Don't disagree on the journalistic standards at Cowtown's only surviving daily newspaper. But, it does appear that at least some preliminary discussions have taken place.

Sun Belt tries to poach MAC/CUSA schools to replace TX St. They say no.
Sun Belt starts believable rumor that MAC is falling apart to entice MAC schools to join.

That's just mean.

Just curious, who was the BOT member who told you the above information?

Exactly!

Bring on the 🌞 Belt!

To me, two important factors are net Revenue (revenue less travel expenses) and visibility, but they are not the most important one. Arguably, the reasons for playing football are increased visibility to alums and potential students, and maintaining ties to them. If Ohio alums are clustered in state, and all over it, then a move out of the MAC is going to sever those ties. To the extent that they are around the country, then being on TV is more important than being in Akron or Bowling Green. I'm sure that the school's powers that be will assess and weigh all these factors, and it will be interesting to see which they choose.

In the 10 years I lived in Cincinnati I don't think I ever heard Ohio University mentioned on 700 WLW. Maybe the 2012 NCAA Tournament run or and a random interview with Thom Brenneman, but that's probably it.

That was very interesting, thanks. Now, if we had a similar comparison of the AAC, MAC, SBC, and CUSA it would really give us an idea where the MAC stands in the G6 pecking order.

FYI: Per the SBC board, most of the posters consider this guy unreliable and clickbait.

There is a 13 page thread on his Big SBC "juicy announcement" before it starting going into another direction. The big scope was about a pitching coach leaving one program and going to another school.
https://csnbbs.com/thread-1011960.html

Most of the SBC East team posters seem to be favorable to Ohio. The West SBC members are not as thrilled. This is based on the very active SBC message board.

Their seem to be riff developing between the East and West SBC programs. Rumors are that the East teams might breakaway and form a new conference. The East programs have more resources than the West programs. If the AAC start fall apart, ECU and maybe a few other teams might want to help form the new Eastern conference? Maybe that is why Ohio is being brought up, who knows.

Two things - the thread title - SBC rumor in a very slow time during a very slow time for college sports fans.

Second, there has not been one quote from the OU president, AD, or board of trustees chair - just a bunch of folks with lots of time on their hands.

I suspect that the element of truth might lie in this area. As of now, the travel costs for Ohio for non-revenue sports would probably make this move very difficult. Long rivalry ties, alumni base location and such make it that much more unlikely. But there is still room for more football expansion in the conferences out west. The American seems to really prefer colleges in cities. If, say, Memphis, Tulane, and/or Tulsa leaves to go west and Toledo and/or Buffalo end up in the American in response maybe some other American programs like ECU are more ready to look elsewhere. Maybe then the 7 Sunbelt East schools want to break away and team with a couple of regional American schools to save on their own travel cost and if they are looking around at WKU, MTSU, Liberty, Ohio, Miami.... to get back to 12 or 14 then I can certainly now understand why this now makes a ton of sense for us. Maybe also the Sunbelt West schools look at some western CUSA schools at that point. It seems like most articles were talking like this wasn't really talks for 2026 but Ohio possibly having a better relationship understanding with the JMU's and Appy's of the world if there is a sudden paradigm shift. I obviously have no idea what I am talking about but in this context it makes a whole lot of sense.

When CUSA started getting plucked schools like Marshall were anxious to get out. A school like FIU was then left with basically no good options. We don't want to be in a position like that.