The "New Big East"

This season marks a new step in conference realignment and we get our first taste of the American Athletic Conference

By Kristina Callahan

SBNation.com

When the college basketball season begins this year, you may be confused. Some former members of the Big East will be in a new conference, the American Athletic Conference. Syracuse, Pittsburgh, Notre Dame are now members of the ACC with Louisville to follow next season. Rutgers will pack up and move to the Big Ten in 2014. In December 2012, the Catholic 7 made up of DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, St. John’s, Seton Hall and Villanova voted to unanimously to separate from the football playing schools and retain the name, Big East and the right to host the tournament at Madison Square Garden. The remaining schools formed the American Athletic Association.

The new conference includes former Big East members, Cincinnati, the University of Connecticut, Louisville and Rutgers (for the 2013-2014 season), and the University of South Florida. The new members are Temple, Memphis, Southern Methodist University, the University of Houston and the University of Central Florida. Expected to join in July 2014 are East Carolina University, Tulane and Tulsa. Navy is supposed to join in 2015 as a football only school.

This upcoming season will prove to be an adjustment for not only the coaches and players but also the fans. The conference realignment process is inevitable with lucrative television deals hanging in front of athletic departments but nonetheless, college basketball season is right around the corner which means blood, sweat and tears on the court every night of the week.