The rise and fall and future of one of college basketball's historic rivalries

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A quick reminder: We’re heading towards Holiday Hours here at the Extra Points Family of Publications. We’ll have a normal publishing schedule this week, but Extra Points will only published once next week and the week after. We will return to our regular, four-newsletters-a-week schedule, on January 5.

I’ll be writing later this week, but I’m going to put my head down over the next few days to really focus on making improvements to our suite of games, like Who’s That Football Team, the Extra Points Library, and some back-end tech stuff so you can have the best experience possible heading into 2026.

I’m going to pass the mic today to a freelance contributor, Tim Casey, who has a super interesting story about college basketball in Philly in the post-transfer portal era. I’ll turn the time over to him:

by Tim Casey

PHILADELPHIA — At the end of a long day of basketball on Dec. 6, the Villanova men’s team gathered on the confetti-covered court at Xfinity Mobile Arena. The Wildcats had just defeated Penn, 90-63, in a half-full arena to win the Big 5 Classic, an event featuring the Philadelphia-area Division I programs.

The players, coaches and staffers posed for photos in front of a banner declaring them Big 5 champions, which would later be raised to the rafters in the building that’s home to the Philadelphia 76ers and Flyers. They held t-shirts with “Our City” printed across the back, a source of pride in a region rich in college basketball tradition and nostalgia.

But the celebration only lasted a few minutes, and during the postgame press conference, Villanova coach Kevin Willard turned the conversation to the future, speaking about the Wildcats’ next opponent: No. 2 Michigan.

Even so, the Penn victory and Big 5 supremacy meant something special to Villanova followers — though maybe not as much as it would’ve years ago. Across college sports, local and regional rivalries no longer pack the punch they once did — not even this one, which is one of hoops’ longest-standing traditions.

The Big 5 isn’t a conference; it’s a loose association of teams that have competed for Philadelphia’s collegiate basketball title since 1955. That’s when La Salle, Penn, Saint Joseph’s, Temple and Villanova began playing on an annual basis. For more than 30 years, Big 5 games were all held at the Palestra, the iconic gymnasium on Penn’s campus that opened in 1927 and is known as the “Cathedral of College Basketball.” But over the past 40 years, the format has evolved along with the sport itself; in 1986, teams started hosting some Big 5 games on their home courts, and five years later, they trimmed the schedule to two Big 5 games per school each season.

In 1999, the Big 5 re-instituted the round robin, but as the years passed, interest waned. A November 2022 doubleheader at the Palestra drew an announced crowd of 3,246, less than 40 percent of the arena’s capacity. Around that time, the universities’ athletics directors contemplated several models to re-invigorate the competition, taking into account the schools’ desire for leeway in nonconference scheduling and the financial implications of the matchups. In April 2023, the Big 5 became six, adding Drexel, and split the competition into two three-team pods. Each team plays two games (one home and one away) against the others in its pod at on-campus arenas and then a tripleheader at the Xfinity Mobile Arena, with matchups based on the results of the pod games. 

The Big 5 Classic wasn’t universally praised, as old-school coaches, players and fans preferred the round robin format and the Palestra, but it was a solution — an attempt to keep the Big 5 tradition alive in a changing college sports landscape, even if the format and atmosphere looks different than before.

“Some people above my pay grade were suggesting that this might be a good alternative for us,” said Fran Dunphy, a former La Salle star who was head coach at Penn, Temple and La Salle from 1989 through this past spring. “While I would rather it be everybody playing each other every year, to keep it alive in some form or fashion I think is critical.”

But as college sports continue to evolve, with NIL and revenue sharing and potentially even more financial changes on the horizon, can the Big 5 survive? And if so, in what form?

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Comcast Spectacor, which owns the 76ers’ and Flyers’ 21,000-seat arena, played a major role in the new format. Villanova, the most prominent Big 5 program — and the team whose success has given rise to some of the scheduling concerns that prompted this evolution — has long played many of its home games at the venue. But it took more than a decade of Comcast executives pitching a Big 5 tripleheader for the event to materialize.

Mike Sulkes, a Comcast senior vice president and general manager of the Xfinity Mobile Arena, envisioned the event as similar to the popular Beanpot college hockey tournament in Boston, which dates to 1952. Since 1996, the event, which features Boston College, Boston University, Northeastern and Harvard, has been held at TD Garden, home of the Celtics and Bruins.

“We thought it would give the Big 5 a shot in the arm, for sure,” Sulkes said. “It kind of lost its place of importance in the Philadelphia sports landscape. Most years, most Philadelphia sports fans couldn't even tell you who won the Big 5.”

Sulkes, who grew up in Philadelphia, has a soft spot for local college basketball. As a kid, he attended Big 5 games with his father, who worked at Temple. In his office desk, Sulkes keeps his ticket stub from Temple’s 87-84 double overtime victory over Saint Joseph’s at the Palestra in March 2002, when he was in high school.

“It was one of the greatest experiences of my life,” Sulkes said. “It reminds me of what we’re shooting for. We want to create those memories for the next generation.”

Still, the Big 5 Classic is not an altruistic endeavor. The teams pay rent to book the arena, and each school must buy a block of tickets, although most are available for sale to the general public. The schools and Comcast split revenue from ticket sales and sponsorships, too. Toyota is the presenting sponsor, and there are four other corporate partners whose logos appeared on the court and signage throughout the arena. 

Comcast and the schools would not disclose how much revenue the Big 5 Classic has generated, but ticket sales have declined since its inception two seasons ago. The announced crowd for this year’s event was 10,361, just less than half of capacity and down from 15,215 in 2023 and 14,107 last year. The face value of tickets started at $30 apiece, and fans had access to all three games, although the first two were sparsely attended, and the Villanova-Penn nightcap had plenty of empty seats even in the lower bowl. 

