With all the talk about the ACC expanding, and Miami being the key candidate, you've got to stop and ask yourself if the Big East is going to just sit on its hands and let things happen that might destroy the league. I'd like to think the Big East is working on a counter-punch. And here's the lowdown on what they might do.

First of all, the status of ACC expansion appears to be, from listening to different sources, that Miami has the 7 of 9 votes needed from ACC presidents to be invited into the league. Boston College and Syracuse may or may not have those same votes. Going into today, I had heard that the ACC had not been able to muster enough support for Syracuse and BC -- or even Tech or Pitt or WVU -- to come along with Miami, but as the day wore on, WVU sources started to indicate that Miami, BC, and Syracuse had all been approved. That info changes from hour to hour, and some if it may or may not even be true.

(Heck, just by posting any article theorizing on the ACC and the Big East, we run the risk of looking like fools 15 minutes from now if something different happens. But here goes ...)

Note that Big East teams being approved for ACC expansion does not necessarily mean they'll go. That's a separate step. I would like to think that the schools will give the Big East a chance to respond first before making the leap to the ACC.

The bottom line is, the ACC is still interested and talking, 12 teams or not, and Miami is still listening.

We've all been watching this drama play itself out, to the point where it makes us queasy at the prospect of VT getting left behind in a gutted Big East. But lately, a new angle on discussions has cropped up, literally in just the past few days.

Many observers are theorizing that Miami's latest dalliance with the ACC is just a power play to force the Big East to do something about its situation with the basketball-only schools and non-football playing Notre Dame. The conference's hodge-podge membership of eight football schools and six "basketball-only" schools, as they're called, prevents it from expanding its football side, because the basketball schools would never agree to it, and it would make the league even more unwieldy than its current configuration.

The Canes might be trying to force the Big East to change -- or else -- and some evidence has been appearing in the newspapers that something is in play here.

"I'd like to see the ACC stay at nine and us [the Big East] go to nine," Weaver said. "We have two conferences here that have automatic berths to the BCS and to me ... two opportunities are better than one."

But there is also a growing sentiment among Big East schools to be proactive and take steps to entice Miami to stay. The main incentive would be for the eight Big East football-playing members to break from their basketball-only brethren and form their own conference, with almost the same configuration they had a decade ago when the topic was first broached. In this instance, however, Connecticut, which is joining the Big East as a full member in football starting in the 2005 season, would replace Temple.

Mulcahy declined to discuss what options Rutgers is exploring if the Big East football conference dissolves, but speculation is that the league may try to appease Miami by having the football schools break away from the rest to form their own conference. That would give the eight teams a league in which all had the same interests and agendas.

Hmm, an athletic director suddenly talking about expansion, which is only likely if the Big East football schools break away, and two newspapers suddenly talking about breaking away. As they like to say, where there's smoke, there's fire. Let's dig into this a little bit.

No one has even considered the possibility of the eight Big East football schools breaking away, for two reasons: (1) BE Commissioner Mike Tranghese wouldn't allow that to happen; and (2) the departing schools would leave behind their NCAA basketball tournament revenue-sharing dollars.

I can shoot both of those down.

(1.) Mike Tranghese won't let it happen.

While you can't expect Tranghese, whose roots go all the way back to the formation of the Big East as a basketball league, to facilitate the process, he doesn't have to be involved. The football schools can just do it themselves. Leave the league, leave the commissioner. Just like the football schools don't need the permission of Seton Hall, St. John's, et al, to break away, they don't need Tranghese's permission to do it.

(2.) The departing schools leave behind their share of NCAA Tournament dollars.

Maybe, maybe not. This is where it gets complicated, so stick with me.

In 1994, the four Big East football schools at the time -- Syracuse, Pitt, Boston College, and Miami -- pledged that if non-members WVU, Rutgers, Temple and VT were not invited into the league for all sports, they would all break away and form a new eight-team league.

You know how that came out. WVU and Rutgers got the votes, and VT and Temple didn't, and the quartet headed by Syracuse stayed put. Loyalty played some part in that, but so did the fact that the four football teams couldn't leave and keep their NCAA tournament dollars.

A little background before we continue: The NCAA distributes millions of dollars of NCAA men's basketball tournament revenue to participating conferences based on a formula that rewards conferences for putting teams in the tournament.

From the NCAA's web site:

The basketball fund provides for moneys to be distributed to Division I conferences based on their performance in the Division I Men's Basketball Championship over a six-year rolling period (for the period 1997-2002 for the 2002-03 distribution)�

One unit is awarded to each institution participating in each game, except the championship game. In 2001-02, each basketball unit was worth approximately $100,671 for a total distribution of $75 million.

In 2002-03 each basketball unit will be worth approximately $130,697 for a total distribution of $97.5 million.

