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ACC men's basketball coaches like to think of their league as the nation's best.

But this season, the best conference could be the Big East.

Make that the really Big East.

The league has expanded to 16 teams with the addition of Conference USA defectors Louisville, Cincinnati, DePaul, Marquette and South Florida.

"The Big East is the best conference in America," said Notre Dame assistant Lewis Preston, a Franklin County and VMI graduate.

The Sporting News agrees, ranking the Big East No. 1 and the ACC No. 2 in its preview magazine.

"Give me a break," Clemson coach Oliver Purnell said. "We're the best league in the country. ... DePaul and Marquette, they're good programs, but they're not ACC-type programs. Cincinnati is obviously not an ACC-type team."

The 12-team ACC boasts three recent NCAA champs -- Duke, which last won the crown in 2001 and is the top team in this year's ESPN/USA Today preseason coaches' poll; defending NCAA champ North Carolina; and 2002 champ Maryland. The addition of Boston College, which shared the 2005 Big East regular-season title, gives the ACC another strong program.

"We're the best league," UNC coach Roy Williams said.

"The history and tradition of the ACC is nonpareil," said Virginia Tech coach Seth Greenberg, whose school jumped from the Big East to the ACC last year.

But the Big East has heavyweights, too. Fifteen of the league's current schools have been to the Final Four, including 2005 Final Four participant Louisville, 2004 NCAA champ UConn and 2003 NCAA champ Syracuse.

"It's kind of a who's who of college basketball," DePaul coach Jerry Wainwright said. "The basketball tradition in the new Big East is unbelievable."

The preseason ESPN/USA Today poll features five Big East schools, including No. 2 UConn and No. 4 Villanova, and four ACC schools. Both have five teams in The Sporting News' preseason Top 25.

The Big East has five teams to the ACC's three in Street & Smith's preseason Top 25; Duke and UConn are 1-2 in that magazine.

North Carolina and 2004 NCAA runner-up Georgia Tech are absent from all three rankings because each lost five starters.

BC is expected to be a force in its inaugural ACC season. The Eagles are ranked 11th in the ESPN/USA Today poll and were picked to finish second in the league in the ACC's preseason media poll.

So why shouldn't the ACC consider itself the best?

Because "they haven't had the infusion of five teams like we have," Preston said.

But bigger doesn't always mean better, said UVa coach Dave Leitao. He rates the ACC higher than the Big East, noting the difference in tradition between UVa, picked last in the ACC poll, and South Florida, picked last in the Big East poll.

"They will talk about Louisville and Syracuse and Connecticut ... but what's going to happen to the [Big East] teams that are unable to compete?" said Leitao, who steered DePaul the past three seasons. "You can't say great things about South Florida in relationship to the Big East being the greatest league in the country. But the ACC, you can't tell me one of its 12 teams can't, in any given year, leapfrog and be in the top four or five teams in the league. That's the difference."

The Big East raided Conference USA after losing Virginia Tech, BC and Miami to the ACC. Louisville is expected to be the only Big East newcomer to make a splash this year, though. The Cardinals are ranked eighth in the ESPN/USA Today poll and were picked third in the league in the Big East poll.

No other Big East newcomer is in the ESPN/USA Today Top 25, nor among the top eight in the league poll. Cincinnati, which ousted coach Bobby Huggins in August, was only ninth in the league poll.

"Cincinnati, without Bobby Huggins, isn't Cincinnati," said Greenberg, once South Florida's coach. "It's like UNLV without Jerry Tarkanian isn't UNLV."

Wainwright isn't sure which league is the best, but he is amazed by the depth of the Big East.

"With the frontcourt that Connecticut has, they could play in the Midwest Division in the NBA right now," said Wainwright, a former Richmond coach in his first season at DePaul. "You throw Syracuse in with them, you have those schools that are much like the corporate powers in the ACC -- schools that every year are going to be there. But now you have schools that were so, so successful last year returning all those players -- West Virginia and Villanova. And you take the best teams from Conference USA.

"It's very demanding."

Georgia Tech coach Paul Hewitt points to recruiting as evidence the ACC is the best.

"The ACC, top to bottom, can go anywhere in the country and recruit," Hewitt said. "It's hard for people to come into ACC territory and pull a kid out, but we've had success in Texas, we've had success in Los Angeles. ... That makes you the best league in the country, when you can go anywhere and get the best player."

Seven current members of the Big East advanced to the NCAA tournament last season, including Louisville and Cincinnati. Six current ACC schools reaped NCAA berths last season, including BC.

Eight ACC schools have reached the Final Four, including four former NCAA champs. Five current Big East schools have won NCAA titles.

Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski wasn't happy the ACC raided the Big East for Virginia Tech, Miami and BC because now some of the league's teams play each other only once a season.

He is even more dismissive of Big East expansion. That league is so big that some of its teams won't play each other at all this season.

"I don't see how you can have a league and not play somebody in your league," Krzyzewski said.

Leitao wonders how some of the smaller Big East schools will coexist with rivals with greater resources.

"All of the ACC schools are major universities," he said. "The Big East, there's a separation right now. It's going to be interesting to follow what Providence can do versus what Louisville can do."

So which league is better? The argument will be decided on the court -- and in the homes of high school prospects, too.

"You'll see some tremendous recruiting wars between those leagues," Wainwright said.