Boston College’s official move into the ACC last week wasn’t the only change in conference alignments across the nation.
This link will highlight how all of the major conferences are currently comprised.
On Friday, The Houston Chronicle did a long story on the current state of Conference USA. (The Chronicle’s website is not one of the best for easily finding recent articles, so I am not going to waste a lot of time looking to link it.) The story obviously shared the new East/West alignment structure of C-USA.
C-USA East – UAB, UCF, East Carolina, Marshall, Memphis, Southern Miss
C-USA West – Houston, Rice, SMU, UTEP, Tulane, Tulsa
The alignment of the new C-USA immediately struck me as interesting because of its obvious imbalance from the perspective of competitive football – The Eastern Division looks to be much stronger (and balanced) for football, whereas the Western Division seems looks to be much weaker. Marshall and Southern Miss are strong mid-major programs that very few major programs have historically wanted to play. Memphis has been an above-average program since Tommy West arrived, and Central Florida has been down in recent years, but has a world class coach in George O’Leary and a geographic advantage of being located in Orlando, Florida.
Since I live in Houston, I began thinking about how excited I would be if I were a Cougar fan. The new C-USA looks like a great opportunity for UH to get their athletic footing again. With Tom Penders already producing immediate results in basketball, the football program suddenly looks to have its best opportunity for some success as it has in years.
On Saturday, the Chronicle ran an article that did a great job of developing the idea that a weakened and re-aligned C-USA is good news for a metro-based program with some historical name recognition. Check out the article if you’ve got some time or interest.
Parting Shots
===> I’m going to make the prediction that in 2 to 3 years the UH vs UTEP (oached by Mike Price) football game will consistently be “the game” in the Western Division of C-USA.
===> “The Cougars haven’t won an NCAA Tournament game in 21 years. They haven’t even made a Tournament appearance in 13. And the football program is 28-40 the last five years.”
