This morning's news is that C-USA has reached out to currently Independent New Mexico State and FCS members Tarleton State and Sam Houston State.

Cmon MAC. Dooooo it. Hilltoppers is a great MAC mascot.


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Interesting tidbit about James Madison to the Sun Belt: they have to get state approval before the can transition from FCS to FBS.

https://www.dnronline.com/sports/college/sun-belt-could-b...

Southern Miss and Old Dominion have officially been added to the Sun Belt. Southern Miss intends to join the league no later than July 1, 2023.

Marshall is expected to sign next, followed by James Madison.

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Over on the MAC boards, its rumored to believe that the MAC was pursuing Marshall and WKU, but would only take both. With Marshall going to the Sun Belt an invite to WKU may not happen.

I've been a fan of theirs since 2007 when they beat Michigan. And I was a Michigan fan at the time.

Yeah and I think that's the reason most WKU fans really want to be in something other than C-USA. In order to keep their autobid for the NCAA Tournament the conference has to have at least eight members. When the dust settles as of now they'll have five.

WKU wasn't thrilled about going back to the SBC, mostly because they don't care as much about basketball as they do football. And the SBC held a grudge against WKU for leaving to go to C-USA. Marshall stated some of the same desires to have a stronger basketball conference as well, but they appear to be headed to the SBC simply for the football product.

Football drives the bus and a combination of Marshall, App State, Louisiana, Coastal Carolina and FBS transition James Madison is a great place to start. That doesn't even include rising program in urban Atlanta in Georgia State and usually solid Georgia Southern. That's a pretty damn good conference football wise.

This whole conversation feels like the embodiement of the expression "rearranging the deck chairs on the titanic."

It feels very much like the writing's on the wall for the non P conferences, and that's not changing regardless of which groupings of each other they come up with.

I think that's why, with the exception of the AAC, most of these conferences want to be as regional as possible. If and when the well dries up and you can't afford the travel, being able to bus your volleyball team on a Wednesday night makes so much more sense in the long run.

I'm not thrilled the MAC isn't being a tad more aggressive, because I do think the league needs a little bit of juice and new members would do the trick. But being as regional as it is, there's only a handful of schools the MAC could realistically go after and still maintain that mentality. So I totally understand not overreaching your borders. And not taking flyers on football only programs is absolutely the right move.

-WKU fit the bill. And they love basketball which makes the conference stronger in that regard.

-Marshall definitely fits that bill.

-MTSU is a little further than you'd like, but think of MTSU like you would an NIU or Buffalo. Kind of far removed from most, but still close enough for some. And Murfreesboro is about 45 min from a cool as hell city in Nashville in the event you did have to fly.

-Army is in the footprint, but I don't see them ever giving up their independent status.

Other than those? You're talking schools moving from FCS to FBS. There's not really anyone else close that isn't already taken or in better situations.

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Taking this a step further, I'm going to be very interested in seeing what happens if the power leagues decide they no longer need the basement dwellers. If you're someone like Purdue, Indiana, South Carolina, Vanderbilt, etc...I'd be scared as hell thinking about 25-30 (let's call it 32 for giggles) make their own league and become a pseudo farm system for the NFL. What happens to those schools?

If Cincinnati wins out and wins out in dominant fashion and gets left out of the playoff, a G5 team will never make the cut in the current format (which is probably only going to be around for a few more years).

Of course, Cincy -- along with BYU, Houston and UCF -- will be "P" teams in a couple years when they join the B12. That'll leave the G5 pickins pretty slim in most seasons.

If Cincinnati wins out, I’m pretty confident that they’re in.

I think Alabama or Ohio State will need to lose again for Cincinnati to get in.

I don't think OSU is the team UC needs to worry about.

UC needs:

-Alabama to lose to Georgia in the SEC Championship. Putting a second SEC team with two losses in over an undefeated UC would cause huge uproars and set a ridiculous precedent.

-The other way around though? Especially if it's close, two SEC teams getting in is very possible if both only have one loss. It's happened before.

-Oregon. If Oregon wins out and has the same record as Ohio State, logic tells us that Oregon should be in over Ohio State since they already played and Oregon won. But this is the CFP committee we're talking about here and they do dumb stuff. If Oregon loses again, that not only knocks them out but also makes OSU's loss look worse in comparison. So what I'm saying is, you should root like hell for Oregon State to win the Civil War. Go Beavers! Actually no, we want Oregon in and OSU to lose as many as possible. So go Ducks. Idk. Whatever.

-Then there's Oklahoma. I don't know how they get through their schedule without a loss, especially knowing how they looked against Kansas. If it comes down to 1-loss Oklahoma vs. undefeated Cincinnati then we may have some juice.

Smith is a very accomplished guy, but I want it known that I took his wife to my ninth grade homecoming dance