NCAA Basketball: Reimagining the Conferences - Readjustment, not Realignment

TIER 2: OTHER TOP BASKETBALL CONFERENCES

With Gonzaga and Saint Mary's in the Mountain West, the best remaining basketball programs are overwhelmingly in the most Northeastern corner of the country. The other stragglers were left for leagues one tier below.

Big East: UConn, Providence, Boston College, Syracuse, St. John's, Seton Hall, Georgetown, Villanova, Notre Dame

Feels like the old Big East, and Notre Dame is happy to be the biggest non-Hawaii geographic outlier in the nation to join back in. It's the one conference where I'm still a sucker for tradition, so sorry to VCU, who probably should be in, but doesn't fit as a big, public, southern school. The other best candidates fit better in the next conference.

Midwestern Collegiate Conference: Cincinnati, Xavier, Dayton, Butler, Marquette, DePaul, Loyola Chicago, Iowa State, Saint Louis, Creighton, Wichita State

The rivalries in this conference would be special. Creighton stays with Marquette, rejoins with Wichita State and starts one with Iowa State. DePaul and Loyola in the North Chicago Derby. The Crosstown Shootout twice a year, as a part of a Xavier/Cincinnati/Dayton/Butler rivalry quartet that would be fueled by decades of future nasty fan vitriol.