Looks like this is gaining some traction.
https://www.sunherald.com/sports/college/conference-usa/article242750786.html
https://www.sunherald.com/sports/college/conference-usa/article242750786.html
Realignment article
- Thread starter cottrell75
- Start date
Article says the merge would look like this:
Louisiana Tech, Southern Miss, UAB, Louisiana-Lafayette, Louisiana-Monroe, South Alabama, Arkansas State, North Texas, Rice, UTSA, Texas State and UTEP would be lumped together in the West.
Florida Atlantic, Western Kentucky, Marshall, Florida International, Middle Tennessee, Old Dominion, Appalachian State, Charlotte, Georgia Southern, Georgia State, Troy and Coastal Carolina in the East.
Louisiana Tech, Southern Miss, UAB, Louisiana-Lafayette, Louisiana-Monroe, South Alabama, Arkansas State, North Texas, Rice, UTSA, Texas State and UTEP would be lumped together in the West.
Florida Atlantic, Western Kentucky, Marshall, Florida International, Middle Tennessee, Old Dominion, Appalachian State, Charlotte, Georgia Southern, Georgia State, Troy and Coastal Carolina in the East.
I’d be in for that but I’d love for us to somehow include JMU (assuming they’re interested in making the jump).
Same. JMU would be legit from the start. Nice campus, nice facilities, good recruiting base, recent football teams have been solid...plus an easy drive for Marshall fans.
One little thing. Yep, JMU has the "potential" to be I-A. Same could be said about a dozen or more schools. And, while we are at it, probably a third to a half of the MACers have the "potential" to get out of that lowly league and try the water in the deep end of the pool.
But what they don't have is a brass pair. They cower where they are. Bigger schools, bigger states, richer schools, richer states. Still they do not try to be all they could be.
MARSHALL had a pair.
But what they don't have is a brass pair. They cower where they are. Bigger schools, bigger states, richer schools, richer states. Still they do not try to be all they could be.
MARSHALL had a pair.
JMU would have been a hell of a better choice than Charlotte or ODU. But they have potential. Lol!
Charlotte has a far better basketball tradition than most CUSA teams with the exception of UTEP and WKU. Their football is certainly improving having beaten us 2 times recently
"Choice" implies that JMU applied. It did not. It chose, and continues to choose, to remain in I-AA. Meanwhile, MU remains among the smallest public I-A colleges, in a dying town and a dying state to boot.
What a pair we have.
Most all of these hypothetical pipe-dream conferences that CUSA haters dream up include JMU, which has never even tried to move up, and various MACers, none of which have either.
Have they come close to winning CUSA? When we have had more success in CUSA than they have, it doesn’t make me all warm and fuzzy about their tradition. We have great football tradition as well, hasn’t helped us much either.
IMO this is way too big. A better solution would be split into two new conferences.
It would be two new conferences.
They had some of their best years in CUSA when CUSA was a great conference with Louisville, Cincinnati and Memphis. Last championship was 2001
That was almost 20 years ago. Most of their current players were in diapers or not born. While I respect that tradition, much like our glory years in the MAC, it's not relevant to football program now - sadly.
Honestly, this proposal is much better than the current Sun Belt/CUSA alignment... Especially if the goal is to cut down on travel costs.
Break the new CUSA into two divisions North and South, and the travel load gets even lighter. The only problem is it puts the three traditionally strongest football teams in the same division (MU, WKU, App).
North –
Marshall
Old Dominion
App State
WKU
Charlotte
MTSU
South –
Coastal Carolina
Ga. State
Ga. Southern
FIU
FAU
Troy
Break the new CUSA into two divisions North and South, and the travel load gets even lighter. The only problem is it puts the three traditionally strongest football teams in the same division (MU, WKU, App).
North –
Marshall
Old Dominion
App State
WKU
Charlotte
MTSU
South –
Coastal Carolina
Ga. State
Ga. Southern
FIU
FAU
Troy
Agreed! Sadly, we have but one conference championship in football during most of our recruits lifetime.
I actually like the look of that conference and it would be a tough conference and a good southern based conference. There are some good teams in there with some good tradition. Games that are close for fans to get to.
JMU has no TV potential at all...they bring very few TV sets
True but television market being a deciding factor is pretty a outdated way of thinking.
Our media package is minuscule and isn't getting any bigger/better any time soon.
Ever been to Boone, North Carolina? Troy, Alabama? They don't bring tv sets, either.
We need to focus on regional schools who have an interest in staying/becoming a solid G5 in FBS.
Last edited:
Does anyone think CUSA and the Sunbelt could just do a "trade", of sorts? I don't see how CUSA would be a thing without Texas teams, seeing as it's a Texas located and centric conference.
