Sbro,
Yeah they are going to discuss a new team in the meeting later this month I think. The best situation in my opinion would be for us to get Temple all sports. Not only would this give Temple a boost in basketball (A-10 isnt bad but if you can get in a league with Louisville Memphis and Cincy and get football why not) it would bring in that 12th team for CUSA football. I will not fool myself and believe we will make near the money the SEC and Big 12 do but it will atleast be what the Mac championship game is. I do believe our new comish has a plan to make everyone happy and hopefully get us into the BCS. I know they have already came out and said that the MWC was not up to their standards (or so I read on the MWC board) but I havent heard them say anything against CUSA. I believe that CUSA could make a great improvement over the current alignment next year when we are going to eliminate the divisions which for Memphis will be great because they will no longer be playing in the weak national division and everyone will play everyone with certian rivals playing twice. I think this might have also be implimented to allow for the inclusion of another allsports team. Hopefully anyways. While I do not believe we are as good as the SEC or BIG 12 I do believe that CUSA in another 5 to 10 years may reach the popularity level of say the ACC or Big East. This is if the current alignment stays together and we keep doing well in basketball and improve in Football.

DawgNDuck fan,
You are absolutely right. It is ashame that the mess on the football side will cause not only Southern Miss but other schools to miss out on playing their rivals. Southern Miss has been playing ECU Louisville and Memphis for almost 20 years and we are building great rivalries. At the Louisville/Southern Miss game this year our students had shirts that said Louisville SUCKS, and during the football games when CUSA scores are announced only time the crowd reacts is to the Louisville games. I mean its is fun playing them win or loose and I really hope after next year CUSA can get a better scheduling deal going. Hopefully when that 12th team comes around we can break into two divisions and have one permanent rival you would play every year, and then a rotating game from the other division. As for the basketball only schools I personally wouldnt mind dropping Army Depaul and St Louis and bringing in Temple and Tulsa to replace them. Temple and Tulsa would add to basketball and give us 12 for football. But dropping Army could be also be a bad thing considering if the BCS issue ever went to Congress it would be nice to have Army on our side.

I love Tulsa for C-USA. Instant hoops credibility. I have always loved C-USA on paper for hoops, but some of the team slike Marquette and DePaul are perpetually overrated. Tulsa would add an awesome basketball program that can really deliver in the tourney. They'd only improve with C-USA membership. With Tulsa, Cincy, and Louisville, you guys would be as good at the top as anyone.

As far as football only members go, why not add Navy? Having both Army and Navy would really help if Congress was a factor in a dispute over the BCS. I'm kinda surprised no conference has considered making that rivalry game a conference game. If you could pair it up with your conference title game, you'd have a real winner and tons of bonus air time and exposure.

I'd still like to see Marshall added for football. Dump UAB, bring in Tulsa and Marshall. You instantly go up a notch in both sports. Your guaranteed three heavy hitter in hoops (as well as several other semi-succesful teams), and USF, Marshall, and TCU (and hopefully USM and Cincy) will continue to improve in football.

ACCNole,
C-USA has looked into bringing Navy in the conference in the past, only to be rebuffed by Navy's athletic department. The Navy fans say they want to be in the Big east and they want Army to come along with them. Personally I hope Army stays in C-USA. Many C-USA teams have Army bases near by, so the officers can watch their alma mater more. ;)
Tulsa actually had a chance to join C-USA when it formed, but opted to join the 16 team WAC instead. I think Tulsa regrets not joining C-USA now, and if they get a second chance to join, I don't see them passing it up.
I'd love to see Marshall added also, but all-sports is the big issue with Marshall. While the MAC is somewhat weak football conference, it is a very strong basketball conference. (the midwestern equivalent of the ACC, IMO.) When C-USA looked into giving Marshall a football-only invite, Marshall scrambled to find a good conference home for its other sports. They figured that the Horizon League wasn't too bad for bball, so they tried to join that, but the Horizon League wasn't interested in Marshall bb. The MAC doesn't allow bball-only members in the conference (although it does allow fball-only members), so Marshall couldn't leave the rest of its sports in the MAC. Marshall told C-USA they'd love to join, but they wanted an all-sports invite. That's where C-USA and the Herd stand today.

If ND hops into the BE, then that Army/Navy pairing really might happen over there.

It seems as some people have some misconceptions as to the formation of Conference USA and some of its members.

First off, Conference USA was formed as a merger between the Great Midwest Conference (basketball) and Metro Conference (basketball). The charter members include Marquette,UAB, Memphis, DePaul, Saint Louis, and Cincinnati from GMW.

