primarily a football term to describe the conferences that are ruling the NCAA, the Power 5, by making their own rules and restricting access and opportunity to all other D-I programs. (my view- their view is confirming the reality of the gap that exists).
It is a dangerous trend for this to occur in basketball - it was clearly happening as a conference of one - the old Big East - due to ESPN early promotion. The American and the new Big East are not generally considered to be part of the basketball power elite (the same P5 as in football), but if you add the MWC and Atlantic 10, those 4 conferences are challenging the bottom of the P5 for prominence. The MVC appears to be moving to that group, but has really been top-heavy with Wichita, NIU and formerly Creighton.
The American can gain respect when Tulane, ECU, USF, Houston and UCF are 500 or better programs. There was a clear demarcation this year after Memphis - top 6 , bottom 5. And, per the NCAA, and to my surprise, a less clear demarcation of the top 2 (SMU and Cinncy), and next 4 (Temple, TU, UConn and Memphis). Having Memphis and UConn have subpar seasons, by their standards, hurt the American. TU could have helped the conference and itself by avoiding flops in ORU and SEOSU and by being more competitive with OSU, OU and Wichita. The wins over Auburn and Creighton looked good at the time but only so-so at the end of the season. Had Creighton been an NCAA team (and the win over OU made one think that might be the case, but the game here showed them to be slow) or Auburn a middle of the pack SEC team, it would have made a difference.
