Creighton's Doug McDermott glad to join Big East

NEW YORK - Doug McDermott gave a lot of thought to leaving Creighton and entering the NBA draft after last season, but the move of the Bluejays from the Missouri Valley Conference to the Big East provided him with an incentive to stay in school.

"Something had to be different coming back for the next year," McDermott, a 6-foot-8 senior, said Wednesday at Big East media day. "This is the best way I could have it, playing against some of these top-tier programs and top-tier fan bases."

McDermott, who was a unanimous selection by league coaches as the conference's preseason player of the year, said he likes the challenge the Big East will present in terms of talent and arenas.

"It's the competition and the change of travel, different venues, cities," he said. "We're not going to Carbondale, Ill., or Terre Haute, Ind. We're going to Philly, we're going to D.C., we're going to New York. This will be kind of a change for us and I think it's a good change."

Notes. Big East coaches selected Villanova to finish fourth in their preseason poll. Marquette picked up five of the 10 first-place votes to emerge as the favorite, followed by Georgetown and Creighton. St. John's was fifth. . . . Former Vaux High School standout Rysheed Jordan of St. John's was named the conference's preseason rookie of the year. A pair of Villanova players, junior forward JayVaughn Pinkston and sophomore guard Ryan Arcidiacono, were named second-team all-Big East. . . . Entering his 13th season leading the Wildcats, Jay Wright learned that he is the league's senior coach in terms of years at his current school. "I don't know what to do about that yet," he said ruefully. "I have not come to grips with that."