Conference Expansion: Temple To Join The Big East?

Let the conference expansion talk begin once again.

After Memphis decided to join the Big East several weeks ago, there were questions as to whether or not the conference was finished expanding. It appears that they are not.

ESPN’s Andrea Adelson is reporting that officials from Temple are in talks with the Big East to join the conference in all sports as early as 2012.

From a basketball perspective, this move seems natural given the addition of Memphis. With the conference set to lose West Virginia next season, and Pittsburgh and Syracuse down the line, the Big East needed to add replacements that were somewhat worthy of helping the conference basketball-wise.

Memphis and Temple are two programs that likely won’t be falling off anytime soon either.

Although Josh Pastner‘s Tigers haven’t had the level of success they expected this year, they still have a solid nucleus that will be a force next season.

And as for Temple, they might be one of the more underrated teams in the country right now.

The Owls are in the poll at 22, but they might be even better than that. They’re 21-5 and have a 10-game winning streak heading into tonight’s game at LaSalle. These guys are the real deal, and there’s no way I’d want to play them come NCAA tournament time.

With UCF, SMU, and Houston all set to join the Big East, landing Memphis and Temple was pretty big on the basketball side of things.

Of course, we’ll see when the official word comes down on this before any celebrations begin. Remember, expect the unexpected when it comes to conference expansion.