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The Catholic 7 have made the decision to leave the Big East

Mike Aresco

In this photo taken Saturday, Oct. 6, 2012, Big East Commissioner Mike Aresco answers a question during an NCAA college football game between Connecticut and Rutgers in Piscataway, N.J. Aresco has to be smiling heading toward the midpoint of the football season. He has three ranked teams, and they’re all unbeaten. (AP Photo/Mel Evans)

AP

In case you weren’t ready to believe it yet, there are multiple reports out that state that the Catholic 7 have officially made the decision to make their exit from the Big East.

The question now is, simply, how?

From ESPN:

The presidents of the seven schools conducted a teleconference with Big East commissioner Mike Aresco on Thursday morning. The presidents are expected to issue a statement on their schools’ future in the next 24 to 48 hours.

According to the report from USA Today, the basketball schools have two options. The first is that they can leave as a group, and while that would prevent them from having to pay any exit fees, it would forfeit their share of the exit fees from the schools that have already left the conference, the NCAA tournament win-shares and their right to the Big East “brand”.

The other option?

Well, that’s where things could get crazy:

The Catholic schools could vote to dissolve the league. With seven votes out of 10 being cast (Connecticut, South Florida and Cincinnati are the others), the Catholic schools would have the two-thirds majority to pass that measure.

Once that is done, the outstanding bills of the league would be paid and the assets would then be divided among the 10 members. But everything else disappears including the current agreements in place with football and basketball, naming rights for each conference and the issue of spots in the new football system of playoffs and bowl games and the NCAA tournament spot that is guaranteed to the Big East tournament champion.


(UPDATE: Well, maybe not:

I can’t keep up.)

If you’re a lawyer, you might want to try and get yourself connected with whatever firm the Big East and the Catholic 7 schools hire.

Because regardless of how this plays out, the legal fees generated while the schools fight over who gets what money will be enormous.

I should have gone to law school.