REPORT: Six C-USA schools will apply to join The American Athletic Conferen
TAMPA, Fla., (OCT. 18, 2021) – One week ago Conference USA executives sent a letter to their counterparts at the American Athletic Conference asking them to consider a regionalized model to reorganize the two leagues.
The proposal was for the conferences to reinvent themselves based on geography, creating two new conferences under different names.
Meanwhile, the AAC unsuccessfully recruited several Mountain West members – Colorado State, Air Force, San Diego State and Boise State – to join its “P6” Conference.
That failure appears to have led AAC Commissioner Mike Aresco, who publicly spoke against any type of merger with C-USA, to circle back and consider accepting several C-USA members should they apply.
According to Pete Thamel, a National College football and basketball reporter for Yahoo! Sports, applications are forthcoming.
Thamel reported that The American is expecting to receive applications from FAU, Charlotte, North Texas, UTSA, Rice and UAB this week. All are members of C-USA. If the applications are accepted, and it appears they will be, the AAC could look like this for football (at least):
EAST: South Florida, East Carolina, Navy (football only), Temple, Charlotte, UAB and FAU
WEST: Memphis, SMU, Tulane, Tulsa, North Texas, Rice and UTSA
Wichita State would give the conference 14-teams for basketball.
This type of alignment creates in-state rivalries while alleviating some stress on travel budgets.
How the loss of Houston, UCF and Cincinnati and the addition of FAU, Charlotte, North Texas, UTSA, Rice and UAB will affect the American’s ESPN TV deal is anyone’s guess. Currently the AAC TV revenue distribution dwarfs that of C-USA.
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