If bigger is better, then the Big East would have to be considered the best now.

The… If bigger is better, then the Big East would have to be considered the best now.

The conference officially admitted five new members last Friday, upping its enrollment to 16 teams, making the new Big East the largest I-A conference in America. The additions came as no surprise because the move was announced in November 2003, but with the newly expanded conference going into effect this year, the additions had to be made official.

Joining Pitt in the Big East will be Cincinnati, DePaul, Louisville, Marquette and South Florida. The conference sought the addition of these schools — all of which came from Conference USA — after Boston College, Miami (Fla.) and Virginia Tech left for the Atlantic Coast Conference.

“This is a landmark day for the Big East Conference,” Commissioner Michael Tranghese said in a press release. “We have been working closely with our new members since they accepted membership, and we are extremely excited to move forward together. Our new schools have already added an enthusiastic spirit to the Big East. We know they are bringing outstanding levels of athletic competition and academic excellence.”

“We are very excited as we formally embark on a new chapter in the history of the Big East Conference,” added Pitt Chancellor Mark Nordenberg, who is also the chair of the league’s presidents. “We have already become friends and colleagues with our new members, and we look forward to a future that will be rewarding for everyone.”

For football, the Big East will have an eight-team alignment: Cincinnati, Connecticut, Louisville, Pittsburgh, Rutgers, USF, Syracuse and West Virginia. A charter member of the Bowl Championship Series, the Big East will begin its league schedule this fall when West Virginia plays at Syracuse on Sept. 4.

For basketball, the conference will be one large 16-team division. Match-ups are still being discussed, but initial speculation is that a team will play 13 teams each season, three of them twice, and will skip playing the other two entirely. Details on the upcoming basketball season will be announced at a later date.

Cincinnati, with an enrollment of 33,000, sponsors 18 sports. The Bearcats will come to Heinz Field on Oct. 8, for a contest with the Panther football team.

The University of South Florida has an enrollment of 42,000. USF sponsors 18 sports. Pitt’s football team will entertain the Bulls on Oct. 15, a rematch of a 43-14 Panther victory last season that catapulted the Panthers into the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl.

Louisville, with an enrollment of 24,000, has 22 sports. Pitt’s football team will venture to Lexington for a Thursday night battle with the Cardinals on Nov. 3.

DePaul has an enrollment of 23,600 and sponsors 15 sports. Marquette, with an enrollment of 11,000, sponsors 14 sports. Neither Marquette nor DePaul sponsors a I-A football team to compete with the Panthers.

Since the conference’s inception in 1979, the Big East has won 25 national championships in six different sports. What’s more, 123 student-athletes have won individual national titles and more than 300 student-athletes have earned Academic All-America honors.

With the incoming members, the Big East markets will contain almost one-fourth of all television households in the United States. Also, Big East institutions will now reside in seven of the nation’s top 30 largest media markets, including New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston, Washington D.C., Tampa, Pittsburgh and Hartford.