players, winning basketball games and they were telling me it was going to be great. So I believed them.”
 
The 2022-23 season has seen as many as five BIG EAST teams ranked in the AP Top 25 poll and at least five teams will be ticketed for the NCAA Tournament again this year. Maybe there will be some deep March runs ahead. Perhaps a few Sweet 16 appearances. An Elite Eight entry or two? Or dare to dream of a team reaching that third weekend Cooley talked about? Only time will tell. What is certain is the BIG EAST’s NCAA tournament bid totals will balloon once again this year. And that’s not bad for a conference that lacks the financial muscle of those “football” conferences the BIG EAST is happy to no longer be a part of.
 
 “We don’t have ACC money, we don’t have SEC money and that’s who we’re competing against in basketball,” Ackerman said. “And I think that’s a tribute to the league, too, because in spite of that resource differential, we’re still performing at this level. Again, our schools get the credit for figuring out a way to get that done. And they’ve done it.”