Surprised this hasn't been mentioned, but what happens to Sun Belt men's soccer? With Hartwick dropping to Division 3, the Sun Belt now has five schools with men's soccer: Appy State Coastal Carolina Georgia Southern Georgia State Howard (affiliate) So what happens? There are no independent men's soccer programs left in NCAA Div. 1. North Alabama is jumping up to Division 1 and the Atlantic Sun Conference, but they don't have men's soccer.
should merge with southern (6 teams) , asun or big south. Or those 4 conferences (sunbelt 5 included) merge and form 2 very good conferences.
Well, let's see. Here's how those conferences you mentioned look for this fall men's soccer season: Big South: 10 programs, no affiliates. Southern: 7 programs. 6 full members, plus 1 affiliate (Belmont). Atlantic Sun: 6 programs, no affiliates. The Big South should be pretty satisfied with 10 programs. The ASun is at the bare minimum, and needs more programs, but the ASun schools are in Florida, New Jersey, and Tennessee, which means higher travel costs for the non-revenue sport of men's soccer. The SoCon will have 7 members, and the SoCon and SunBelt footprints overlap for men's soccer. I would have to guess that the SunBelt and ASun will come to some sort of agreement and join forces for men's soccer, mostly because they both need the numbers although merging the SunBelt and SoCon rosters for men's soccer would involve less travel expenses and less lost class time. ASun/SunBelt would create a roster of 10 men's soccer schools, 11 if Howard is included in the agreement.
Here are the schools that are in a conference which is 1) not their primary conference and 2) has 7+ members (so it could in theory lose someone): Conference USA (9 soccer schools) Kentucky South Carolina New Mexico Horizon (9 soccer schools) Belmont Missouri Valley (7 soccer schools) Central Arkansas WAC (10 soccer schools) Houston Baptist Incarnate Word San Jose State UNLV Belmont might be an option. Central Arkansas would make sense in other variations of the Sun Belt, but it doesn't make a lot of sense with the actual Sun Belt schools.