Well the 2009-2010 bowl season is just about over. Only the BCS National Championship between Texas and Alabama remains. The Big East finished its bowl season with a postseason record of 4-2. We’re going to recap the Big East’s bowl season starting with the scoreboard, followed by our commentary on the results.

Dan:
A 4-2 bowl season record might appear pretty good at first glance. But some people would have you think that it’s actually a poor record for the Big East this year. I’ve seen a few articles that pointed out that Cincy was blown out by Florida and WVU lost to a 6-6 FSU team, turning the Big East’s two losses into pretty awful losses.

I don’t buy it though. Sure, Cincy did get blown out by Florida. But you have to attribute some of that poor play to Brian Kelly leaving the Bearcats without their head coach for the bowl game. He did make a lot of the offensive calls, afterall. At any rate, Cincy lost to a great Florida team. They were a team that was ranked first in the nation for most of the season. Florida was the better team. But the play of a single team certainly doesn’t reflect the overall strength or performance of the entire conference.

As for WVU, I feel like they deserve a little more criticism than Cincy. WVU played a pretty bad FSU team. Granted, the fact that it was Bobby Bowden’s final game probably fueled FSU, and it was a virtual road game for WVU. They still shouldn’t have lost that game. Where was Devine late in that game? Come on WVU. Still, the circumstances just seemed to favor FSU.

On the other hand, there were four other games that turned out pretty well for the Big East. Pitt’s win over UNC is my pick for top Big East bowl win. That’s not a homer pick. UNC may have had a mediocre season by the record, but they had a top ranked defense and a home crowd in Charlotte. Pitt went in and let Dion Lewis rack up another 100+ yard game on that 6th ranked defense. The Panthers outplayed UNC despite making a few mistakes and came away with a win. UConn’s win is my pick for the second best win. As much as the SEC will want to point to the Sugar Bowl outcome, Big East fans can point to this one. UConn, after overcoming tragedy this season, pulled out a decisive victory over South Carolina, an SEC opponent.

And what about the other two wins? Well USF blew out Northern Illinois, a MAC opponent. Rutgers rolled right over UCF from C-USA. Isn’t that enough to silence the Big East haters that claim we’re a mid-major conference? The Big East simply plays at a higher level than those conferences and it showed in these two wins.

So about that 4-2 record? Well let’s put aside the fact that it’s better than the SEC, Big 12, ACC, Big Ten, and Pac-10 this year (and yes, that will stand despite the outcome of the BCS National Championship). We can even forget for a minute that the Big East sends a larger percentage of teams to bowls consistently. What’s most impressive to me is that since 2006, the Big East now has gone 17-6 in bowl games. Until people start respecting this conference, the best thing the teams of the Big East can do is keep posting records like this.

Mike:
The Big East went 4-2 this bowl season, not too shabby if you think about it. I predicted 5-1. Looking back though, how impressive is that 4-2 record? Rutgers and USF were expected to win their games against weak opponents, Cincinnati and West Virginia laid eggs in their games, Pitt beat a decent North Carolina team in what was a practical road game for them, and Connecticut had the most impressive win by beating South Carolina. I give the nod to UConn because of the tragedy they went through this year and the fact that South Carolina is a team from a dominate SEC. They barely edged Pitt in my opinion. As the record shows, the ACC had another terrible bowl year, so how great is that win for Pitt?

Looking back at my predictions, I wasn’t too far off on some. I really thought the Rutgers game would be closer and more of a defensive game then what it was. I figured UConn and USF would run away with their games. I honestly thought Pitt would just run up and down and all around on North Carolina and that game ended up being much closer than expected. West Virginia, I have no idea what happened there, being up 14-3 and then just not using Noel Devine. That would be like Pitt not using Dion Lewis or Jonathan Baldwin. Uh, what? Looking back, I wasn’t even that far off with the Cincinnati game, I figured they would lose and by double digits, but I didn’t think it would be that ugly.

All in all, it was a good year for Big East football. They had 0 teams ranked in the Top 25 to begin the year, but should end up with 2, maybe 3, teams ranked: Pitt, Cincy, maybe WVU. It was supposed to be a down year for talent and the teams in general, yet we saw the birth of new stars. Next year should be another fun year for Big East football. You have to figure Pitt and UConn are the two front runners. WVU and Cincy are next depending on players going to the pros and coaching transition for Cincy. Rutgers could easily be around the top next year, while USF is still a question mark, and Louisville and Syracuse are still rebuilding. It’s been a year full of memories, some good, some bad. But in the end, it was another successful Big East football season.

We’re not finished with our coverage of the 2009-2010 football season just yet. Look for a BCS National Championship preview tomorrow morning. Plus, we’re going to recap the Panthers successful 10-3 season in detail as soon as the final BCS rankings are released.

Also, don’t forget that Pitt basketball is in full swing now as they’ve entered into the Big East portion of the schedule. Look for an increase in our coverage of men’s basketball now that football season is over and basketball season is heating up.