Also, I knew this all had a familiar feel to it
https://marshall.forums.rivals.com/threads/how-about-the-sun-belt.45759/
https://marshall.forums.rivals.com/threads/how-about-the-sun-belt.45759/
Yep. The teams merging from the west divisions fit better with the C-USA moniker and the eastern teams should be a part of the new Sun Belt.
Yes I have. Nice area. And does FAU, FIU or any other conference team bring a TV audience? We did at one time, USM maybe.
The league chose Charlotte and ODU because of markets/TV and that turned out to be a huge flop. Neither has done much and if anything, we have learned, they don’t even command their local tv markets.
One thing this COVID deal has really opened my eyes to: just how much of modern journalism is nothing more than untrained amateurs reading articles on the internet, and then re-writing hypothetical summaries or logical leaps based on those articles that generate clicks and comments. Slap the masthead of a semi-legitimate news source above it (as with the article here), and it suddenly becomes "news," but at the cost of the continuing decline in the public's trust in the impartiality, accuracy, and validity of news itself.
But here, I'll bite - schools who were FCS or didn't exist in 1997 in bold:
"In the East, it would be Florida Atlantic, Western Kentucky, Marshall, Florida International, Middle Tennessee, Old Dominion, Appalachian State, Charlotte, Georgia Southern, Georgia State, Troy and Coastal Carolina."
We'd be the elder statesmen! *SHOOTS SELF IN FACE*
But here, I'll bite - schools who were FCS or didn't exist in 1997 in bold:
"In the East, it would be Florida Atlantic, Western Kentucky, Marshall, Florida International, Middle Tennessee, Old Dominion, Appalachian State, Charlotte, Georgia Southern, Georgia State, Troy and Coastal Carolina."
We'd be the elder statesmen! *SHOOTS SELF IN FACE*
I called for this a couple weeks ago. Take both Wests and take both Easts to form "new" conferences. The West would be CUSA and the Easts the Sun Belt.
Not saying you are technically wrong BUT viewership goes beyond what DMA a city or town is in. CUSA went by DMA during the last go around, how did that work out for us? JMU actually has tons of alumni in DC. They are more like App State, small city, doesn't matter, product on the field and court is what matters. I am not for or against them FWIW. I just get sick when someone starts mentioning DMA (FIU, FAU pre Kiffin comes to mind) as a reason to add or not to add, since we have been down this road in the current version of CUSA.
Last edited:
I don't know about that, I mean we got this brand new, state-of-the-art IPF that was an assured, huge boost to recruiting, so I would say Marshall is definitely on the rise!
*WATCHES FILM OF LAST YEAR'S CHARLOTTE GAME*
*WATCHES MARSHALL STRUGGLE MIGHTILY IN RAINY CONDITIONS*
*WEEPS OPENLY INTO THUNDERDOG WRAPPER OVER CRUEL IRONY*
It should have helped. The problem is you have to bring those recruits here. I just don't feel the last five years that these coaches are going after the same caliber player that we went after prior 2015. Even the NQs are kids we could land regularly. They used to be players like Yulee, Butler, Jean-Louis, McManus, and the higher end guys we weren't getting straight up. Now we're offering NQ spots to guys we're battling Elon for.
We needed the IAF because we had been losing practice time to weather. Also it did appeal to players that we were recruiting against bigger schools for. Like I said though we don't seem to go after those guys.
I just don't think the staff members hired since 2015 either have the belief that Marshall can actually get those players or they themselves don't think they could win a recruiting battle. It's also entirely possible these latest coaches are just horrible judges of talent.
Has Charlotte "improved". Maybe, but not that much. I believe that our decline has been steeper than their improvement. We just passed them on the way down and they caught us. I know this is tough for us all to swallow, but had Charlotte not beaten us they would not have went to a bowl game. Thus having another losing season.
Sorry to nitpick because I agree with the rest of your post, but Charlotte went 7-5 during the regular season last year. Beating us made them 6-5 but they still had another game against ODU.
Would they have beaten ODU though? I am sure that our win had them riding high. Who's to say that if we had taken care of business we that loss wouldn't have crushed their spirits.
Agree with this. I still say since we won the title in 2014, mission accomplished and Doc and Co. have been on cruise control ever since. Just don’t see any fire or effort to really get better.
I agree. In a lot of cases it seems the self life of a head coach is 6 to 9 years. it will be interesting to see how Mike handles Doc have this season.
I agree. I also want teams who actually make an effort into building their programs...ODU and Charlotte fooled everyone into believing they were the real deal given what resources they have. App State may not be in a huge market, but at least they put out a good product against teams with those markets.
