Temple Returning to Big East in 2013
So this is what the final leg of expansion has come to for the Big East, welcoming back a team that was kicked out for terrible performance only eight years ago.
Well, eight years might as well be eight decades considering the way realignment has turned conferences into corporate raiders, all too eager to destroy each other to preserve themselves. At turns, expansion has been part “Lord of the Flies,” part Generation Me. But it has completely taken the biggest toll on the Big East — turning a conference that had already lacked national respect into one that is a collection of teams formerly known as non-automatic qualifiers.
As in most of its other moves in the past four months, the Big East adding Temple to the football fold immediately had a sense of desperation attached. The Big East appeared to have no plan once West Virginia bolted for the Big 12 to the tune of $20 million. Playing with seven members for 2012 was not feasible. The Big East called on Boise State to join a year early. The Broncos thought the financial price too steep.
So Temple became the only viable option. The Owls may have been tossed out of the Big East in 2004, but their football program has been rejuvenated and the school wanted desperately back into the Big East fold. Bygones should be bygones, right?
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