(11-24-2020 10:29 AM)Nerdlinger Wrote: (11-24-2020 10:17 AM)edscollects@gmail.com Wrote: (11-16-2020 04:00 PM)johnintx Wrote: Central Arkansas to FBS? It is 30 minutes north of Little Rock. I guess it fills that niche that some wanted for UA-Little Rock. I'm still not sure if Arkansas can support three FBS schools, especially with the statewide reach of the Hogs.
Or, perhaps they're planning for the restructuring of the Southland in any number of rumored ways? Makes sense for them to get out of Texas if some of those schools are planning to leave the Southland. Even if nothing happens, that removes the odd-numbered school in a (relatively) far-flung part of the footprint. The SLC would move to 12 schools, 10 with football.
One thing for sure: ASun no longer stands for Atlantic Sun. It's just ASun. There's nothing Atlantic about Conway, Arkansas.
The Southland has been rumored to lose a bunch of schools from the Athlon Aritcle here
https://athlonsports.com/college-footbal...tball-2020
This article says Central Arkansas to the ASUN and the WAC interested in Abilene Christian, Lamar, Sam Houston State, and Stephen F. Austin. Now just to remind everyone that the MEAC is losing their collective minds losing 3 schools next year. This proposal if completed would take 4 from the Southland and ultimately when a conference starts taking on water it usually has other defections as well. Now the interesting question is what will the Southland do? If they look to recover their numbers frrom Division 2, the Lone Star has a similar footprint and has 8 schools sponsoring football. Even more interesting is if the Southland has to look for basketball programs, the Lone Star has 17 programs which could definitely be picked off. Some of those programs recently moved from the defunct Heartland Conference and Texas-Tyler moving up from Division 3.
I'm sure the A-Sun is interested in UCA and the WAC is interested in those other Southland schools. However, I can't imagine the feeling in mutual. So these rumors may have been spawned by the A-Sun and WAC reaching out to the schools in question or by a DavidSt/NoDak style message board fantasy. Regardless, no such moves will take place, because, with few exceptions, it doesn't make sense to downgrade conferences like that.
There’s a split with the Southland schools, in my opinion. One group is more like the WAC/ASUN and the other is more like the OVC. If Belmont and Murray St do leave for the MVC as previously been rumored on this board, I can see the Southland splitting followed by the OVC:
From Southland:
To ASUN: Central Arkansas, New Orleans
To WAC: Abilene Christian, Houston Baptist, Incarnate Word, Texas A&M - Corpus Christi
From OVC:
To MVC: Belmont, Murray St
To Summit: Eastern Illinois, SIU - Edwardsville
To SWAC: Tennessee St
Merger
Southland and OVC schools into the Southern Valley Conference.
SVC Schools (14):
From Southland: Lamar, McNeese St, Nichols St, Northwestern St, Sam Houston St, Southeastern Louisiana, Stephen F. Austin St
From OVC: Austin Peay St, Eastern Kentucky, Jacksonville St, Morehead St, Southeast Missouri St, Tennessee - Martin, Tennessee Tech