Revenue from the Big 5 Classic dwarfs any money the five non-Villanova schools make for their home games, but they must split the revenue and rent the facility, which is costly. As such, Jill Bodensteiner, Saint Joseph’s athletics director, said that “Saint Joe’s is not driven by the finances of this.” Drexel AD Maisha Kelly said “the business model is an aspect of it that probably varies in the benefits for folks,” and, she added, “from a Drexel perspective, it’s about the event and the brand and just part of being something bigger.”

Bodensteiner and Kelly said their programs benefit from being able to host season ticket holders, boosters and alumni in suites, which they cannot offer at their home arenas, while the coaches use playing a game in an NBA venue as a recruiting tool. 

“It's a phenomenal facility, phenomenal space,” Bodensteiner said. “There's good alumni interest. The ticket sales are solid. We can always do better, but I think people enjoy the different arena, the different experience, the ability to get together with their buddies from other schools and enjoy some time together. The feedback I've received from fans has been overwhelmingly positive.”

Bodensteiner said Saint Joseph’s success may have biased those responses, though. The Hawks won the Big 5 Classic the first two years and finished third this year, thanks to a 3-pointer at the buzzer from Deuce Jones that clinched a 70-69 victory over Temple.

“Thank you Hawk fans!” Bodensteiner shouted afterward to the band and students sitting behind the basket where Jones made his shot.

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Jones, a sophomore guard, grew up about 45 minutes from Philadelphia in Trenton, N.J., but he said he didn’t know about the Big 5 until he arrived at La Salle as a freshman last season. He transferred to Saint Joseph’s this year. Villanova guard Devin Askew, a California native, said he hadn’t heard of the Big 5, either, before transferring from Long Beach State. 

While the Big 5 teams used to be filled with numerous players from the Philadelphia area who had known (and played with and against) each other for years, that is no longer the case. In fact, none of the starters on the six teams grew up in Philadelphia; only six were raised in the surrounding suburbs. And 21 of the 30 starters have transferred at least once, making it difficult for them to understand the Big 5’s history — and for fans to know them.

Still, Saint Joseph’s coach Steve Donahue and Penn coach Fran McCaffery, who are both in their 60s and grew up outside Philadelphia in the Big 5’s heyday, are in favor of keeping the traditions alive.

“I thought it was a great day of college basketball,” McCaffery said. “The fans really were into it. I’m just thrilled with the opportunity that we won our way here [to play in the championship game].”

Said Donahue: “I love this format. I think it’s done so much for the Big 5. I hope as we grow each of our programs, the interest will continue to grow because it’s the right way to do it. … Obviously we’re all going through the transfer portal, NIL, all six of us. I think as we figure this out, this event will even be better because the teams will be better.”

The contract between the schools and Comcast has one more year remaining, meaning the current format will be in place for 2026, barring any unforeseen changes. Bodensteiner said she and the other five athletics directors and Comcast executives will probably discuss and recap this year’s event in the coming weeks and incorporate any feedback, as they do each year. The Big 5 does not have a commissioner or director, so it falls on the schools’ administrators to come to an agreement on any changes in a shared governance structure. 

Although the six Big 5 schools are located within 20 miles of one another, they play in five conferences that have different thoughts and imperatives on non-conference scheduling. And with the House settlement this past summer, athletics departments are now paying their basketball players and need to focus even more on maximizing revenue.

“We’re in a very different place economically in college sports than we were three years ago or five years ago,” Bodensteiner said. “I think it’s prudent for us to re-evaluate consistently and determine whether it’s the best format and best thing for all of us.”

Indeed, Villanova is in a different stratosphere than its local competitors, both from an economic and competitive standpoint. Though the Wildcats lost four Big 5 games the past two seasons under former coach Kyle Neptune, they are back in their position as the top area school with Willard at the helm. They won their three Big 5 games this season by an average of 20 points and looked like the team that won 35 of 37 Big 5 games before the format changed in 2023. In analyst Ken Pomeroy’s rankings, Villanova is No. 33 as of Wednesday, while Temple is the next-closest Big 5 school at No. 163.

Off the court, it’s just as lopsided. Villanova’s men’s basketball program generated $17.6 million in revenue and had $12.3 million in expenses during the 2023-24 school year, according to the Department of Education’s Equity in Athletics database. Those numbers are significantly higher the other Big 5 schools: Temple had $7.5 million in both revenue and expenses, Saint Joseph’s had $4.9 million, La Salle had $3.7 million, Drexel had $3.1 million, and Penn had $2.1 million. All but Temple are private schools, so their specific athletic department financial data is not in the Extra Points Library.

Kelly said the invitation to join the Big 5 two years ago was a “terrific opportunity” for Drexel and helped put the school in the same group as the other area programs for the first time. It has helped Drexel’s schedule, too, playing games against Big 5 teams from higher-rated conferences. Still, she knows Drexel must collaborate with the other area colleges and do what’s best for the collective Big 5.

“Prior to this format, there were a lot of shots, negative shots perhaps, that the Big 5 was taking, that there wasn't as much of an energy around the games than they historically had,” said Kelly, a Philadelphia native who was a track athlete at Saint Joseph’s in the late 1990s. “I think this format has helped that. And I think in this ever-changing landscape that we live in in athletics that it's fair that we have to do a look-in every so often. I think we’re likely at that inflection point right now.”

Tim Casey is a journalist who has covered professional, college and high school sports for more than two decades.