Publius, I'm not sure that I understand your question. ???

My point was that the historical patterns in college basketball changed abruptly in the past 10 years. The conferences who are currently in BCS football have suddenly taken over college basketball as well. These same conferences have been successful in basketball in the past but nothing like what they have been in the past decade.

I mentioned UConn as one of the few schools to make it to the Final Four in the past 10 years who does not play BCS football.

I mentioned Providence as one of a number of schools who was frustrated with a loss in the regional finals (Elite 8) in recent years when this same caliber of school was getting to the Final Four with regularity in the past.

I was trying to restate the fact that while these schools (Providence and UConn) were not fielding I-A football teams at the time of their respective runs, they were still members of a conference (BIG EAST) that was sitting at the roundtable of the hierarchy of college athletics by virtue of a football conference being listed amongst the "Big Six." Granted, no other schools can be said to meet such a distinction other than the "basketball-only" schools of the BIG EAST (Notre Dame excepted), as all other major conferences retain a policy of "full" membership or no membership.

"Major" being construed to mean BCS (C-USA not included, although I am not of the opinion that C-USA basketball is necessarily mid-major).

Publius, thanks for the clarification. I agree that Louisville basketball is not mid-major in history & tradition.

I suspect that what has happened is that the inherent advantages of the big time football schools were held in check for a long time by the fact that at one time only conference champions could go to the tournament. Even when the tournament expanded, at first only 2 or 3 schools from a conference could get bids by the limits of a 32, later 40, & then 48 team tournament, so even schools without the advantages of a big athletic budget could maintain a comparable basketball profile to the big football schools & therefore compete with them for recruits. However, now that about half the members of the big football conferences go to the NCAA basketball tournament each year, the basketball-only schools & others have lost the chance to balance the advantages of big budgets.

It took a few years, but things changed after the tournament expanded to 64 teams. The big conferences have seen this & therefore have "locked in" the number of at-large bids, thereby creating the necessity for "play-in" games & essentially expanding the tournament even further. By the mid '90s, the big-time football conferences had the stranglehold that they had been seeking.

because they are a one-trick pony. They even dismantled their championship baseball team. :o>:( :(