Which school has benefitted the most from the NBE?

[Django]

I'd say Creighton and it's not very close.

From a creighton fan's perspective -- I think most of us online fanatics perceived our program as the weakest of the invitees. We were very worried about the 3rd invite going to Dayton or SLU. Butler had recently made their deep runs in the tournament and Xavier had been a quality program going back to the early 00s. Creighton was a big fish in a small pond with very little success in the tournament. Our recruiting was bad -- the end of Altman's tenure (spring 2010) was a particularly low point if I remember correctly.

Then we got into the BE and we were lucky to have a highly experienced roster with the NPOY. That early success helped us elevate our recruiting immediately. We brought in quality transfers who could see the potential for success (Watson, Huff, Foster). Then we leveraged that success to improve our high school recruiting. Now, instead of hoping that a kid chooses between us and Georgia Tech, we're competing against legit power conference schools and we have the expectation of being a top 25 team every season. The program is light-years ahead of where it was a decade ago.

This is spot on. The only other change as dramatic is Georgetown’s abysmal drop.

[adoraz]

Nova easily. You can't do anything bigger than winning a National Championship and they've done that twice in the new Big East after not doing so for decades. After that it's UConn as their recruiting improved after rejoining the Big East and that led to a National Championship.

After those it's Creighton, Providence, Seton Hall and Xavier (in no particular order). Marquette, Butler and DePaul are more neutral.

I wouldn't say St. John's or Georgetown were hurt by the new Big East, we just hired mediocre coaches. Now we're good.

[MUBoxer]

Nova easily. You can't do anything bigger than winning a National Championship and they've done that twice in the new Big East after not doing so for decades. After that it's UConn as their recruiting improved after rejoining the Big East and that led to a National Championship.

After those it's Creighton, Providence, Seton Hall and Xavier (in no particular order). Marquette, Butler and DePaul are more neutral.

I wouldn't say St. John's or Georgetown were hurt by the new Big East, we just hired mediocre coaches. Now we're good.

How do you figure us neutral? If the argument is whether Buzz stays and can at least replicate his VA Tech success at MU then we were hurt, if he's able to meet the previous 5yrs success at MU then we were hurt. Even if we say the Wojo hire was independent of the NBE and ignore how bad he was then we still lost our extremely successful coach in part due to the NBE so it's a negative for 7 of the 10yrs it took to get back to 05-13 levels.

[Burrito]

I really think the case for Seton Hall and Providence is being underrated. My understanding is that both schools were effective bottom feeders in the OBE. In the NBE they have been near or in the tournament almost every year.

I would say Seton Hall and Providence have been winners in the NBE as well (but not to the same extent as Villanova and Creighton).
They mostly finished in the bottom half of the standings in the OBE.
In the NBE, Willard and Cooley have had them regular finishing in the top half of standings.
They just haven't had as much success in the NCAA tournament. We'll see how their new coaches do going forward.

[adoraz]

Nova easily. You can't do anything bigger than winning a National Championship and they've done that twice in the new Big East after not doing so for decades. After that it's UConn as their recruiting improved after rejoining the Big East and that led to a National Championship.

After those it's Creighton, Providence, Seton Hall and Xavier (in no particular order). Marquette, Butler and DePaul are more neutral.

I wouldn't say St. John's or Georgetown were hurt by the new Big East, we just hired mediocre coaches. Now we're good.

How do you figure us neutral? If the argument is whether Buzz stays and can at least replicate his VA Tech success at MU then we were hurt, if he's able to meet the previous 5yrs success at MU then we were hurt. Even if we say the Wojo hire was independent of the NBE and ignore how bad he was then we still lost our extremely successful coach in part due to the NBE so it's a negative for 7 of the 10yrs it took to get back to 05-13 levels.

Fair points, I guess I'm more looking at things from today's perspective rather than 10 years ago. I don't see a scenario where Marquette gets a better coach than Shaka so things in the end worked out.

As for Buzz I think he would've left regardless. Maybe stayed an extra year, but he also left VT despite their P5 status.

[hoops22]

It's a good question with a lot of good responses, but I'd have to say the clear winner is Nova. It's tough to beat two national championships plus another final four. Actually, all the northeast teams benefited immensely when Syracuse, UCONN, and Pitt, were all exiled into southern based leagues. Syracuse and UCONN became largely irrelevant, normally falling on the wrong side of the tournament bubble, and Pitt had a year where they were arguably the worst team in all of Division 1. Meanwhile, Providence became the premiere team in New England, although UCONN's return seems to have reversed that. Seton Hall, a perennial bottom feeder in the BE suddenly emerged as a consistent tournament team, with the potential for deep tournament runs. Only St John's continued to flounder, but hopefully that's in the past with Pitino at the helm now. But back to the original question, I think Nova is the clear winner, and while I respect all that Creighton has done, Providence and The Hall can't be discounted either.