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In case you were paying more attention to the World Series or this lovely October weather, the major college sports conference game of musical chairs has been playing once again over the past few weeks.
While most sports fans are quite aware that the University of Texas and Oklahoma University will become the 15th and 16th teams in the expanded Southeastern Conference, some of the other college sports conferences have joined the reshuffling act in a big way lately.
Speaking of Big, let’s talk about the Big 12 Conference. Though during the past few years they were more accurately the Big “12 minus 2” Conference with only ten teams, the loss of Texas and OU lit a fire under the remaining members to get big or fall apart. They recently extended invitations to four new schools by adding the University of Houston, Cincinnati, the University of Central Florida, and Brigham Young University to the conference.
The updated math is now correct, too. 10 teams -2 teams +4 new schools = 12. Yes, the Big 12 is officially comprised of dozen teams once more. Hooray!
Hold on! Didn’t three of those teams just come from the American Athletic Conference? The AAC can’t just sit around and let their conference fall apart, could they? No, sirree! The AAC has recently announced that they are replacing those three teams, plus they are adding three more for a total of six new colleges to their conference line-up soon.
The new AAC members will be Florida Atlantic, the University of Alabama-Birmingham, Charlotte, and three Texas teams. North Texas (Dallas-Fort Worth), UT-San Antonio, and Rice (Houston) insure that the biggest TV markets in the state of Texas will become part of the new and improved AAC.
Now, wait a minute! Those six schools jumping to the AAC all came from Conference USA, didn’t they? How many teams does that leave in C-USA?
After the six departing teams, Conference USA would have eight remaining members. UTEP (El Paso), Marshall, Western Kentucky, Middle Tennessee, Florida International, Old Dominion, Southern Miss, and Louisiana Tech make up the Great Eight of C-USA.
So, does this now mean that Conference USA will be shopping for up to six new teams?
As our buddy Lee Corso says every Saturday morning on television, “Not so fast!”
In the past week, the Sunbelt Conference has shocked the college sports world by announcing that it will be adding Southern Miss and Marshall to their conference with Old Dominion and current FCS powerhouse James Madison also expected to become members of the Sunbelt soon.
Conference USA is having math problems. They get passing marks in subtraction, but this league can’t seem to figure out how to add anymore.
With the initial six teams bolting for the AAC and three more likely to join the Sunbelt, that will leave just five teams remaining (as of today) in Conference USA. UTEP, Marshall, Western Kentucky, Middle Tennessee, Florida International, and Louisiana Tech are now the Fab Five.
What are the possibilities of those other five schools finding a new conference home?
The Mountain West currently has twelve member schools. It would be easy to make the case for UTEP to leave C-USA and play other schools more in their geographic footprint.
The Mid-America Conference (MAC) also has twelve member schools right now. Marshall, Western Kentucky, and Middle Tennessee are regionally plausible as possible future MAC teams.
That would leave Florida International and Louisiana Tech. FIU was a former member of the Sunbelt Conference from 2005 through 2012. It would make a lot of sense for them to rejoin that conference and become the 15th member of the Sunbelt.
That leaves Louisiana Tech. Tech could join the Sunbelt as the 16th team. It would make the most geographic sense to play in an athletics conference with two other Louisiana schools – UL-Lafayette and UL-Monroe.
Ah – there’s the rub.
Louisiana Tech doesn’t want to lower itself to play in the same football conference with their arch-rivals just 30 miles to the east of Ruston via I-20 in the northeast Louisiana city of Monroe. Many fans of the ULM Warhawks feel the same way about playing the Bulldogs, too.
These two schools simply do not like each other and have a recent history of refusing to play football against each other. It has been 21 years and counting.
At Louisiana Tech, the Bulldogs jumped into the large-school division of college football teams in 1989. Not to be outdone, the Northeast Louisiana University Indians (which is the predecessor name for the school and sports teams now known as the ULM Warhawks) took the leap into the football big leagues five years later in 1994.
The Indians had been regular participants in the 16-team FCS playoffs and won the national championship in 1987. Their championship squad featured future NFL players like quarterback Stan Humphries (Chargers), tight end Jackie Harris (Packers), and kicker Teddy Garcia (Patriots). The team started its championship season with a 44-7 pounding of Louisiana Tech at Tech’s home field in Ruston. Ouch.
Since that time, Louisiana Tech has “owned” their rivals from Monroe. Tech is 8-0 in those match-ups which have now ceased being played since the year 2000. It has been 21 years since Louisiana Tech and UL-Monroe have played a football game against one another.
It’s not like a local matchmaker didn’t try to get them to play, though.
In 2012, ULM finished with its best FBS mark ever at 8-4 and was invited to play in the Independence Bowl just down I-20 in Shreveport. That same season, Louisiana Tech finished 9-3 but was passed-over by a couple of bigger name post-season bowls. The Indy Bowl extended an invitation for Louisiana Tech to come and play in their 2012 bowl game against ULM.
Instead, the Bulldogs opted to reject the offer and sat at home during the holidays instead of playing football against their rivals from Monroe.
So, why did this happen?
Though no one in north Louisiana wants to say it out publicly, Louisiana Tech (after it moved up to the larger school classification) has adopted the mindset that they have the second best athletics program in the state of Louisiana behind LSU. That may or may not be true, but there is no question that Louisiana Tech’s football program has competed well after stepping up to the BCS group of top130 teams.
As the years progressed, the Bulldogs (and their biggest financial boosters) have also made it a point to avoid playing football in the same football conference which would feature any other Louisiana rivals – especially those schools located in Monroe and Lafayette.
The Ragin’ Cajuns of UL-Lafayette would be willing to schedule football games against the Bulldogs on a regular basis, but Tech hasn’t played the Cajuns since 2015. For UL-Monroe, the wait to play Louisiana Tech has been even longer.
This new and improved version of the Sunbelt Conference would make for a perfect place for Louisiana Tech to continue playing football. Whether right or wrong (and, as a graduate of Louisiana Tech, I think it’s wrong), the Bulldogs continue to position themselves as being “too good” to play in a college football conference with other Louisiana schools not named LSU.
The idea of playing in a new conference where travel would be drastically reduced is good for Bulldog athletes and good for the athletics department’s bottom line. Louisiana Tech has convinced itself that the Bulldogs have become a national brand by playing in the geographically far-flung Conference USA since 2013. Based on home football attendance over those same years, you wouldn’t be able to notice any uptick in their local fan base.
Note to Louisiana Tech boosters – More fans are likely to show-up for football games and other sporting events to watch Louisiana Tech compete against long-time rivals like UL-Monroe and UL-Lafayette than for teams from the C-USA such as Florida International and Middle Tennessee (no disrespect meant to either of those programs).
This is all about money and ego.
Louisiana Tech’s athletic department has been extremely fortunate to have a few very wealthy local benefactors to help seed the program and keep it financially viable. However, in return for the big donations, those boosters have successfully dictated that the school is NOT to lower themselves by playing football games against their former Louisiana long-time foes.
Failure to heed the warnings of Tech’s big donors would likely spell big trouble for the Bulldogs’ athletics budget, too.
The Sunbelt Conference would be wise to welcome Louisiana Tech. The school’s academic and athletics programs are a great regional fit. It’s up to the Bulldogs to work out a deal and give their alumni and students a chance to renew athletic match-ups against a couple of long-time in-state rivals once again.
If recent history is a good indicator, I wouldn’t bet on it.