Big East Conference

The Big East Conference is a collegiate athletic conference that competes in NCAA Division I in 10 men's sports and 12 women's sports. Headquartered in New York City, the 11 full-member schools are primarily located in Northeast and Midwest metropolitan areas. The conference was officially recognized as a Division I multi-sport conference on August 1, 2013, and since then conference members have won NCAA national championships in men's basketball, women's cross country, field hockey, men's lacrosse, and men's soccer. Val Ackerman is the commissioner.

The conference was formed after the "Catholic Seven" members of the original Big East Conference elected to split from the football-playing schools in order to start a new conference focused on basketball. These schools (DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, Seton Hall, St. John's, and Villanova) had announced their decision in December 2012. In March 2013, the new conference purchased the Big East Conference name, logos, basketball records, and the rights to the men's basketball tournament at Madison Square Garden from the football-playing members of the old Big East, who formed the American Athletic Conference (AAC), which is the old conference's legal successor. Both conferences share 1979 as their founding date, when the original conference was founded by Dave Gavitt, and the same history through 2013.

Three more schools, Butler, Creighton, and Xavier, joined the conference on its July 1, 2013, launch date. In June 2019, the Big East invited the University of Connecticut (UConn) to "re-join" the conference from the AAC, which they did on July 1, 2020. Football is not a sponsored sport, and UConn is the only member with a varsity football team in the top-level Division I FBS. Butler, Georgetown, and Villanova do operate football programs in the second-level Division I FCS. The conference also has four associate members in field hockey, and one in men's and women's lacrosse.