SOURCE: Southern Miss has just finalized its agreement to join the Sun Belt. However, the additions of those three schools to the Sun Belt are viewed as just a formality, and an official announcement of some new members to the Sun Belt is expected Monday, sources said.Ĭhris Vannini of The Athletic (who wrote about the possibility of the Sun Belt grabbing C-USA members earlier in the week) added some confirmation on Twitter: Conference USA members Old Dominion and Marshall and FCS member James Madison are expected to join the Sun Belt, although those schools have not officially applied for Sun Belt membership yet, sources said. USM is expected to be the first of four new Sun Belt members, sources said. The Golden Eagles will begin play in their new conference in 2023, sources said. The Sun Belt officially added Southern Miss from Conference USA on Friday, and the Sun Belt is expected to add more C-USA schools soon, sources told the Action Network.Ī charter member of Conference USA since 1995, Southern Miss applied and was accepted into the Sun Belt on Friday. McMurphy writes that the Sun Belt officially added Southern Mississippi Friday, and that two other schools are expected to come along as well: The AAC then responded by raiding Conference USA for six schools, and as per Brett McMurphy of The Action Network, the Sun Belt has now followed suit. The Big 12, eager to keep its Power Five status, fought hard to prevent any further exits (even sending a cease-and-desist to ESPN on that front, for what good that may or may not have done) and added four schools: American Athletic Conference members Cincinnati, Houston, and UCF (which was funny considering an AAC source’s claim they were going to try and get remaining Big 12 schools the reverse happened), plus independent BYU. The Sun Belt is one of the few G5 conferences that can say that.Ĭory Diaz covers the LSU Tigers and Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns for The Daily Advertiser as part of the USA TODAY Network.The latest wave of NCAA conference realignment may have started in the Power Five with Texas and Oklahoma heading to the SEC, but it’s had subsequent Group of Five reverberations as well. One of the reasons why we’ve worked so hard for CFP expansion, we really do think opening that up just a little bit would give us room to get there,” he said. However that arrives - if it does - Gill believes the Sun Belt is in position to to earn spots in a 12-team or bigger field. With the talk of super conferences in the near future for college football, playoff expansion would surely follow suit. That was a good thing because it got us positioned for what could come next.” “We’re well-positioned for this next round of realignment that’s going to result from the USC-UCLA ripple effect. But it’s a matter of, is there an opportunity for us to grow in ways that make sense?” Gill said. “I think for us, it’s really about, 'Is there an opportunity there?' We feel really stable, really good with our 14 teams. For the Sun Belt, how well it emerged from the last round of major moves gives it flexibility. With the conference now sitting at 14 members, Gill said there’s no number he has in mind for possible further expansion. The Sun Belt was the only Group of Five league that didn’t lose any football members from 2021. No conference has been safe from some form of movement over the past calendar year. “It’s going to be a good springboard for us, the future is going to be bright for us. “We take pride that we’re so attractive that our 10 schools wanted to say and help us build this conference into what it is today. “We take pride in that fact that we were so attractive for four great schools wanted to join us,” Gill told The Daily Advertiser in a one-on-one interview Wednesday. The healthier-than-ever conference has placed itself among the top seven conferences in college football, finding a seat at the table as realignment continues. Media Days marked the first step into the spotlight for the league after Gill and the universities’ athletic directors and presidents were proactive from the news of Texas and Oklahoma inquiring last summer about joining the SEC. Keith Gill, commissioner of the Sun Belt Conference, announces that Southern Miss will join the Sun Belt Conference at the Southern Miss Trent Lott Center in Hattiesburg, Miss.
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