jimrtex
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RE: Southern Indiana releases D1 internal report
(01-30-2022 10:42 AM)chargeradio Wrote: (01-29-2022 05:28 PM)jimrtex Wrote: If I were the Summit I'd be wary of this happening. They are at 7 for baseball and football only because they St.Thomas showed up. To get to 6 without St.Thomas they need affiliates (UNC for baseball, Eastern Illinois for soccer) and Western Illinois for both sports.
If I were in Sioux Falls or Fargo, I'd be looking at inviting Eastern Illinois and SIUE to the Summit. This would get baseball to 9 and soccer to 8.
The MAC is going to think they are the core of a soccer league (they had 5 of 7 teams in the NCAAT in 2021), including 3 of 4 of the MAC schools. If they can't get affiliates, I'd think they would look at affiliating with the Horizon League. It would certainly cut down on travel.
It is quite possible one of the OVC or Summit dies if the right moves take place. If Western Illinois leaves the Summit, this makes things very hard for the Summit.
The Summit would really need UMKC to add baseball, as the Summit would be down to NDSU, SDSU, Omaha, Oral Roberts, St. Thomas, and affiliate Northern Colorado. I'm not sure Sacramento State is attainable as an affiliate.
They also technically need two men's soccer members - the conference needs to volunteer North Dakota and South Dakota since that would make more sense for them than baseball. If Eastern Illinois is off the table, there would at least be options for affiliates with Houston Baptist, Air Force, San Jose State, and UNLV.
Finishing off the OVC by taking Eastern Illinois and SIU Edwardsville would be a good form of life insurance for the Summit:
Denver, UND, NDSU, USD, SDSU, St. Thomas,
Omaha, WIU, EIU, SIUE, ORU, Kansas City
Aside from Denver, this lends itself to natural North/South divisions, which even if they exist only for scheduling, would reduce travel for the new members.
Western Illinois is a charter member of the Summit League. They stayed put through all the years when Central Connecticut, Troy, Centenary, Southern Utah were members. Bunches of teams have moved up to DI and then left when they came across a more stable home.
The Dakota schools have finally given some stability to the conference. They are unlikely to leave. It's a long way to Montana, let alone Arizona and California. The only real risk might be if the MVC split with Northern Iowa, Missouri State, and Illinois State joining a new football sponsoring league, and the other MVC schools formed a basketball-oriented league.
So is Western Illinois going to join a league that has lost its Top 2 football and Top 2 basketball programs, and might be replacing them with Chicago State, which has been in East Coast Conference, the Mid-Continent Conference, and the WAC - which kicked them out.
If the remaining OVC schools are not looking for new homes their President and AD's are not doing their job. I imagine conference meetings go like this:
All: "All for one and one for all!"
President gets urgent text message:
"A book has fell over in the library"
President: "Sorry, I've got to get back to campus, there has been some sort of problem in the library.
After leaving meeting, he contacts office: "Is it the Southland or ASUN, Big South or WAC?"
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