By Since November, there has been constant talk about whether or not the Big East conference will be expanding, but there is no clear answer.
Currently, the Big East conference is made up of 11 teams, most of them being located amongst the east coast and midwest regions of the United States. The conference is made up of schools that are NCAA Division 1 schools that do not have football teams.
Though there are various universities throughout the nation that do not have football teams, one school seems to be the best fit for the Big East conference: Gonzaga.
Gonzaga is currently in the West Coast Conference (WCC), and while it is thriving, its biggest rival, BYU, recently left the conference. This makes the competition level practically impossible for anyone in the conference to beat out Gonzaga given past seasons and outcomes. So, while there is a great benefit for the school in terms of winning out the conference, the game becomes less intensive and enjoyable when one team is given to beat out the rest.
As a result of BYU leaving the WCC, Gonzaga has been rumored to be looking to join a new conference, and the Big East is a great contender. But, there is one main reason as to why Gonzaga should not join the conference: location.
Gonzaga is located in Washington, and while it is a perfect location for the WCC, the Big East conference has all of its schools based at least 1,700 miles away from Gonzaga’s campus.
But, this would not be the first time the Big East conference has expanded. The conference expanded into the midwest in 2013 as DePaul and Marquette were added. But, regardless of the conference’s willingness to expand, there are still lingering issues with travel, both fees and duration, and starting times for games with the time differences.
All in all, the impracticalities of adding Gonzaga to the Big East conference do not make the addition justified. There would be a significant toll on the athletes in the conference, they would struggle with meeting the demands of a normal season while having to add on travel times which would further exhaust them and prevent them from attending classes. There is also the issue of needing to fund the travel out to Washington, which is difficult to keep up if there are not many fans from both teams at the game locations, especially if there are not fans from the competition due to how far the other schools in the conference are from Gonzaga.
There are just too many impracticalities to add Gonzaga to the Big East conference. If the Big East is looking to add a team, they should look more locally before they outsource to the west.
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