2009 Big East men's basketball tournament

2009 Big East men's basketball tournament
ClassificationDivision I
Season2008–09
Teams16
SiteMadison Square Garden
New York City
ChampionsLouisville (1st title)
Winning coachRick Pitino (1st title)
MVPJonny Flynn (Syracuse)
Top scorerEric Devendorf (Syracuse)
(84 points)
TelevisionESPN
← 2008
2010 →
2008–09 Big East men's basketball standings
Conf Overall
Team W   L   PCT W   L   PCT
No. 1 Louisville 16 2   .889 31 6   .838
No. 4 Pittsburgh 15 3   .833 31 5   .861
No. 5 Connecticut 15 3   .833 31 5   .861
No. 11 Villanova 13 5   .722 30 8   .789
No. 23 Marquette 12 6   .667 25 10   .714
No. 13 Syracuse 11 7   .611 28 10   .737
West Virginia 10 8   .556 23 12   .657
Providence 10 8   .556 19 14   .576
Notre Dame 8 10   .444 21 15   .583
Cincinnati 8 10   .444 18 14   .563
Seton Hall 7 11   .389 17 15   .531
Georgetown 7 11   .389 16 15   .516
St. John's 6 12   .333 16 18   .471
South Florida 4 14   .222 9 22   .290
Rutgers 2 16   .111 11 21   .344
DePaul 0 18   .000 9 24   .273
2009 Big East tournament winner
As of April 4, 2009[1]
Rankings from AP Poll


The 2009 Big East men's basketball tournament, a part of the 2008–09 NCAA Division I men's basketball season, took place in March 2009 at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The Louisville Cardinals defeated the Syracuse Orange 76–66 in the tournament finals to earn the Big East tournament championship for the first time, and received the Big East Conference's automatic bid to the 2009 NCAA tournament.

This was the first Big East tournament to include all 16 of the conference's teams. The teams finishing 9 through 16 in the regular season standings played first-round games, while teams 5 through 8 received byes to the second round. The top 4 teams during the regular season received double-byes to the quarterfinals.[2] The tournament featured a conference record six-overtime quarterfinals game (the second longest game in NCAA history) in which Syracuse defeated UConn 127–117.[3]

  1. ^ "Big East Conference Standings - 2008-09." ESPN.com. Retrieved 03-23-10.
  2. ^ "16-Team Men's Championship Format" (PDF) (Press release). Big East Conference. Archived from the original (PDF) on February 6, 2009. Retrieved March 13, 2009.
  3. ^ "Syracuse survives longest game in Big East history with epic win over UConn". ESPN. New York City. AP. March 12, 2009. Archived from the original on December 13, 2017. Retrieved March 13, 2009.