Mike Celizic

It’s the time of year when the Big East hype machine is running at full throttle and pundits start talking about how there’s not a more powerful basketball conference.

I’ve fallen for that line before, launching into flights of rhetorical rapture over the Big East's wonderfulness. My opinion was tinged by having covered Seton Hall and St. John’s back in the glory days of the 1980s, including 1985, when the conference sent three teams to the Final Four with Villanova beating Georgetown in the greatest championship game upset ever. But I believed it when I agreed that the sun may rise over the ACC and set over the Pac-10, but it reaches its zenith over the Big East.

I’ve gotten over it.

The Big East is a great basketball conference, but it's not the best. And before I jump back on the conference bandwagon, it’s going to have to prove it deserves the distinction — on the court, during March Madness.

Winning a championship would be nice. The Big East did nail down one of those in 2004, when Connecticut cut down the nets one year after Syracuse had done the trick. But since 2000, the ACC has won three times — Duke, Maryland and North Carolina; the SEC has won twice, thanks to Florida’s back-to-back efforts, and the Big Ten (Michigan State) and Big 12 (Kansas) have one each. (To say nothing of the league's title drought from 1986 to 1999.)

So if you’re counting by titles — which is the way most people count, the ACC has been the best this century. Before this century doesn’t really matter. We’re talking about which conference is best now, not historically.

But I’m going to cut the Big East a break and say it’s not just about championships. That’s because the NCAA tournament is a one-and-done party, and whenever you have single elimination, you also have luck. So I’m not going to say that a Big East team has to be the last team dancing at the end of March Madness to justify calling the conference the best there is and maybe ever was.

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But it is about being in a position to win the title, and that means getting to the Final Four. And it’s here that the Big East has been falling short. Since 2000, three Big East teams have made the Final Four — Georgetown in 2007, Connecticut in 2004, and Syracuse in 2003 (current Big East teams Louisville and Marquette were still in Conference USA during Final Four runs in 2005 and 2003, respectively).

In the same period, the ACC has had eight appearances by four teams, including two years when the ACC had two teams in the Final Four. The Big 10 has had seven Final Four appearances by five teams, including two years with two teams in the Final Four. The Big 12 has six Final Fours in that time as the Big East, and also landed two teams in the same Final Four.

So with all due respect, how can anyone call the Big East the best?

I don’t really care how many teams they have in the Top 25 at the end of the regular season. Big East boosters use that criterion to further their argument. Right now they’re saying the Big East rules because it has four teams in the Top 10 and two in the Top 3. But we judge teams by what they do in the tournament, not by what they do in the AP poll.

Anyway, with 16 teams, the Big East should have more Top 25 teams than the other power conferences and more teams in the tournament. Even when the Big East has gotten eight teams into the tournament, that’s half the conference. The ACC needs to get just six teams in to have the same level of success.

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The Big East doesn't stack up according to other measurements. The RPI may have its detractors, but it's still a measurement the NCAA tournament seeding committee uses. The Big East is tied for third, behind the ACC and the Big Ten and even with the Big 12. Ken Pomeroy's ranking of conference by the average rating of teams places the Big East third.

So before we start declaring the Big East the most powerful conference in the game — and maybe the most powerful ever — let’s wait for the tournament and see who’s standing at the end. Get more teams in the Final Four than anyone else, and I’ll listen. Win the title, too, and I’ll be back on the bandwagon.

If the Big East is as good as its boosters say it is, that shouldn’t be so hard, should it?

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