Sports

Rivalries, fans lose in league shakeups

I wonder if this is what it was like in the 1690s in Salem, Mass., when people lost their heads and then, well, lost their heads.

This realignment madness has men behaving badly. By week’s end, it is likely the Big East will have 12 football members, the SEC will have Missouri, the ACC will have Pittsburgh and Syracuse and the Big 12 will have TCU.

All of the leagues will point to their enormous footprints and huge TV contracts and screech in glee, “Witch! Witch!”

We’re warning you now, bad things happen when people lose their grip on reality. Really bad.

Speaking of Massachusetts, since joining the ACC, Boston College has become irrelevant in college sports. The Eagles (1-6) can’t compete in football. They have no natural rivals.

The first time the vaunted Tar Heels came to Conte Forum, students camped outside for hours to get seats. Same with Duke. Now the novelty has worn off. Fans in Beantown wouldn’t give a bowl of Manhattan clam chowder to see BC-Wake Forest or BC-Clemson.

It’s worse in football. BC had great competitions with Penn State and Syracuse and West Virginia. But if you’re not a BC alum, you don’t care about those games against Duke or Virginia Tech or N.C. State.

A similar fate awaits Pittsburgh. The first time the Panthers go to Tallahassee and Florida State visits the Steel City will surely be events. But the novelty will wear off.

But it’s in basketball where Pitt will really regret the move to the ACC. When the Panthers became a Big East power under Ben Howland, they did so by recruiting the New York-New Jersey area.

Former Pitt assistant and Manhattan coach Barry Rohrssen told players and their families that almost every league game was just a short plane flight away. Parents could watch their son.

Not when Pitt joins the ACC. Try getting a non-stop from Pittsburgh to Tallahassee, or New York to Winston-Salem or Newark to Blacksburg. Pitt is going to have to develop a new recruiting approach.

It is exactly what happened when Penn State left for the Big Ten. Joe Paterno, one of the great closers in college football history, could no longer walk into a recruit’s living room and tell the parents they could drive to almost every game.

Syracuse does not have to fear its program will slide. Jim Boeheim has built a beast, one which can fill the Carrier Dome with more than 32,000 fans.

The question for Syracuse president Nancy Cantor is this: How will Orange fans afford to attend the ACC Tournament? They could carpool to the Big East tourney at the Garden. They could crash at a friend’s apartment or mooch off their parents or aunts and uncles. How many of Syracuse’s thousands alums in the New York City area have a place to stay in Atlanta, where the ACC tournament is played?

This discussion is not limited to schools in the East. How are Boise State fans supposed to support their team when they are flying to Hartford or Tampa? Is it worth membership in an automatic-qualifier conference?

Wait. We remember now. None of these questions can even be heard. To ask them is heresy. University presidents are running around screaming, “Witch! Witch!”

Sadly, it’s the players, their families and fellow students who will hang.

lenn.robbins@nypost.com