Conference USA reloading by adding 6 schools Conference USA, which has four schools departing to the Big East next season, is reloading by adding six schools in 2013, industry sources told CBSSports.com. Florida International, Louisiana Tech, North Texas, Texas San Antonio, Charlotte and Old Dominion will join C-USA giving the league 14 members. However, it's not clear how soon after 2013 Charlotte, which is beginning its football program in 2013, and ODU, currently in the FCS, would be able to compete as a C-USA football member. An official announcement could come as early as Friday, sources said. http://www.cbssports.com/collegefootball/blog/brett-mcmurphy/18923863 When completed, Conference USA's new 14-team league is expected to be split into two divisions: East - East Carolina, FIU, Marshall, Southern Miss, UAB, Charlotte and ODU; West - Louisiana Tech, North Texas, Rice, Texas San Antonio, Tulane, Tulsa and UTEP.
I'm really interested in what ODU does. ODU's decisions will definitely impact the Commonwealth of Virginia with George Mason and Virginia Commonwealth potentially going to the A-10 and leaving James Madison with one of the larger FCS programs left behind.
The West will belong to Tulsa for the foreseeable future and the East will likely be owned by Southern Miss with East Carolina perhaps providing a stumbling block every now and then. As someone that secondarily follows UAB (I have a degree from there as well as Alabama), it'll be nice to see the Blazers have a few more guaranteed wins on the schedule every year. Depending on who they draw from the west on their schedule, they could possibly even get to six wins on a semi-regular basis.