New York — The large marquee outside of Madison Square Garden sported a blue and white message for the masses on a bustling Seventh Avenue: "WELCOME BACK, UCONN."

Inside the historic building that's been the site of many memorable moments in the men's basketball program's history, the Big East Conference embraced the return of UConn during a Thursday afternoon news conference.

Commissioner Val Ackerman laid out the welcome mat for the Huskies, one of the original members of the Big East before conference realignment led them to the American Athletic Conference in 2013.

"The opportunity to add a member who is a national basketball brand, that's in our geographic footprint, who has an outstanding fan base with proven support of our biggest annual event, and who brings the added bonus of having a deeply etched, shared history with us, intense rivalries with many of our school, all that taken together represented an opportunity that we simply couldn't pass up," Ackerman said.

The warm and fuzzy feeling was mutual.

"Rejoining the Big East now, UConn is coming home," UConn President Susan Herbst said. "History matters immensely, but today is really about our excitement for the future as a university and also as a conference. It's a new era for us. We enter it with real eagerness and optimism."

Initial discussions, initiated by UConn, began shortly after college basketball season ended. The Big East presidents unanimously approved adding UConn as its 11th member on Monday. The UConn Board of Trustees members all voted in favor of the move on Wednesday.

The date of UConn's entry into the Big East hasn't been formally determined, but won't be before July 1, 2020. The Huskies have to negotiate an exit fee with the AAC, which will likely be around $10 million. Their entrance fee into the Big East is $3.5 million.

Athletic director David Benedict spoke about the decision for the first time on Thursday, attending the news conference along with basketball coaches Dan Hurley and Geno Auriemma.

The move will do more than just restore rivalries, energize the fan base as well as cut down on travel therefore saving a couple of million dollars a year, according to Herbst.

"Long term, as we've said recently, this is the best thing for our university, our student-athletes and our athletic programs that are going to be competing in the Big East," Benedict said.

"There's a lot of the financial piece, that it's going to take a little bit of time. We've got some conversations that need to take place before there's complete clarity and we can be totally transparent related to that because we don't have all that information yet.

"But, in the end, if we don't put ourselves in a position where we can be successful, none of that other stuff matters because if you're not successful, you're not going to be able to generate resources, your tickets (sales) are going to continue to go down.

"We've had 2,000 people either purchase or renew season tickets since Friday. So that tells you the kind of interest there is in this decision."

For someone who grew up in New Jersey, played at Seton Hall and was drawn to UConn because of its rich Big East history, Hurley was giddy about the move.

"To be the head coach of the UConn Huskies in the Big East Conference, that's a heck of a position to be put in," Hurley said. "If you grew up around basketball and everything you've ever know is basketball, and the majority of it was Big East basketball ... for me, it's like, I pinched myself when I got news of it happening.

"It's just ideal for us."

Not lost in the celebration was that football, which drives major college athletics, has now taken a backseat to basketball in Storrs.

Auriemma said the dream of UConn playing football in a Power Five conference has died.

"At some point you've got to deal with what reality is," Auriemma said. "All those years, every sport was at the mercy of college football. And if your college football team is bringing in $40-$50 million every year, you suck it up and live with it and make the most of it.

"If that's not the case, then at some point a university has got to say, alright, are we going to stay still or are we going to make a move? I think it took a lot of courage for our university to make that move. And that's not to say you turn your back on football, because I don't think we should ever do that."

So what's the plan for football going forward?

Benedict did provide one detail when asked.

"I know that everyone wants the answers to, what is our plan? Well, the plan is we've got to have a conversation with (AAC) commissioner (Mike) Aresco and the American, which I look forward to doing as soon as possible so that we can begin to put that plan in place. There's going to be a lot of things that happen after that, but that's where it has to start.

"Based on what comes of that conversation, we'll know what the next steps are. ... We're committed to Division I football. We brought Randy (Edsall) back and we certainly had no idea that this was going to come about. But there's no better person situated to take us through the transition. He took us through the transition from FCS to FBS and he's going to take us through this transition, whatever that amounts to be."

Aresco, however, told the Associated Press later Thursday that there is no chance the AAC will keep UConn as a football-only member.

AAC's bylaws require UConn to give 27 months' notice, and Aresco told the AP if UConn wants to negotiate an earlier departure, it needs to initiate that conversation, something he says has not yet happened.

g.keefe@theday.com