We discuss realignment options for schools that we didn't attend all of the time.
But what about realignment options for your school? I will start with mine.
1)B12: Our academic peer list includes Oklahoma St, Iowa St and WVU so this would be the conference to join with its rural college towns. We make a perfect travel partner with WVU only 2 hours away.
But this would first require Cincinnati to land in the ACC as they would be ahead of us in the pecking order for a conference move and require a stadium expansion to at least 32,000 seats (capacity of the smallest P5 stadium) to make it viable.
2)AAC: We're the logical replacement school for Cincinnati if they were to leave. Football stadium is expanding with a facility this year and the basketball arena which seats 13,000 is getting a 2 million dollar scoreboard upgrade. Academically we definitely cut it with more Fulbright scholarships than an current AAC school over the last decade.
But unless the AAC can grow its base revenue distribution from 3.5 million to at least 10 million per school it's not going to be enough to offset the increased travel cost and higher salaries required to compete in the AAC.
3)CUSA: Marshall has pushed for us to join and we've had what amounts to a standing invite for years. We have a basketball profile and budget that exceeds everyone in the MAC, SBC or any FCS school they would consider. If CUSA basketball starts to take off with WKU, ODU and UAB returning to form it becomes more attractive.
But so long as the MAC is stable and has a TV deal we wouldn't look at this. Buffalo could leave and it would have zero impact on the deal. If NIU and Toledo were to leave and the deal is close to renewal it might. Also we'd demand (because we can) Miami University to be added as a package deal to make it worthwhile. I think CUSA would agree to that demand.
4)MAC-MVC: This is a situation where the MAC loses more than 3 schools at once and has to either merge with the MVC with some of the schools joining it or add a large block of MVC football schools: Il State, UNI, NDSU ect. to stay in the FBS game.
But this to me sounds like a crapshoot as to whether the TV deal will be honored and/or G5 status is continued. Basketball will probably remain at 1 bid even if the MAC goes as far as to add Northern Iowa.
Ranking the options:
B12 (No direct path at present)
AAC (Wait and see how TV goes)
CUSA (Legitimate backup plan)
MVC (Desperado plan)