Big East commissioner John Marinatto will hold a telephone conference call today with the media to discuss some aspects to the league’s realignment plan, it was announced yesterday.
Sources told The Post that Marinatto will not comment on any specific program nor will he say if any official invitations have been extended. Rather, Marinatto is expected to say the league has increased its exit fee to $10 million (from $5 million) for FBS members, as reported last week in The Post.
Marinatto, who disdains discussing expansion plans, is doing so because he does not want the topic to dominate tomorrow’s Big East men’s basketball media day. The non-FBS schools have made it clear they do not want their day infringed upon.
The league’s expansion plan has not changed. The league is poised to extend football-only invitations to Boise State and Air Force of the Mountain West Conference and Navy and all-sports invitations to Central Florida, Houston and SMU of Conference USA.
That would boost membership to 12 in football and 17 in basketball. But there is no guarantee that would save the football league.
The Big 12 is debating whether to expand to 10 or 12 programs. If it goes to 12, Louisville would surely get an invite and almost certainly would accept. Not only would that cost the Big East another key football member but an elite basketball member as well.
Pittsburgh and Syracuse recently accepted invitations to join the ACC. TCU, which was supposed to begin play in the Big East next season, is headed to the Big 12.
The Post has learned the actions of Pitt were considered especially distasteful. Pitt chancellor Mark Nordenberg, the most influential leader among Big East FBS schools, was personally involved in the league’s discussions with Navy before doing a 180 and taking Pitt to the ACC.
The Big East, which has suffered two series of defections to the ACC –Miami, Virginia Tech and Boston College in the middle of the last decade and now Pitt and Syracuse — must raise its exit fee to make its non-FBS members and the six new members feel a bit more secure.
A source told The Post the league was discussing a change in the 27-month penalty, a rule Nordenberg helped craft. The source said the league would not likely hold Pitt and Syracuse to a 27-month window before departing but only if the schools agreed to pay a higher exit fee.