From the metro...Louisville, Charlotte, Southern Miss, South Florida, Tulane.

The first basketball season of C-USA, involving these 11 members was in 1995-96. Football didn't begin until 1996 with the addition of Houston.

Next, according to C-USA by-laws it is almost impossible now for member school to "kick out" any of the 11 charter members. Originally, any issue had to be approved by 3/4 of the members, but any football issue had to be passed unanimously by the football members. That changed when the University of Louisville blocked nearly every football issue at the spring meetings in 1997. The entire conference membership (-minus Louisville) actually voted the cardinals out of the conference, changed the rules and re-admitted them, all within an hours period. This is in the conference record and was covered in the newspapers of the day. The rules now require a 3/4 approval of all conference members and a 3/4 approval of all members playing that sport (if. appl.) So in order to remove a current member or add a new member, it would require 12 votes and in c-usa 12 votes is a near impossibility.

Lastly, UAB is no longer in dire straights financially. The pronouncement of eliminate the deficit or else for the university systems board, was in effect an effort to hasten a change in both the university's athletic and administrative leadership. That being said, the original deficit was large, but had already been cut by almost half from the year ending 9/01 (the yr with that deficit) to the year ending in 9/02. Then new president immediately removed the monetary amount of scholarship costs from that total, which was a significant portion. The remaining deficit was much more manageable and significant fund raising/donations have occurred to essentially cover that yearly deficit.
The athletic director, who also happens to be the football coach, has begun talking about the facilities additions and improvements that had been put on hold because of the situation.

Lastly, the new conference commisioner (a basketball man , prev of the big12 and the southland) stated. That expansion of the conference is NO LONGER being considered and was a dead issue.

Trigger, I saw something similar to that about the new commish over on www.killerfrogs.com CUSA board, but in this case the commish said that expansion is not being considered AT THIS TIME. He said nothing about it being a dead issue.

I agree with a post I saw earlier stating that in 2005 conferences will realign to be more regionalized than before. I also think that this will include CUSA WAC and the SUNBELT. The MWC and MAC are already regional conferences. The SUNBELT will trade New Mexico State Idaho and Utah State to the WAC to combine with Hawaii Fresno State Boise State UTEP and Nevada, that gives you eight right there you get two nice rivalries NMST vs UTEP and Boise vs Idaho not to mention that Nevada and Utah State could be hyped to become a nice little matchup. Now for CUSA and the EWAC with the Sunbelt. I love CUSA but here is the prolbem with CUSA. CUSA has gone for broke and is gonna end up broken. CUSA is stretched thin from Wisconsin to Texas, Football schools vs basketball schools and a conference board which cant seem to compromise on anything not even that Jennifer Garner is the best thing to happen to leather since the cow. Anyways I think its gonna be the basketball schools left out in the cold by the Football teams in CUSA. This is what I can see happening. ULL Houston TCU RICE SMU La Tech Southern Miss Tulsa Tulane North Texas Arkansas State UAB are gonna form a new conference. Now you got a few schools left out there. Louisville ECU Cincy Memphis USF UCF Temple Marshall and Toledo can combine together to form a nice conference. IN this one you got some basketball some football and Memphis Cincy and Louisville get to keep playing each other with the addition of Temple, not to shabby.

Lastly I would just like to say a few things about the three 1A conferences on the edge. CUSA great idea bad planning - too many schools without much history together. SUNBELT too many teams not reaching the standards a few are gonna survive but not enough to keep the SUNBELT name alive. WAC once again a great conference that got a little to greedy without the 96 expansion we might be talking about the WAC as a BCS conference.

Finally, some definitive information about CUSA!!! (Possible breakup, expansion, etc)
See the link below:
http://www.killerfrogs.com/cusa/index.php?act=ST&f=4&t=1652&s=436a05ced908b290857ab2de680268f0

Simple - C-USA can't afford to take any more bad football programs. Not that we have too many now - other than army no one is horrible.

Not really - the core of c-usa, as I mentioned above, has been in an all sports conference, except for football, for 25 years (USM, UL, UM, UC, Tulane). Houston and TCU were together for 25 years. Several teams played ECU; UAB has little history and USF was an old sunbelter.
That's why I want to see it return to its core from the metro plus houston, tcu, usf (market) and a couple of others.
As for the sun belt, the problem is that even if usm, tcu, houston, usf, tulane and maybe memphis are left to form a conference, where will they look? To the sun belt or to rice, smu, tulsa, etc.? The sun belt teams hope reside on the resultant c-usa desparately wanting 12 teams, and, even then, a few will be left out.

