The Big East Conference was a collegiate athletics conference that consisted of as many as 16 universities in the eastern half of the United States from 1979 to 2013. The conference's members participated in 24 NCAA sports. The conference had a history of success at the national level in basketball throughout its history, while its shorter football program, created by inviting one college and four other "associate members" into the conference, resulted in two national championships.
The UConn Huskies are the intercollegiate athletic teams that represent the University of Connecticut, located in Storrs. The school is a member of the NCAA's Division I and the Big East Conference. The university's football team plays at Rentschler Field, and the men's and women's basketball teams play on-campus at Harry A. Gampel Pavilion and off-campus at the XL Center.
The UConn Huskies football team is a college football team that represents the University of Connecticut in the sport of American football. The team competes in NCAA Division I FBS as an independent. Connecticut first fielded a team in 1896, and participated in Division I-AA until 1999. The Huskies began their two-year Division I-A transition period in 2000, and became a full-fledged Division I-A team in 2002. From 2000 to 2003, the team played as an independent. The school's football team then joined the conference of its other sport teams, the Big East, taking effect in 2004, through 2019. In 2019, the UConn football team left the American to again play as an independent, as the school's current primary conference, the current Big East, does not sponsor the sport. The Huskies are coached by Jim Mora.
Randy Douglas Edsall is a retired American football coach, formerly the head football coach at the University of Connecticut from 1999 to 2010 and again from 2017 until his abrupt retirement in 2021. He also served as the head coach at the University of Maryland from 2011 to 2015 and as director of football research-special projects for the Detroit Lions of the National Football League (NFL) in 2016. During his first stint at UConn, he oversaw the program's promotion from the NCAA Division I-AA level to Division I-A. He is the program's all-time leader in wins and games coached.
The Villanova Wildcats are the athletic teams of Villanova University. They compete in the Big East for every sport; except football and rowing where they compete in the Colonial Athletic Association. On December 15, 2012, Villanova and the other six, non-FBS schools announced that they were departing the Big East for a new conference. This conference assumed the Big East name on July 1, 2013.
The Big East women's basketball tournament is a conference championship tournament in women's basketball. It was first held in 1983, at the end of the 1982–83 college basketball season that was the first in which the Big East Conference sponsored women's basketball. Following the 2013 split of the original Big East along football lines, the women's basketball history of the original conference has been maintained by the non-football league that assumed the Big East name. The tournament determines the conference's champion, which receives an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.
The 2009 International Bowl was a postseason college football bowl game between the Connecticut Huskies (UConn) and the Buffalo Bulls at Rogers Centre in Toronto, Canada, on January 3, 2009. The game was the final contest of the 2008 NCAA Division I-Football Bowl Subdivision football season for both teams, and ended in a 38–20 victory for Connecticut. UConn represented the Big East Conference in the game; Buffalo entered as the Mid-American Conference (MAC) champion.
Donald Eugene Brown II is a former American football running back who played in the National Football League (NFL) for seven seasons, primarily with the Indianapolis Colts. He played college football at Connecticut, where he became the school's all-time leading rusher, and was selected by the Colts in the first round of the 2009 NFL Draft. Brown was a member of the Colts for five seasons and spent his last two seasons with the San Diego Chargers.
Larry Taylor is an American gridiron football wide receiver and kick returner who is currently a free agent. He originally signed with the Montreal Alouettes of the Canadian Football League as a free agent in 2008. He played college football for the Connecticut Huskies, where he returned punts for touchdowns in each of the Huskies' first two bowl games—the 2004 Motor City Bowl and the 2007 Meineke Car Care Bowl.
The 2009 Connecticut Huskies football team represented the University of Connecticut in the 2009 NCAA Division I FBS football season as a member of the Big East Conference. The team was coached by Randy Edsall and played its home games at Rentschler Field in East Hartford, Connecticut. The team finished with a record of 8–5, 3–4 in Big East play and won the PapaJohns.com Bowl 20–7 against South Carolina.
