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NEW YORK -- Syracuse basketball coach Jim Boeheim, whose team is coming off a national championship, is tired of hearing how the Big East Conference is going to fold its tents and go away.

"You laugh when people come in with that stuff," Boeheim said Wednesday at Big East media day in Madison Square Garden. "I've heard it over and over again since I've been here. But let's face it: We're going to have a better basketball league, there's no doubt about it."

Boeheim, like everyone else around the Big East, is anticipating a windfall with the expected additions of Conference USA members Marquette, DePaul, Cincinnati, Louisville and South Florida. An official announcement by league presidents is scheduled for 2 p.m. Tuesday at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in the Big Apple.

"To me, every crisis is an opportunity to do something better," Boeheim said. "That's what this league was all about when it started (in 1979). I remember a few years ago, we couldn't score in our league and it was ugly basketball, that nobody would want to come and play in the Big East. Then, Connecticut wins the national championship (in 1999) and last season we get all four of our invited teams to the Sweet 16 and we win the tournament. People ask me about the Big East and how it's going to come back. We've been down a few times, and we always get up. We're still breathing."

The oxygen was temporarily cut off this past summer when football powers Miami and Virginia Tech accepted invitations to join the Atlantic Coast Conference in 2004-05 and Boston College followed suit earlier this month and agreed to join the ACC by 2005-06, if not sooner.

The exodus by those schools will have a considerably larger impact on Big East football than basketball, though Boeheim did not seem concerned.

"I remember when Miami came into the league and they were 1-9 in football," Boeheim said. "Virginia Tech was 1-10 or whatever they were. Things change. Teams get better. I believe we'll have a great basketball league for a long time -- maybe too good -- and I think we'll have good football, too."

Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese is already setting forth plans to accommodate a 16-team basketball league, which is two more than the current membership. He acknowledged that he'll be challenged by so many basketball schools and, potentially, nine football schools.

The football league would look like this as soon as 2005-06, should the five Conference USA schools join: Pitt, Syracuse, Connecticut, Rutgers, West Virginia, Cincinnati, Louisville, South Florida and Boston College. There's a chance Boston College could be gone by then, provided it pays the necessary exit fee and an agreement is worked out.

The basketball league would look like this: DePaul, Marquette, Georgetown, Notre Dame, St. John's, Villanova, Seton Hall and Providence, along with the aforementioned football schools.

"This won't be just a 16-team league, but a 16-team league that can play," said Tranghese, who would have to keep four teams out of the league tournament if the current format remains in effect. "We have to manage it. It's going to be hard, but we'll do it. We're going to have success because our people want to succeed."

Asked if he suspected the league would separate into two entities at some point, Tranghese doesn't think it will.

"They said we'd separate in 1990 (when the football league was formed)," said Tranghese, whose contract with the Big East expires in two years. "It never happened. This league had a chance to separate four times, and all four times they looked in the mirror and said no. People looked around and decided the collectiveness is better than being separated.

"Our presidents wanted to get this done and they're getting it done. They made up their minds that they would make this work. I can't describe the amount of time they've spent with this. From a basketball perspective, this is going to be a pretty interesting place to play. Our coaches are excited by it. They're not afraid of it. They're already talking about who they're going to be recruiting against and how this league is going to look in the near future."

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