NCAA: The Missouri Valley Football Conference has a dilemma, but it's easily solvable

[GKJ]

And all these programs and conferences are interested in re-aligning? Yes there is a domino effect - the American obviously has to expand, but that doesn't mean it affects Northern Illinois getting an in-state rival. Some schools (Texas A&M) don't want them.

 

[No Fun Shogun]

The Big Ten had eleven teams for years and years and it was never an issue. They just had teams play a mid season or late season out of conference game every week, no biggee.

I won’t pretend to have an inside with the valley even though I live in Bloomington-Normal, but I’m doubting that they’re in a rush to realign when there’s already an easily established fix.

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

The new conference consisting of Bellarmine, Belmont, Bradley, Drake, Evansville, Lipscomb, Loyola (IL), Oral Roberts, St. Thomas, and Valparaiso could be called the Central Private Intercollegiate Conference.

When ECAC Metro, the Northeast Conference of today, was planning a name change for 1988, Eastern Private Intercollegiate Conference was among the proposed new names.

The Horizon League, now consisting entirely of public schools, could divide into divisions as such:

East: IUPUI, Michigan-Dearborn (new member) Northern Kentucky, Oakland, Purdue-Fort Wayne, Wright State
West: Chicago State (new member), Green Bay, Kansas City (new member), Milwaukee, Omaha (new member), UIC

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

The new-look Missouri Valley Conference's alignment could be this:

North: Augustana, North Dakota, North Dakota State, Northern Iowa, South Dakota, South Dakota State
South: Eastern Illinois, Illinois State, Indiana State, Missouri State, Southeast Missouri, Western Illinois

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

Georgetown football could also leave the Patriot League for the Pioneer League.

The Hoyas are currently at a disadvantage because they do not offer scholarships to their players like other Patriot League schools do. The other PFL schools however play non-scholarship football like the Hoyas. The PFL could then split into divisions, with the five teams in east coast states, plus Morehead State, forming the East division, and the Midwestern schools and San Diego forming the West Division.

Combined with the departure of Fordham for the FBS-level MAC, it puts the Patriot League at five schools for football, all full members. Needing a 6th member, their only choices in D1 are schools that currently play in the Northeast Conference. Most scholarship FCS conferences allow the 63 scholarships, the Patriot League stops at 60 and the NEC at 40. No school is willing to shave a few scholarships without shaving them all (like Presbyterian did). So the NEC is the PL's only D1 option to raid.

And they might want a school who is known for being very selective in admissions like current PL membership. So Central Connecticut, as a public school, is out.

Of the full NEC members who play football and are also private schools, Sacred Heart has the lowest acceptance rate, though it still is pretty high, 63.9%. Then again, recent addition Loyola MD has an over 80% acceptance rate.

So, I could see Sacred Heart make the move from the NEC to the Patriot League to keep PL football afloat.

To even out at 12 members, the PL could add another school that would not play football in the conference.

The best choice for that would be Air Force. Yes I know Air Force is in Colorado, while the PL is based in the Northeast. But the other D1 service academies, Army and Navy, are already in the PL except for football. The academies all play FBS football. Air Force would join Army as an FBS independent under this arrangement, while Navy would continue to play football in the American.

The three service academies are all funded by the federal government, which would help the fully private schools with their travel costs to and from Colorado every year like Hawaii helps the Cali schools in the Big West.

 

[GKJ]

I don't see Air Force being strong enough to be independent in football. It's easier for Army because of location.

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

Yet many schools are honored at the ability to have one of the service academies on their schedule. Air Force has been pretty strong as both a WAC and MWC member.

Before joining the WAC in 1980, Air Force had only been to three bowl games. Since that time they have been in 24.

Yet because of being in a conference, they only have the ability to play two other schools each year in addition to CIC trophy games, sometimes three if they are playing at Hawaii.

Again, it is very lucrative for another school to put Air Force, Army, or Navy on their schedule (although Navy now only has one opening for whoever they want, two if one of them is a game at Hawaii, every year due to being in the American and also playing Notre Dame every year in addition to the CIC Trophy games).

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if Navy wanted to take their football program out of the American.

 

[GKJ]

Yet many schools are honored at the ability to have one of the service academies on their schedule. Air Force has been pretty strong as both a WAC and MWC member.

Before joining the WAC in 1980, Air Force had only been to three bowl games. Since that time they have been in 24.

Yet because of being in a conference, they only have the ability to play two other schools each year in addition to CIC trophy games, sometimes three if they are playing at Hawaii.

Again, it is very lucrative for another school to put Air Force, Army, or Navy on their schedule (although Navy now only has one opening for whoever they want, two if one of them is a game at Hawaii, every year due to being in the American and also playing Notre Dame every year in addition to the CIC Trophy games).

They would just want to fill their schedule with Mountain West teams though. They have Colorado and Baylor coming on the schedule too, there's not much else for them to do.

 

[Unholy Diver]

I'm hearing rumblings that Alabama and Georgia are going to leave the SEC and move to the Pac-12 and it will be renamed the Western United States Coastal Higher Education League of American Style Football, the conference name is a little unwieldy at first but originally on the Sims 2 that was going to be the name of the league so I think they will use it, and after a few years it will just roll off the tongue

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

They would just want to fill their schedule with Mountain West teams though. They have Colorado and Baylor coming on the schedule too, there's not much else for them to do.

Filling their schedule with MW teams would defeat the purpose of leaving the MW. The only MW team they would want to play on a consistent basis would be Colorado State due to being an in-state rivalry. Other MW schools, including ones that would replace AF and Big 12-bound BSU (perhaps Montana and Montana State), would be scheduled only occasionally.

Remember that the Central Time Zone is only one hour ahead of Mountain.

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

The Southland Conference has announced the addition of TAMU-Commerce

Other schools I could see joining the SLC are Delta State and West Alabama of the Gulf South Conference, and West Texas A&M of the Lone Star Conference.

The Ohio Valley Conference could add Chattanooga and ETSU from the SoCon, Kentucky State from the D-II SIAC, Carson-Newman and Tusculum from the D-II SAC, and Kentucky Wesleyan from the D-II GMAC (they have football, but would be primarily added for basketball).

I've also now proposed the Horizon League become 16-team, as follows:

East: IUPUI, Michigan-Dearborn (new member), Morehead State (new member) Northern Kentucky, Oakland, Pitt-Johnstown (new member), Purdue-Fort Wayne, Wright State
West: Chicago State (new member), Green Bay, Kansas City (new member), Milwaukee, Omaha (new member), SIUE (new member), UIC, UMSL (new member)

This would remove all of the OVC schools from that conference that do not play football in the conference. While Morehead State has football, it isn't a scholarship program like the OVC's are, instead playing in the Pioneer League.

With all the membership changes in the OVC, plus the elevation of ASUN football to FBS, it would give the OVC a monopoly on FCS football in Tennessee, although it would still have three members in Kentucky (two of them new).

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

The Big East could also add Gonzaga, which has outgrown the WCC, to even out at 18.

The Big East could organize into two 9-team divisions for basketball:

East: Duquesne, Georgetown, La Salle, Providence, St. John's, St. Joseph's, Seton Hall, UConn, Villanova
West: Butler, Creighton, Dayton, DePaul, Detroit Mercy, Gonzaga, Marquette, Saint Louis, Xavier

Home-and home with division rivals (16 games), three rotating cross-division games (3 games), cross-division game based on previous season's standings (1 game, example 1st place in East VS. 1st place in West), which means sometimes a cross-division matchup could occur twice in a season.