The Sun Belt Conference will be a 12-team league in most sports starting next season, an endpoint sought by Commissioner Karl Benson for more than two years.
Benson officially welcomed Coastal Carolina to the league during a news conference Tuesday afternoon at Conway, S.C. The Chanticleers, who currently compete in the Big South Conference, will join the Sun Belt in every sport except football on July 1, 2016. The football program, ranked No. 5 in a preseason NCAA Football Championship Subdivision poll, will join July 1, 2017, after an expected stadium expansion.
Benson made clear that Tuesday's announcement was not an addition to the league, but the final piece in trying to put the league back together after five schools left for Conference USA over two-year period.
"This was not an expansion," Benson said. "This was a replacement of Western Kentucky that took 2 1/2 years."
Coastal Carolina provides the Sun Belt a travel partner for Appalachian State, a chief concern of Benson's, and creates two six-team divisions split between the East and the West.
The six westernmost schools are Arkansas State, UALR, Louisiana-Lafayette, Louisiana-Monroe, Texas State and Texas-Arlington. The six easternmost schools are Coastal Carolina, Appalachian State, Georgia Southern, Georgia State, South Alabama and Troy.
"This decision was not driven by any particular sport, it was not driven by any type of revenue projections, it wasn't driven by television, media markets," Benson said. "This was done really with the one intention to take care of our student-athletes primarily from our 11 core sports."
Coastal Carolina was chosen over New Mexico State, which is a current football-only member of the Sun Belt, and Eastern Kentucky, which is in the Ohio Valley Conference. Sun Belt officials visited all three campuses before presidents and chancellors met Sunday in Dallas and voted to invite Coastal Carolina.
Benson said the structure of future basketball schedules have not been determined, but that the 20-game, home-and-home schedule will not be implemented in 2016-2017. He said it will be be an 18- or 16-game schedule and will be decided within the next 30 days.
UALR Athletic Director Chasse Conque had been on his job for only a few weeks when his basketball teams had to charter planes to play at Appalachian State last season, then played at home two days later. If UALR has to charter flights to go east in the future, at least it would get two games out of it.
Conque said he also favors an 18-game basketball schedule, and the all-around quality of Coastal Carolina.
The Chanticleers had a $23.4 million athletic budget in 2014, according to research by USA Today, and reached the postseason in football, men's basketball, baseball and volleyball last season.
"I think all three [schools] were attractive, but I'm impressed with Coastal," Conque said.
Benson said Coastal Carolina's addition does not change the Sun Belt's timing for a decision on a football championship game. Further discussion will occur after the season, when Benson expects the NCAA to lift its restriction of a conference needing 12 teams to host a championship game and the Sun Belt's decision on the future of football-only members Idaho and New Mexico State.
Idaho and New Mexico joined the league last season with four-year agreements subject to a renewal following the second year, which is this year, Benson said.
"I think it's premature now to even speculate as to what that decision is," Benson said. "Once the decision is made then we'll either be a 12-team league in 2017, or perhaps an 11-team league or a 10-team league are the options. I hope that by the middle of January we will know the future football structure will be."
Sports on 09/02/2015