Big East Hoping for Better Days in Its Future

Let’s just say the Big East has had better days.

In the span of 24 hours, the college conference lost one of its major power brokers, saw an institution suffer embarrassment over a hiring and, last but certainly not least, had one of the basketball programs that are the foundation of the league accused of behavior certain to draw the scrutiny of NCAA investigators. Two of the developments are the direct result of the Big East’s decision to accommodate its members fielding Division-I football teams by adding the University of Miami. The third is fundamental to the image of the remarkably successful conference.

Sam Jankovich, the athletic director who got the best deal for Miami in the major realignment taking place in college sports, resigned from the university to assume command of the lowly National Football League franchise currently operating in New England. The man was introduced to the media as the chief executive office of the Patriots Thursday in Foxboro, Mass. The Patriots are nearing the end of a season in which the team has established itself as the worst in the NFL and the organization was publicly chastised and fined for its handling of a sexual harassment claim by a female reporter. For what amounts to a herculean task, Jankovich will be paid as well as a professional linebacker, no small achievement for a balding 56-year-old administrator who wears thick glasses.

During Jankovich’s seven years plus at Miami, the school not only was credited with three national football championships but revived its long dormant basketball program. It was largely for the sake of basketball, which has yet to generate much success or community support, that he aligned the school with the Big East. The Hurricanes will participate in league play starting next season.

No more than 40 miles away from Foxboro, in the affluent Boston suburb of Chestnut Hill, a news conference to introduce the new head football coach at Boston College had to be scrapped when the appointee, Jimmye Laycock, called Athletic Director Chet Gladchuk in the pre-dawn hours to say that, on second thought, he wanted to remain at William & Mary. Only a few days earlier, the first choice, Frank Beamer of Virginia Tech, had withdrawn his name from consideration. All this came about because in committing its football program to a permanent alliance with Syracuse, Pittsburgh and, especially, Miami, as well as four colleges to be named later, BC felt Jack Bicknell couldn’t cut it any more.

To anyone exposed to Bicknell during his decade at The Heights, it was an unfortunate decision. Not so much because the man had compiled a 59-55-1 record against demanding schedules, not so much because he had guided the Eagles to four bowl games or to their first consecutive Lambert Trophies since the days of Frank Leahy, not so much because he had given an unsolicited freshman quarterback named Doug Flutie room to stretch his imagination, but because he was the ideal person to represent an institution of higher learning. Cowboy Jack was a class act who did considerable good for BC’s image as a serious and ambitious university and, despite four straight losing seasons, he deserved the opportunity to run a program that finally would be placed in a structured situation.

Of greater concern to the conference, however, are the allegations in the Syracuse Post-Standard that the basketball program at Syracuse broke dozens of NCAA rules during the course of the last eight years. Most involved money and favors from boosters, including Coach Jim Boeheim’s closest friend, but one involved the changing of a grade so that a player might retain his eligibility. The program also had been cited in “Raw Recruits,” a book highlighting abuses in big-time college basketball,for its connection with a New York “scout” who steered players to the university.

In 11 years, the Big East has risen to a place of great prominence in college sports without any of its members being sanctioned by the NCAA. Although it has never won a national championship in the sport, Syracuse is the single most significant member of the league, the result not only of a winning tradition but the on-campus Carrier Dome, home to the largest crowds in the country and site of many national telecasts. The Syracuse program was the one the conference could not have lived without, the one that forced commissioner Mike Tranghese to include Miami in future plans so as to prevent the Orangemen from joining another all-sports alignment.

An extraordinary gathering of boxers took place Tuesday night at Madison Square Garden, which used to be synonymous with the sport but lately has been inactive as a fight club. Alas, heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield, former titleholder Mike Tyson and the ever-popular Sugar Ray Leonard were attending a basketball game between the Knicks and Lakers. Of the three, only Leonard has the Garden in his plans, another comeback bout in February. He underscored his lack of familiarity with basketball by clanking three free throws off the front rim in a shoot for charity during an early timeout.

Holyfield and Tyson both were in town to promote the agreements signed by their promoters with cable outfits planning to establish rival pay-per-view networks. Holyfield will lead off with George Foreman in April in what shapes up as a fine example of mass entertainment. Tyson will have a go with Razor Ruddock, whom he previously avoided under mysterious circumstances, in March.

The latter is a curious choice for a man in position to challenge the winner of Holyfield-Foreman for mega-millions. Apparently, Tyson has convinced himself he is once again invincible after dismantling Alex Stewart two weeks ago. And Don King has not been moved to dissuade him, even if there is no title at stake and the payoff will be what the promoter calls “chump change.” Either way, King stays in the game. He has future calls on both men, but the match carries a major risk for Tyson.