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<< Front page Sports November 7, 2003
 
NCAC Roundup

Major conference merry-go-round

Welcome to major college sports, where east is east (and the Big East includes a team from Wisconsin) and south is south (while the southern-based ACC includes a team from Boston).

This isn’t even the beginning. A domino effect that began with the luring of the University of Miami to the Atlantic Coast Conference several months ago continues to have repercussions across NCAA Division I, as conferences great and small must reconstitute themselves due in large part to that customary scapegoat, dollars and cents.

The ACC, currently a nine-team conference, was attracted by the lure of millions in ticket prices and advertising dollars to hold a conference championship game in football. However, to do so a conference needs two divisions, and to have two divisions, a conference needs 12 teams.

And so the ACC went hunting. The addition of Miami, out of place in the northern-based Big East, only makes sense. Virginia Tech soon followed as the already-weak Big East lost their top two football schools.

Then, a few weeks ago, Boston College joined the mass Big East exodus and gave the ACC its coveted 12th squad in a move that seemingly takes the student out of student-athlete with such an increase in traveling distances.

Naturally, this sent the Big East on a quest to bolster its depleted ranks, which it more than achieved Tuesday as five members of Conference USA switched allegiances.

Cincinnati, Louisville and South Florida will join the Big East for all sports and DePaul and Marquette will join for all sports but football starting in the 2005-06 season.

While the new Big East schools may not make up for the defectors in football, basketball will be another story.

The Big East will become a basketball super-conference with 16 teams include several of the premier programs in the nation.

Meanwhile, the departures sent Conference USA scrambling for replacements, which they found Tuesday in two MAC schools and three WAC schools.

Central Florida and Marshall will join Conference USA from the Mid-American Conference and Rice, SMU and Tulsa will join from the Western Athletic Conference in the 2005-06 season.

Dizzy yet? We might not be finished. The latest exodus will leave the MAC with 14 schools and the WAC with seven.

Mano a mano — barely

The showdown between the Cleveland Caveliers and the Denver Nuggets in Cleveland last night was much anticipated conception of a rivalry between two teenage rookies — but LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony were quiet Wedneday night.

Instead, Cleveland native Earl Boykins, all 5’5” of him, stole the show, scoring all 18 of his points in the second half to lead the Nuggets to a 93-89 victory over the winless Cavs.

LeBron scored only seven points in his home debut.

Compiled by Laurie Stein