There was an eerie feeling in the corridors of Penn Station; fans decked out in all blue with looks of bewilderment. They had just witnessed their blue-blooded Duke Blue Devils suffer a defeat to the St. John’s Red Storm, a team who had not won a game in the Big East Conference at the time.
A question was raised immediately: is this incarnation of the Big East as good as the “Old” Big East? Founder of the prestigious Kenpom computer rankings, Ken Pomeroy, raised this very question.
“When an 0-11 Big East team beats the preseason title favorite, you have to at least be open to the idea that the new Big East is as good as the old Big East,” Pomeroy said, via twitter.
This game did not create this debate, but it radically brought it to the forefront of sports media. Now I’m not here to tell you why the new Big East is as good as its predecessor, but the new league is definitely at its strongest since realignment.
“St. John’s strong showing Saturday was reflective of the conference’s depth and talent, even at the foot of the league where the Red Storm currently occupy last place,” Patrick Brennan, a reporter for Cincinnati.com, said.
Rise of the New Big East
When the Catholic 7 broke off of the 16-team conference, the prevailing thought of the sports world was there will never be anything like the Big East Conference, ever again. Immediately the debate shifted to the Catholic 7 being labeled a strong mid-major league. Which was bolstered by the additions of mid-major powerhouses Xavier, Butler, and Creighton.
In the years since, the new version of the conference has been consistently one of the top basketball conferences in the nation, most notably backed up in Villanova’s national championship in 2016, as well as sending 70 percent of its teams to the NCAA tournament last March.
Fast forward to this season, and the Big East is again among the best conferences top to bottom. A league that is headlined by two top-5 teams is one where any team could win any night.
Which brings us back to St. John’s, the historic program from Jamaica, New York, who has seen better days, to put it politely. Since the Johnnies named all-time great Chris Mullin head coach, New York’s team has been on track to finish at or around the bottom of the Big East every season.
St. John’s followed up the upset of Duke by knocking off No. 1 Villanova, in Philadelphia, Pa. The Johnnies were the worst team in the conference with 11 straight losses to open league play, and now there is talk of them somehow making the NIT based on their huge wins this past week.
The strength of a conference is measured by how solid the bottom teams are, and whether it is Georgetown, DePaul, or St. John’s, each have showed in the past why they need to be taken seriously by the rest of the league. Because of this the Big East’s Kenpom and RPI have soared this season. Ranking second in RPI and third in Kenpom out of every conference in the country.
The new Big East is one of the top conferences in the country from top to bottom. Each day, respect for the conference grows more and more by its actions on the court. Fans of this conference claim that their favorite teams do not get the recognition they deserve, but by winning the games in front of them, the Big East is putting itself on the map.
J.P. Proulx can be reached at jeanpaul.proulx@student.shu.edu or on Twitter @ProulxCenter.