the 2002 big east men's basketball tournament took place at madison square garden in new york city. its winner received the big east conference's automatic bid to the 2002 ncaa tournament. it is a single-elimination tournament with four rounds and the two highest seeds in each division received byes in the first round. the six teams with the best conference records in each division were invited to participate for a total of 12 teams. teams were seeded by division. connecticut and pittsburgh had the best regular season conference records and received the east #1 seed and west #1 seed, respectively.