Saw these posted elsewhere and thought I would share.
It is a two-part history (not very long) of the creation and expansion of the Big East, from long-time Syracuse AD Jake Crouthamel that he wrote in 2000:
http://www.suathletics.com/sports/2001/8/8/history.aspx
http://www.suathletics.com/sports/20.../history2.aspx
Some of the key takeaways (some I knew, some I didn't) and blunders:
--Rutgers was offered in the original formation. They declined because they did not want to damage their relationship with Penn State (they were in the Atlantic 8/10 together for non-football sports). Their spot was then offered to Seton Hall.
--Obviously the biggie and most well-known, Penn State requested to join a couple of years after the league was established. They needed 6 votes to get in, but the final vote was 5-3. They were approached again later when the other conferences started to expand, but joined the Big Ten before any action could be taken.
--There was a split, even back when the football conference was developing, because the basketball schools didn't want to give up numbers, but they didn't want to risk losing Pitt/BC/Cuse. They compromised by allowing open invitations to UConn and Villanova in exchange for their expansion votes. St. John's president sided with the football schools, over the protests of their AD.
--Notre Dame was admitted, obviously, as an appeasement move to the basketball schools.
--One of the underrated keys (I know their fans are well-aware, but most aren't) is that the school played VPI and Temple (and to a lesser extent Rutgers and WVU, who were admitted after a couple of years) by not letting them join as full members for more than 7-years, making them keep their other sports in the Atlantic 10. It is interesting that the success of VPI during that time lead them to greater things in the ACC and the failure of Temple got them a demotion to a non-AQ conference.
--The other biggie, that I did not know, is that CBS approached the Big East football representatives at a football meeting about a contract, along with the SEC, to help beef up their college sports lineup, but they wanted football and basketball. The football reps were unable to make a move without the basketball schools and missed out on that potential golden opportunity (I would assume the basketball schools were too closely aligned with ESPN to consider making it happen).
Anyway, sorry for the long post. It is interesting to read, as the article is 10+ years old and makes it sound like things were headed in a great direction. I'd say the three biggest blunders were Rugers blowing their opportunity and letting Seton Hall take the forefront in NJ basketball, missing out on that CBS contract, and obviously blowing off Penn State (the only true anchor-type school in the Northeast).