The strong rumor I have heard the last few years, and it has picked up steam over the last few months, is Miami-FL to the ACC, Syracuse, Seton Hall, and maybe another team like Pitt (I doubt it though), or Georgetown (I can see that), heading over to the Big Ten, Rutgers going to C-USA or the A-10, or even Seton Hall going to the A-10 instead, and Cincinnati, Memphis and Louisville going to the Big East. The Big East might be on the verge of losing Miami-Fl football to the ACC and need some replacements, and of course the basketball teams need replacements. The thinking from the Big East is that Cincinnati, Memphis and Louisville are national powers in basketball and bring a ton of tradition and are natural rivals to each other. They also have natural geographical rivals, like Cincinnati and West Virginia and Pitt, same with Louisville and Memphis. Also in football Louisville has a strong football program so they get soem help trying to replace the pieces of Miami-Fl. Cincinnati and Memphis are also solid teams capable of cracking the lower tier of the Top 25. Cincinnati has been to bowl games 4 of the last 5 so that helps the Big East. They don't need Cincinnati to be a national title contender, just a team capable of grabbing one of the lower tier bowls for the Big East and filling their quota for bowls. Same for Memphis, and then those programs, with the backing of the Big East, can grow into legit Top 25 teams and national players. This all makes sense, and something seems to be in the work to make this happen. In football Miami-FL would be a big blow, but the Big East still has plenty of powerful teams along with Louisville coming in. In basketball Cincinnati, Memphis, and Louisville is a step up from Syracuse, Miami-FL and Seton Hall. Hopefully this gets completed, The name value that UC, Louisville and Memphis brings, the tradition, and the coaching power add serious luster to the Big East, especially if they're losing some teams.

I would add, the next best thing to joining the Big East would be to clean up C-USA and add upgrades. Get rid of St Louis, Depaul, maybe even Houston, and UAB, and add someone like Tulsa, Temple, Notre Dame would be great, don't know if it could happen, and maybe Marshall if possible. Marshall seems to me to be a basketball program that could grow in a higher profile conference. A basketball conference with Tulsa, Cincinnati, Louisville, Temple, Memphis, Marquette? Are you kidding, that would be great! Especially if a miracle happened and Notre Dame was added. That would be more feasible, and maybe more productive then finding a way to go the Big East and hoping they break up or something. Heck maybe they boot out teams like Seton Hall and they join C-USA, who knows.

The only team going to CUSA is an X BE team Temple.Miami is not trading in its special deals with the BE for the ACC.The BE is getting bigger it will replace football only member Temple with UCONN.Then it will take Army and Navy as football only members.Then it is up to ND as to whether it wants BE football.If ND does then Louisville is added as full 15th member.If it does not UCinn will be the 16th member.This process is already active.The BE is getting rid of its 2 division status going back to 1 division.This is a move favored by ND.

I do believe Tigershark is right. Louisville and Cincy have very few years left in CUSA before they move on. I would put my money on both of them to the Big East. I also believe Notre Dame will have to swallow a big pill and join the Big East, if they do not the Big 10 and the Big East can always join forces to keep ND out of any BCS bowls and would virtually have to go undefeated to have a chance at a National Championship.

The Southern Teams of CUSA are displeased with the current football situtation. I believe Southern Miss Tulane TCU Houston South Florida and Memphis will come together to form a new league after Louisville and Cincy leave the question is who else will they let in your need eight, nine would be ideal. I believe Marshall, La Tech and UCF would be the most logical additions. This gives you a league of UCF USF Marshall Memphis Southern Miss TCU Houston Tulane and La Tech would be a great conference it would be better than the MWC in football with Tech Southern Miss Marshall and TCU all being better than the Moutian Wets top four. Basketball would be so so but Memphis would be good and Houston if they could come on would also be great. If basketball was a great consideration I would say drop Tech for ULL you give up a little in football but you add a closer rival to USM and Tulane or go to Twelve add Tulsa ULL and UTEP for basketball to help out Memphis. I believe that this year Louisville will announce it is leaving CUSA and Cincy will follow of the Big 3 basketball in CUSA, Memphis is the odd man out I do not believe the Big East will go for them.

[url][/url]http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/sports/1804893[ftp][/ftp]

Houston is in poor shape financially, enough to where their new AD made the statement "I don't want to be the guy who presided over the demise of the University of Houston as a Division I-A program."

They only have $500,000 of the $3 million needed to fund scholorships at this point.

The flip side is that UAB isn't facing immediate death by the University of Alabama system. Supposedly, the UofA system was using the finicial deal as leverage to oust some of the higher ups at UAB. It worked, so the pressure is off...for now.