Big East Realignment as “The Godfather”

We’ve already compared the break-up of the Big 12 to the break-up of the “Zack Attack” from “Saved by the Bell” and cast “Friday Night Lights” with real college football characters.

But when Rick Pitino compared Pitt chancellor Mark Nordenberg to a “Godfather” character for betraying the Big East, we couldn’t help ourselves from casting the movie’s main characters with those in college basketball.

As it turns out, the similarities between the “Five Families” that control organized crime in New York City and the Big East battling the four potential “super conferences” – the ACC, SEC, Big 10 and Pac-12 – to stave off elimination are quite similar.

We examine:

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Vito Corleone is … Mike Tranghese

Vito Corleone is “The Godfather,” a mob boss who has seen his empire come under attack as the rival Five Families of New York seek to destroy his family.

We know Dave Gavitt was the founder of the Big East but have some respect for the man’s recent passing. Tranghese works in the role of Vito because he’s a Godfather-type who served as longtime commissioner of the Big East. He’s now seeing the league he spent so much time building into the nation’s most powerful basketball conference stare demise straight in the face as talk of four “super conferences” (Big Ten, ACC, SEC, Pac-16) runs rampant. Tranghese is furious but appears powerless to stop it all.

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Michael Corleone is … John Marinatto

Michael is Vito’s youngest son who wasn’t supposed to be involved in the family business, so to speak. But he abandons a career in politics to become the head of the family and proves to be a ruthless leader.

Marinatto is the new boss of the Big East who took over for Tranghese in 2009 – much like Michael became head of the family. Both underwent assassination attempts of sorts – Michael in the literal sense, and Marinatto from the ACC, which has begun to siphon teams away from his league under commissioner John Swofford. But just like Michael, don’t expected Marinatto to take it laying down, as he’s already taking public jabs at Swofford. Marinatto says the remaining schools have agreed to a pact to stay in the Big East but ESPN is reporting that Connecticut still has eyes for the ACC.

And can anyone really be trusted at this point?

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Salvatore Tessio is … Mark Nordenberg

Tessio is Vito’s longtime associate that betrayed the family, someone who wasn’t expected to throw away such a long-term relationship.

As pointed out by Pitino, Pitt’s chancellor represents betrayal as his school stabbed Marinatto in the back despite having a longtime affiliation with the Big East family. Oh, he’s also the same guy who blasted Miami (FL), Virginia Tech and Boston College for betraying them for the ACC in 2003. Nordenberg left the Big East for dead just days ago by announcing the Panthers would join the ACC.

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Fredo Corleone is … Rick Pitino

Fredo Corleone is Vito’s middle son who is insecure about his standing in the family and is undone by his constant womanizing. His older brother, Sonny, provides the bluster, while young Michael is the confident heir to their father’s throne. Where does Fredo stand? He doesn’t know, either.

Pitino is asking the same question in the new frontier of college athletics, especially with his standing in the Big East. He’s waiting on Marinatto to save the Big East family. Pitino is watching Jim Boeheim’s group head to the ACC and Jim Calhoun’s Connecticut team possibly follow while Louisville basketball becomes an afterthought. As for Pitino’s weakness with women? Well, you already know all about that.

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Sonny Corleone is … Jim Calhoun

The hot-headed Sonny is Vito’s oldest son who is always ready to go to war at a moment’s notice. His mercurial personality is his calling card but has worked to his detriment, too.

This is a perfect match. Calhoun has a famous temper that gets a lot out of his teams, but also gets him in trouble with the media. He has had famous rants involving a Connecticut sportswriter over ex-Providence star and Connecticut native Ryan Gomes, and a local political activist who broached the topic of Calhoun giving back some salary to his cash-strapped state. We think Sonny would have had the same response: “Not a dime back!” We know one thing about realignment: People better not cross Calhoun in all this.

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Luca Brasi is … Bob Huggins

Brasi is a family associate known as a ruthless personal enforcer for Vito. Simply put, Brasi is the muscle.

The same can be said for Huggins, who came back to West Virginia in 2007 as an addition to the longtime Big East coaching family – one who made it considerably stronger. Huggins’ alma mater, WVU, has been a longtime member of the Big East, which needed the Mountaineers’ football program in recent years to stave off the same exodus that is beginning to take place now. A hulking brute on the sideline who can go nuclear like Calhoun, Huggins certainly isn’t a stretch in Brasi’s role. Would you be surprised if Huggins – with his school in serious danger of being left in the cold – went and intimidated Swofford himself?

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Hyman Roth is … Jim Boeheim

Roth is a longtime associate that does his work at a distance, planning assassinations and keeping his hand in business dealings despite his failing health.

The longtime Syracuse coach surely is healthy as an ox – let’s not compare them in that way – but he can be ruthless when needed, especially when he’s unhappy with how things are going down. And Boeheim does his work in the background – with considerably less bluster than, say, Calhoun. Unless, of course, you make him angry. Boeheim is upset that Syracuse is leaving the Big East but is resigned to the fact this is how college athletics works. As Roth himself put it in “The Godfather: Part II”: “This is the business we’ve chosen!”

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