It's been three months since they indicated they would be leaving the Big East to form their own conference, but the Catholic 7 have finally made a departure date official. Friday, the Big East announced it has agreed to allow the Catholic 7 schools - basketball only institutions - to depart on the 30th of June.
"I am pleased that this agreement has been reached," Big East commissioner Mike Aresco said. "With the long-term well-being of our outstanding institutions and their student-athletes of paramount importance, each group worked through a number of complex issues in an orderly, comprehensive and amicable manner marked by mutual respect. We part ways as friends and colleagues and look forward to the success of both conferences."
The Catholic 7 schools -- DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, Seton Hall, St. John's and Villanova -- will form a 10-team league by adding Butler, Xavier and likely Creighton, sources say.
The blow is a big one for the Big East who will have to scramble to find replacements, especially since they aren't being compensated they would have been if this were including NCAA Football teams.
For the Catholic schools, this brings opportunities for more exposure with their first step being a Fox Sports contract for multimedia rights. I suspect the Fox contract will be the first of many in a long line as the years wear on,
Interestingly, the Catholic 7 will still be allowed to use the Big East logo (not sure why they would), despite removing all affiliation with the conference.
It's been tough going for the Big East lately, in the past two years, 16 schools have left or announced they were leaving the Big East.
What remains for the Big East in 2013 is a 10-team conference: Connecticut, Cincinnati, Houston, Louisville, Memphis, Rutgers, South Florida, SMU, Temple and UCF.
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