In 2001-02, for example, the Big East received $7.35 million from the "basketball fund," which means that the Big East had 73 "units" in the previous six years (1997-2002) of NCAA Tournaments.

That's a lot of money to leave behind.

But the football teams wouldn't necessarily have to leave it behind. Not this time around.

I'll bet that got your attention. The NCAA has realignment rules that specify where NCAA basketball tournament participation dollars stay, should teams start moving. Rule number one -- actually item (a) under realignment clauses -- is:

(a.) If an institution leaves a conference and realigns with another and its original conference remains in operation, the units it earned remain with the conference that it left.

That's why the four Big East teams didn't leave in 1994.

But get a load of this clause:

(f.) If 50 percent or more of the member institutions in a given conference leave the conference simultaneously and the remaining conference membership falls below six member institutions, the conference shall be considered disbanded and each member institution shall retain the units it earned in the basketball fund as if the conference had in fact disbanded (for the purposes of the basketball fund distribution).

That clause says: "If at least half of the schools in a conference depart, and the number of schools left behind is five or less, then the departing schools get to take their NCAA Tournament money with them."

You're immediately counting teams, aren't you? Let me do it for you:

Big East All-Sports Schools (8): Boston College, Miami, Pittsburgh, Rutgers, Syracuse, Temple (Temple is replaced by UConn, for purposes of discussion here), West Virginia, and Virginia Tech.

Basketball Only Schools (5): Georgetown, Providence, Seton Hall, St. John's, and Villanova.

Other Schools (1): Notre Dame.

The lynchpin, as usual, is Notre Dame. If the eight football schools can convince the Irish to leave with them, then only five teams are left behind in the Big East � and the new league gets to take their basketball money with them.

From 1998-2003 -- the current NCAA Tournament payout period -- the football schools went to the NCAA Tournament 19 times; the basketball schools went eight times; and Notre Dame went three times.

The payout is done based on number of games participated in, not just trips to the tournament, but you can see that out of 30 NCAA Tournament invitations over a six-year span, the football schools and Notre Dame had 22 of those invitations, or 73%. So you can guess they would take roughly 73% of the NCAA Tournament money with them if they left the Big East.

Notre Dame has two options: (1) leave with the football schools, taking the NCAA Tournament money with them, and form a new league; (2) stay in a gutted Big East and keep the NCAA Tournament dollars, but watch them dwindle over the coming years in a weakened league that might not even survive.

First of all, understand that if Notre Dame were to leave with the football schools, they don't have to agree to play football with them in the new league. Notre Dame's interest here is in keeping their non-revenue sports and men's basketball housed in a cohesive, stable conference. They can just participate in the new conference for all sports but football, stay independent in football, and enjoy the benefits of an all-sports conference, including NCAA Tournament payouts, much like they do with their current Big East setup.

Or, if the football schools bolt, Notre Dame can stay behind in a six-team Big East, cross their fingers, and hope for the best.

What would you do if you were the Irish?

Of course, it's not all about NCAA Tournament money, although that money is about 15% of the money the league made in 2001-02, so it can't be ignored.

If the football schools broke away, with or without Notre Dame, there's also the issue of a new basketball TV contract, reworking the football contract, trying to convince Notre Dame to join for football, etc.

But by breaking away, the Big East football schools would find themselves in a newer, smaller league that could then have the possibility of expansion � all the way up to 12 teams and a championship game.

And let's make the obvious point here: While the ACC hems and haws and argues about expansion, a smaller, more nimble Big East would go at it, guns blazing, and get it done in no time. They don't have the hangups that the ACC has, such as a "North Carolina Four" that likes to block expansion and keep the power in the conference to themselves.

Suddenly, the new Big East would be a big threat to the ACC, where Clemson, FSU, and Georgia Tech all desire to play in a 12-team football league, and they could be convinced to take a serious look at joining a conference that would offer them that possibility.

And if those ACC teams don�t want to join the new conference, the world is full of MAC and Conference USA teams that would jump at the chance.

There's a lot of talk on the message boards these days about an Eastern Superconference that includes all of the Big East football schools, Notre Dame, and maybe even Penn State or 1-3 ACC schools from the pool of FSU, Georgia Tech, and Clemson (the schools most rumored to want ACC expansion, and to be frustrated by the North Carolina Four's control of their conference).

An Eastern Superconference sounds far-fetched, but certainly a slimmed down Big East with an aggressive expansion agenda represents a force to be dealt with. Perhaps the ACC's latest interest in Miami is a pre-emptive strike to block a Big East breakaway and subsequent expansion.

Or perhaps the Miami and ACC talks are bringing up talks of a Big East breakaway. It's a chicken-and-egg game.

While it is gut-wrenching to watch the expansion talk go on, it's quite possible, if the Big East football schools have the guts, the numbers work out, and Notre Dame cooperates, that the Big East could have a bright future, one devoid of raiding by other conferences.

We can only hope.

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