East Carolina screwed this deal up, insisting on adding eastern teams moving up from FBS. Now ECU is leaving and we are stuck with their bad idea.
Good old Memorial Gym
I feel the opposite. I really like the eastern additions. Neither of them are from the Belch, and I think their fan bases are much stronger than Florida Atlantic and FIU. Both are national research universities. More importantly, it spreads the LaTech brand to large markets on the east coast where we haven't had exposure in the past.
Old Dominion has the support to become a very successful program. I think ODU has sold out every football game since starting the program back up in 2009, and they are about to enlarge their stadium. I'm not sure what happened to their MBB program this season, but prior to this year, it appeared ODU had the best basketball program of anybody in the new C-USA. They average between 7-8,000 at their MBB games. They are located in a large market with minimal competition and fertile recruiting grounds. They already have a $30 million+ athletic budget. ODU has all the tools to succeed at a high level.
It looks like Charlotte MBB is back this year, and I think they also average 7-8,000 at their MBB games. They are building a brand new football stadium, and all their other facilities are first class. I think Charlotte will compete just fine.
I could understand you wanting to stay at 12, but there is no other reasonable candidate out there that I would prefer over Old Dominion and Charlotte.
Last edited by Dawg06; 01-24-2013 at 08:15 AM.
You know if we can keep winning consistently, even if Tulsa leaves we still have a chance to be a decent conference. I'm not talking about budgets/facilities/endowments but strictly from a competitive standpoint Tech/USM/Marshall can be as good as anyone from The Big East or MWC. Boise is the only one that has seriously separated themselves from the pack. Others like TCU for instance have moved on to AQ conferences.
So Tech/Marshall/USM will be strong then you look at MTSU who has been winning recently. UTSA did much better than I thought last year. We could be as good as the MWC/Big East very quickly. Basketball could make some noise as well. I see some good opportunities in MBB. I'm starting to feel a little better about things if we can keep USM.
Basketball is shaping up pretty well.
Football... keeping USM would help a lot. If USM goes, that means that of the six teams that have won a division since the last realignment, all six are leaving. Still losing five, although if Marshall was in the west they might have won a division title one year or another. Combine one of those six (USM) with LaTech, MTSU, and FIU, with maybe an unexpected upstart (like Tulsa was last time around), it could work out.
University of Houston '01. Any references to "we" or "us" likely refer to UH. Cheers!
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/f...,4445743.story
Banowsky wouldn't comment on any schools that he is targeting to fill a possible void in the league, but he did allude to expansion into New Mexico when discussing the league's failed merger with the Mountain West Conference. Western Kentucky is reportedly ready to leave the Sun Belt and join Conference USA if they are asked to do so, as well.
Please, no more SunBelt schools, nor Southland Conference Schools. Damn....if USM bolts anywhere else soon we will be in the SunBelt II. Not what everyone was insistent about that CUSA was it four years ago. I would go to MWC or Big East with Southern Schools in that conference in a heart beat not that most of main CUSA schools we wanted asoociated with have bolted, but we have more work to do internally and by Alumni.
If the conference can just keep from losing any more than one more team between now and 2014 and two more between now and 2015, that would grant them a lot more leeway in avoiding more Sun Belt teams.
University of Houston '01. Any references to "we" or "us" likely refer to UH. Cheers!