OK. Full disclosure. I probably haven't a shred of credibility on this issue because I'm a Boston College guy.

Still, I ask: Given what just happened to UConn — left in the sporting wilderness Monday after the Big 12's decision not to expand — was BC so wrong to bolt the Big East when it did?

I get that most people in Connecticut view BC as Lucifer. Everything short of Apartheid is BC's fault. BC is the reason for UConn's perch in purgatory. Whatever.

Say this much for the Lucifers though: Their leadership was ever mindful and fearful 10 years ago of becoming what UConn has become. In the cornfield and out of the money. So in the interest of saving thine own keisters, the Eagles landed elsewhere.

Many of us, even those of us whose wardrobes are awash in too much maroon and gold, didn't necessarily like BC's methods. I always found former athletic director Gene DeFilippo to be, as the old line goes, a shiver looking for a spine to run up. Disingenuous. He'd shake your hand and look right past you, just in case there was a more interesting guy in the vicinity.

But he's not an idiot. He saw Big East football losing its cachet with the initial departures of Virginia Tech and Miami. BC, a small school in the northeast known for things other than sports, could fade into irrelevance quickly. So he walked into the front door of a Big East meeting and left through the back, never stopping until he hit the ACC.

Hate them all you want. But they read the terrain correctly.

Now in the interest of fairness, you're probably giggling at what's become of the BC athletic program. Football and basketball last won conference games during the Nixon Administration. Attendance is down, interest is down (if that's possible) and the light at the end of the tunnel is, at best, the onrushing Acela Express.

The difference: The checks they're cashing from television and the ACC will keep the athletic program afloat. And on the off chance the current leadership ever understands the rest of the country views BC as a punchline right now, the resources are there to get better.

This story makes for fascinating irony. BC couldn't win an intrasquad scrimmage in football or basketball. And sits in the money. UConn, aside from football, counts its national championships but has no seat at the table. Makes no sense. Except that the decisions made 10 years ago now in Chestnut Hill proved prudent.

I don't know where UConn goes from here. The idea of going back to the Big East in many sports is appealing, except that Big East commissioner Val Ackerman says her league has no plans to expand. Besides, that would leave UConn football on an island. The Huskies could stay in the American Athletic Conference and wait for the day — if it ever arrives — when another Power Five conference expands.

If you can't be with the one you love, honey, love the one you're with.

Too bad the current UConn leadership wasn't around 10 years ago. I doubt president Herbst and athletic director David Benedict would have been as oblivious. Not that it matters now. What is past is prologue.

Here's what I know: UConn will keep winning. Its reputation as an elite level public university will grow. And I hope Benedict and his coaches continue their creative scheduling to incorporate the old rivals. Playing BC and Syracuse in football this year is a good thing. The Georgetown basketball game last year sold out the XL Center in a snowstorm. All good. And it makes the games against Tulane bearable.

Elevate your hate of BC if you want. I might also save some for ESPN, whose sweetheart tax deal with the state certainly didn't merit a quid pro quo. What has befallen UConn isn't right. But it's more a product of the past than the present.

This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro.