12/29/2023 0 Comments Umass conference realignmentThe Atlanta-based school with an enrollment of nearly 40,000 fits geographically. Sources around the league have said Kennesaw State is a favorite to join the conference. Kennesaw State has a chance to be C-USA’s next addition. There were discussions with UConn about joining the conference as a football-only member, multiple sources said, but UConn fans and supporters have been against the move. “We felt like, let’s take that money and apply it to our programs and make them better, and we’re in a position to do that,” said MTSU athletic director Chris Massaro, who noted new facilities plans in the works.Īt the same time, C-USA shored itself up by adding Liberty, NMSU, Sam Houston and Jacksonville State, the latter two from the FCS ranks. MTSU officials pointed to the money to be gained by the exit fees of departing C-USA members (around $20 million in total to be split up), avoiding its own exit/entrance fees and the fact that its alumni base trends southward, as a school just outside of Nashville. In the end, MTSU opted to stay in C-USA, and the MAC had no interest in adding one school in WKU, despite the Hilltoppers’ collective success across multiple sports. Sources in the MAC were mixed about the potential addition of the two schools, but there was some support. Those moves could have dropped C-USA to just three members. ![]() Things truly got dicey for C-USA last year when Western Kentucky and Middle Tennessee considered joining the MAC. But we’ve been resilient.” Conference expansion ![]() “There’s a lot of light at the end of the tunnel and we’re excited for the future,” she said. There is a bit of stability again, even if that feeling can be fleeting, as MacLeod’s whiteboard message reminds her. The conference still stretches across three time zones, but there is a greater sense of unity now, in part because more than half of the future makeup of the league chose to be in it. “Change is inevitable, but I like the position we’re in right now,” Middle Tennessee head coach Rick Stockstill said. “I certainly feel better today than I did last year,” WKU athletic director Todd Stewart said. The league got farther down that list than it would have liked, but it survived. While it appeared from the outside that C-USA was scrambling amid realignment last fall, there was always a plan and a list of scenarios gamed out. Now it’s far from the top of the Group of 5 in football, and successful programs like UTSA and UAB are on their way out. There was a period when it was arguably the top non-BCS football conference with teams like TCU, Southern Miss and East Carolina. It used to be headquartered in Chicago but has since moved to the outskirts of Dallas. None of the original members will remain. It’s the largest reshaping of a conference since the Big East split in half and became the American Athletic Conference.Ĭonference USA was founded in 1995 largely as a basketball league, the result of a merger between the Metro Conference and the Great Midwest Conference. Only five of those 14 will remain - Western Kentucky, Middle Tennessee, Louisiana Tech, FIU and UTEP - and four new members will join next year: Liberty, New Mexico State, Sam Houston and Jacksonville State. It has 11 this year after Marshall, Southern Miss and Old Dominion sued the conference to leave early for the Sun Belt, and it will have nine next year. ![]() It had 14 football-playing schools last year. But you have to shift your perspective sometimes.”Ĭonference USA has felt like a random grouping of schools without a collective identity for several years. “Personally, I’m the kind of person that wants to trust people until they give me a reason not to. “That was written very early during realignment and I’ve never erased it,” MacLeod said.
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