Big East Review: A Tale of Three Coaches

As impressive as Cincinnati was in winning a second consecutive Big East title in 2009, the biggest news involving the Big East this past year actually occurred after the regular season ended involving three of the league's head coaches.

In a nutshell: Cincinnati's Brian Kelly won too much, Louisville's Steve Kragthorpe didn't win enough and South Florida's Jim Leavitt hit too much and then didn't tell the truth.

Kelly was one of the nation's hottest coaching commodities after guiding the Bearcats to 18 consecutive regular season victories and then bolted for Notre Dame after guiding the Bearcats to back-to-back Big East titles. Kragthorpe struggled for a third consecutive season at Louisville and was fired after the Cards finished 4-8 for a 15-21 record at UL.

While the departures of Kelly and Kragthorpe were speculated as real possibilities before the season began, no one would have ever predicted Leavitt wouldn't return to USF in 2010. That all changed, of course, when Leavitt grabbed a player by the throat at halftime against Louisville on Nov. 21 and hit him twice in the face, as initially reported by FanHouse. Leavitt then lied about the incident and tampered with witnesses, according to a USF investigation and Leavitt was fired after 13 seasons.

With Kelly, Kragthorpe and Leavitt gone from the league, Butch Jones (Cincinnati), Charlie Strong (Louisville) and Skip Holtz (USF) will debut at their new schools in the fall. But before we get to 2010, let's take a quick glance back at 2009.

Coach of the Year: Kelly is the obvious choice, right? Despite having to replace 10 defensive starters and losing QB Tony Pike for part of the season to an injury, the Bearcats still repeated as Big East champs. Normally that would lock up Coach of the Year honors. This, unfortunately, was not a normal year in the Big East, especially in Storrs, Conn. Randy Edsall had to deal with an impossible situation following the murder of Jasper Howard. Edsall managed to keep a team and community together. It would have been so easy for the Huskies to fold after Howard's death, but they never quit. And even with three consecutive last-minute losses to West Virginia, Rutgers and Cincinnati (by a combined 10 points and UConn dominated the stats vs. WVU and RU but couldn't overcome four turnovers in each game), Edsall's Huskies finished strong by closing the season 4-0. UConn won in double overtime at Notre Dame, took care of Syracuse and USF at home and then pounded South Carolina in the Papajohns.com Bowl. How Edsall handled Howard's death with his team internally and publicly and kept them from unraveling was truly remarkable. That's what a coach is supposed to be about.

Player of the year: The obvious choice would be Pitt freshman sensation Dion Lewis, who was voted by the league's coaches as the player and freshman of the year. But then again I prefer not to go with the obvious choice. Instead, Cincinnati wide receiver Mardy Gilyard gets my vote. Gilyard certainly had the numbers – he led the Big East in receptions (6.7 per game), yards receiving (91.6 per game), punt returns (12.6 yard average), kickoff returns (30.5 yard average) and all-purpose yards (206.7 yard average, also second nationally) – but what gave Gilyard the edge over Lewis was his leadership abilities. Gilyard was quite simply the team's heartbeat. There was no better example of this than UC's regular season finale when his 99-yard kickoff return for a TD 1:10 before halftime led the Bearcats back from a 21-point deficit and to a 45-44 victory at Pitt for the Big East title.

Game of the year: Cincinnati at Pittsburgh was the de facto Big East title game and it lived up to its billing. Lewis carried a school-record 47 times for 194 yards and three touchdowns, but it still wasn't enough. Sparked by Gilyard's kickoff return, and his third-quarter 68-yard touchdown reception, Cincinnati rallied past Pitt in a game that featured 34 fourth quarter points. Gilyard finished with 381 all-purpose yards in the game. And the fact this game was played in snow flurries only added to its legendary status.

Biggest upsets: Syracuse 31, Rutgers 13. The Orange had lost 27 of their last 28 Big East contests to league members not named Louisville, before shocking the Scarlet Knights. This was not a fluke by any means. Syracuse outgained Rutgers 424-130 and sacked RU QB Tom Savage nine times. USF 17, Florida State 7. With freshman QB B.J. Daniels making his first career start the week after senior QB Matt Grothe's season-ending knee injury, the Bulls knocked off FSU in only their second-ever game with one of Florida's "Big Three" powers. It was the high point of the Bulls' season

Worst losses: Rutgers 31, USF 0. The Bulls have never won a Thursday night nationally televised contest, but this was arguably their worst game in program history. USF was not competitive in suffering only its second shutout loss of all-time. Florida 51, Cincinnati 24. Who knew the Big Easy would describe the Gators' victory against the Bearcats in the Sugar Bowl? Playing its final game with QB Tim Tebow, Florida overwhelmed the Bearcats, who were outplayed from the start.

Other notable items around the Big East:

When Kelly left Cincinnati for Notre Dame, some Cincinnati "fans" pelted Kelly's residence with eggs. Unfortunately for Kelly, the egg throwers finished with an even higher completion percentage than Tony Pike. ... This year's International Bowl between USF and Northern Illinois was not only the lowest attended bowl game (tickets distributed/given away were 22,185), but had the third-lowest TV rating of the 34 bowls. Not surprisingly the International Bowl won't be in the Big East's bowl lineup next season. ... Since the "new" Big East formed five years ago, West Virginia is the only team to finish among the league's top three teams each season. The Mountaineers have gone 5-2 in league play the past four seasons and are a league-best 27-8 since 2005. The other league records since 2005: Cincinnati 23-12, RU 20-15, Pitt 19-16, USF 17-18, UL 16-19, UConn 14-21 and SU 4-31. ... A week after getting fired at USF, Leavitt drove around Tampa giving away some of his USF apparel to "homeless people," the Tampa Tribune reported. "There were some homeless people I gave stuff to," Leavitt said. "I've done that kind of thing before. Who else would want to wear my old stuff?" ... Just a reminder when trying to project next year's Big East standings: just wait for the 2010 schedule to be released. Associate commissioner Nick Carparelli, who is in charge of scheduling, paired the top six teams against each other in their final games in 2009. Cincinnati at Pittsburgh, West Virginia at Rutgers and USF at UConn.

Contact FanHouse reporter Brett McMurphy at brettmcmurphy@gmail.com