The 2010 PapaJohns.com Bowl was a postseason college football bowl game between the South Carolina Gamecocks of the Southeastern Conference (SEC) and the Connecticut Huskies (UConn) of the Big East Conference, on January 2, 2010, at Legion Field in Birmingham, Alabama. The game was the final contest of the 2009 NCAA Division I-Football Bowl Subdivision football season for both teams, and it ended in a 20–7 victory for Connecticut.
The 2010 Connecticut Huskies football team represented the University of Connecticut in the 2010 NCAA Division I FBS football season as a member of the Big East Conference. The team was coached by Randy Edsall and played its home games at Rentschler Field in East Hartford, Connecticut. The Huskies finished 8–5, 5–2 in Big East play to share the conference title with Pittsburgh and West Virginia. Due to victories over both schools, the Huskies earned the Big East's automatic bid to a BCS game, and were invited to the Fiesta Bowl where they were defeated by Big 12 champion Oklahoma 48–20. It was the first major-bowl appearance in the program's 115-year history.
The 2010 Pittsburgh Panthers football team represented the University of Pittsburgh in the 2010 NCAA Division I FBS football season. The Panthers were members of the Big East Conference. They were led by the sixth-year head coach Dave Wannstedt and played their home games at Heinz Field. 2010 marked the university's 121st season overall. They finished the season 8–5, 5–2 in Big East play to be champions of the Big East with Connecticut and West Virginia. However, due to losses to both schools, Pitt did not earn the conference's bid to a Bowl Championship Series (BCS) game. They were invited to the BBVA Compass Bowl where they defeated Kentucky, 27–10. Wannstedt was forced to resign on December 7, 2010.
The 2010 Big East football season was the NCAA football season of the Big East Conference. Conference members began regular-season play on September 2, but did not begin conference play until October 8; the regular season continued through December 4. Following the regular season, six conference teams played in bowl games; although the bowl season concluded with the BCS National Championship Game on January 10, 2011, the last date on which a Big East team played was January 8, when Pittsburgh defeated Kentucky in the BBVA Compass Bowl in Birmingham, Alabama.
The 2011 Connecticut Huskies football team represented the University of Connecticut in the 2011 NCAA Division I FBS football season as a member of the Big East Conference. The team was coached by Paul Pasqualoni and played its home games at Rentschler Field in East Hartford, Connecticut. It was Pasqualoni's first year with the team.
The 2012 Big East football season was the 22nd NCAA Division I FBS football season of the conference that was known as the Big East Conference from its formation in 1979 until July 2013, and ultimately proved to be the last for the conference under the "Big East" name, as well as the last with a full round-robin schedule for conference play. The conference consisted of eight football members: Cincinnati, Connecticut, Louisville, Pittsburgh, Rutgers, South Florida, Syracuse and Temple. In February 2012, the Big East settled a lawsuit with West Virginia University that allowed them to move to the Big 12 Conference effective July 1, 2012.
The 2013 Big East men's basketball tournament, officially known as the 2013 Big East Championship, was the 34th annual Big East men's basketball tournament, deciding the champion of the 2012–13 Big East Conference men's basketball season. For the 31st consecutive season, the tournament was held at Madison Square Garden in New York City, from March 12–16, 2013. The tournament only featured 14 teams due to Connecticut being given a one-year postseason ban due to APR penalties. This would have been the last year with as many as 16 teams participating in the Big East tournament, but Connecticut was ineligible and West Virginia moved to the Big 12 before the beginning of the season. The conference tournament champion received an automatic bid to the 2013 NCAA tournament.
The Syracuse–UConn rivalry is a sports rivalry between the Syracuse Orange of Syracuse University and the UConn Huskies of the University of Connecticut. The rivalry started in men's basketball while both schools were members of the Big East conference, and is slowly growing across other sports.
