G5 Blog Original Content
There have been very few College Sports Conferences that have been hit harder than Conference USA during the last two years of the often chaotic world of collegiate conference realignment. On July 1st Conference USA, which losses ECU, TULANE and TULSA to the AAC and gains WKU from the Sun Belt ,ends their latest and most dramatic phase of conference realignment. July 1st also marks the beginning of a long road of rebuilding and rebranding for Conference USA. Rebuilding and rebranding for a conference that has seen the majority of its best programs leave and join the AAC.
In a few short days ECU, TULANE and TULSA will join former Conference USA mates UCF, MEMPHIS, HOUSTON AND SMU in the American Athletic Conference. Conference USA commissioner, Britton Banowsky, in order to replace these departing schools, turned to North Texas, ODU,MTSU, LA TECH, FIU, FAU, UTSA, UNC-CHARLOTTE and WKU. Half of these programs come from the Sun Belt Conference, while the other half come from new FBS start up programs or the WAC Conference. None of the replacement schools however, bring the name recognition ,winning tradition or brand power that the majority of the schools who are leaving Conference USA do.
Herein lies the real challenge for Britton Banowsky and Conference USA going forward. To take this new group of schools, including their lower profiles and somehow recapture the solid reputation Conference USA has enjoyed in the past. There is little doubt that schools like Marshall , Southern Miss, UTEP ,RICE and UAB, will need to play a greater role in the rebranding of Conference USA if the conference is going to remain relevant in College Sports.
Fortunately for the conference, MARSHALL seems poised to have a ground breaking year in football this season. The Thundering Herd will be lead by the Heisman worthy QB Rakeem Cato. Apart from Marshall however, Conference USA football looks to be void of any news making programs, or teams that have the potential to make noise on ESPN this Fall.
Conference USA also faces an uncertain future in College Basketball. This year the conference was a one bid league with little on the horizon to indicate this might change over the next few years. WKU's entry into Conference USA is a plus, but until UAB among others gets it mojo back, Conference USA will encounter the worst of all battles in sports, the battle of perception. Right now Conference USA is losing the perception war, something Banowsky will need to counter if he wants his league to go beyond the one team stigma.
It is easy to forget that Conference USA was once home to outstanding College programs like Louisville, TCU and Cincinnati to name a few. In fact the conference has an excellent history of sending its members on to bigger and better things. There are questions , however, if the new teams that have been brought into Conference USA have growth capacity to transcend the confines of the conference like past Conference USA schools have. It is likely to early in the process of the new Conference USA to know the answer to this question.
One also has to wonder if Conference USA made a mistake this time around in going after markets instead of winning programs. Not inviting schools from the Sun Belt like UL and Ark State and passing them by for newly formed programs like UNC-Charlotte appear to some to be short sighted and purely market driven. Will the Networks who will be providing Conference USA with its next tv contract be more interested in markets or winning programs? Markets seem to matter very little for most G5 schools, as most G5 schools are not good for tv ratings.
One of the greatest challenge for Conference USA going forward will be for the conference to prove that it can compete consistently on a regional and sometimes national level. The new schools in Conference USA will need to prove to recruits , fans and critics alike that the latest incarnation of the conference can stand the test of time just as it has in the past. Conference USA has consistently been one the best mid major conferences in College Sports. At this point in its history though, Conference USA is essentially starting over with only Southern Miss and a few other schools serving as witness to the better days of the conference.
On July 1st Conference USA begins a new sports life. Can, however, the latest group of schools match the past history of Conference USA? With strong competition coming from the maturing Sun Belt and MAC conferences as well as the G5 leaders Mountain West and AAC , the future for Conference USA is unclear. The next few years will be crucial to the conference as it tries to differentiate itself from the rest of the G5 competition. Commissioner Britton Banowsky's greatest challenge as the commissioner of Conference USA is about to begin. July 1st marks the start of that challenge for both Banowsky and the teams that will make up the new Conference USA. Stay tuned to see how it unfolds.
