As is the case every year, July 1 will mark the day when schools switch conferences. That's when UConn officially rejoins the Big East, which is obviously the biggest move in the conference realignment puzzle for the 2020-21 season. And the timing of it, while coincidental, couldn't be better. Because athletic departments all across the country are reconsidering their travel plans for the upcoming season as a means of saving money.
The Big East, in fact, will be playing a division-based schedule this fall, with teams only playing the schools within their division. Basically, they're separating the "old" Big East schools along the I-95 corridor into the East Division and the "new" Big East schools in the Midwest into their own division. The schools on the East Coast likely won't have to fly at all, while the ones in the Midwest will only have to fly to Creighton (which will still have to fly everywhere).
Meanwhile, had UConn stayed in the American, they'd have to fly for every conference game. But that's what happens when your conference is so spread out. The Atlantic 10 is also incredibly spread out and has announced that it will adopt a "regional" scheduling model this year. I'm not exactly sure what that means for Saint Louis, but the other schools in the conference likely won't have to get on a plane at all.
All of these travel adjustments are being made by necessity, obviously. And no one knows if schools will even be able to play these regionalized schedules. Hopefully these regionalized schedules are here to stay, though. Because, as this pandemic has exposed, "national" conferences might sound great in theory, but they create a massive problem when air travel isn't advised (or even possible). So, maybe the regional model is the way to go. Just like it was in the old days.
Ever since moving to D1, NJIT has had those massive travel headaches. Their first conference was the "Great West," which consisted of five schools that are nowhere near each other and the only thing they had in common was they were new D1 members that didn't have conferences. Once the other four did, NJIT went back to being an independent until the Atlantic Sun needed an eighth member. The Atlantic Sun was a little better fit, but NJIT was still the outlier. The remaining members are all in the Southeast, so they were getting on a plane for every road game.
Those days are finally over! NJIT is finally joining a conference that's a geographic fit. They're the newest members of America East, which also includes Albany, Stony Brook, Binghamton, Hartford and UMBC. They'll still have some long bus rides to New England, but that's a lot better than having their closest conference "rival" be 400 miles away.
Taking NJIT's place in the Atlantic Sun is Bellarmine, which is in Louisville. That's still a hike that will require a flight for the Florida schools, but it's only two and a half hours from Nashville and four hours from North Alabama, so it makes a lot more geographic sense. And Kentucky is at least actually in the Southeast, so no more trying to explain why NJIT is in a conference with a bunch of Florida schools.
Another league that would've been a fit for NJIT is the Northeast Conference, which will be losing a member (and going from 11 to the much more manageable 10). Robert Morris is leaving the NEC for the Horizon League, which looks surprising on the surface, but actually makes a lot of geographic sense.
Robert Morris is in Pittsburgh. Most of the NEC schools are in the New York/New Jersey area or New England. The Horizon schools are in the same footprint as the NFL's North Divisions. So, they're going from the westernmost school to the easternmost. And distance-wise, they're probably making out ahead.
With the exception of Green Bay and UIC, Robert Morris is within a six-hour drive of every other Horizon League school. It's only two hours to Cleveland, less than that to Youngstown, and three to Detroit. In the NEC, Robert Morris was traveling at least five every weekend unless they were playing travel partner Saint Francis (PA), which is outside Pittsburgh, or Mount St. Mary's (which will probably become the travel partner for Saint Francis).
I was having a conversation with a friend about this yesterday and I compared it to Buffalo and the MAC. While Buffalo and the MAC may not seem like a match, Buffalo is actually really close to those MAC schools in Michigan and Ohio. It just looks weird because people don't think of New York as "Midwest." It's the same thing here. Pittsburgh is three-and-a-half hours south of Buffalo. It's pretty much a straight shot. So Robert Morris being in an Ohio-based conference makes just as much sense as Buffalo being in one. (Fun fact, Buffalo was actually in the Horizon League, which was still called the Midwestern Collegiate Conference at the time, before joining the MAC.)
There's obviously a lot that goes into conference affiliation changes. For NJIT, being in a conference that made geographic sense was obviously paramount. For UConn, it was about their alumni and restoring those rivalries. For Robert Morris, the competition factor likely came into play. The Horizon League is a strong mid-major. The NEC is champion often ends up in the First Four. I'm not saying those were the only factors for each school, but they can't be ignored either.
Likewise, conference realignment requires significant planning from a number of parties. Which makes me wonder whether the financial realities and potential travel difficulties faced by some schools/conferences accelerated these timelines. After all, these changes take effect in less than a month.
Either way, I think we can all agree that schools adjusting their schedules or even switching conferences because of travel is better than the other option--cutting sports. We've already seen too much of that. I'll take another round of conference realignment any day. Especially when it actually makes sense.
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