News broke yesterday that the demise of the Western Athletic Conference is all but official. Seattle University has already left for the West Coast Conference,  Grand Canyon for the Mountain West, California Baptist and Utah Valley to the Big West, and now Southern Utah and Utah Tech to the Big Sky. That left Abilene Christian, Tarleton State, and Texas-Arlington.

What does that have to do with EKU? You may remember the Colonels left their longtime home in the Ohio Valley for the Atlantic Sun a few years ago. There was a convoluted plan within that conference that never really worked out. It especially hurt EKU in football, with the A-Sun and WAC forced to combine to make a football only league, the United Athletic Conference.

As of yesterday, the United Athletic Conference will now be a full athletic league, not just football. It will include those three WAC teams (Abilene, Tarleton, Arlington) as well as Austin Peay, Central Arkansas, North Alabama, West Georgia, and Eastern Kentucky, all previously members of the Atlantic Sun. There is still some question about a ninth member since Texas-Arlington doesn't play football and a new conference must have 8 football teams.

Good move or bad move for EKU?

https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2025/jun/26/uca-now-in-wacasunuac-merge/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Athletic_Conference

This also has an affect on Bellarmine University. The Knights are also members of the Atlantic Sun which is now down to seven schools with the defection of the football teams. Current members along with Bellarmine are Florida Gulf Coast, Jacksonville, Lipscomb, North Florida, Queens (NC), and Stetson. They would need another team to get to eight, although I personally think Bellarmine would fit better in the Horizon with schools such as Northern Kentucky, Wright State, IUPUI, etc.

My assumption is its the only move.  The mistake was leaving the OVC.

4 minutes ago, cincyswords said:

My assumption is its the only move.  The mistake was leaving the OVC.

Agreed. It seemed like EKU was dying to get to the Division I-A and dead set on the idea that the OVC was keeping them from getting there. They traded six of one for half a dozen of another and have nothing to show for it except broken rivalries with Murray and Morehead.

If the rumors of Texas State going to the new Pac-12 are true, then a spot will open in the Sun Belt. I could see the dominos of Western Kentucky to the Sun Belt and EKU to the Hilltoppers' place in Conference USA. I don't believe the Colonels will ever been in the same league at Western so long as Western has a vote.

It’s pathetic that EKU isn’t in a better conference, going downhill rapidly in Richmond and all self imposed!

Crazy thing is this unprecedented conference realignment has been underway behind the scenes for about 6 months....It was leaked to Ross Dellenger at Yahoo Sports and the UAC (ASUN + WAC) was forced to make a press release earlier than planned.

 

The move may make the least sense for EKU, who will probably be in the Sun Belt, SOCON, or Big South as those are much better fits. 

1 hour ago, InItToWinIt said:

The move may make the least sense for EKU, who will probably be in the Sun Belt, SOCON, or Big South as those are much better fits. 

I don't think the UAC is a terrible conference for EKU, although the trips to Texas will be longer. Many of the schools in the Atlantic Sun had little to no similarities to Eastern. Mix in that over half didn't play football and it was just a bad fit.

As for future conferences:

• Sun Belt - never say never, but they just added Louisiana Tech to replace Texas State and now sit at 12 teams. I doubt they make another move.
• Southern - makes sense geographically, but EKU is dying to move to I-A in football. The SoCon is I-AA and I've heard next to nothing about any of their schools wanting to move up.
• Big South - they only have two football playing members (Charleston Southern and Gardner-Webb). There's actually been a little chatter about those two potentially coming to the UAC as well. The Big South is currently in a combined football conference with the OVC. If Eastern went to the Big South, they might as well just go back to the Ohio Valley.

10 minutes ago, gchs_uk9 said:

I don't think the UAC is a terrible conference for EKU, although the trips to Texas will be longer. Many of the schools in the Atlantic Sun had little to no similarities to Eastern. Mix in that over half didn't play football and it was just a bad fit.

As for future conferences:

• Sun Belt - never say never, but they just added Louisiana Tech to replace Texas State and now sit at 12 teams. I doubt they make another move.
• Southern - makes sense geographically, but EKU is dying to move to I-A in football. The SoCon is I-AA and I've heard next to nothing about any of their schools wanting to move up.
• Big South - they only have two football playing members (Charleston Southern and Gardner-Webb). There's actually been a little chatter about those two potentially coming to the UAC as well. The Big South is currently in a combined football conference with the OVC. If Eastern went to the Big South, they might as well just go back to the Ohio Valley.

Would the OVC take them back?

44 minutes ago, gchs_uk9 said:

I don't think the UAC is a terrible conference for EKU, although the trips to Texas will be longer. Many of the schools in the Atlantic Sun had little to no similarities to Eastern. Mix in that over half didn't play football and it was just a bad fit.

As for future conferences:

• Sun Belt - never say never, but they just added Louisiana Tech to replace Texas State and now sit at 12 teams. I doubt they make another move.
• Southern - makes sense geographically, but EKU is dying to move to I-A in football. The SoCon is I-AA and I've heard next to nothing about any of their schools wanting to move up.
• Big South - they only have two football playing members (Charleston Southern and Gardner-Webb). There's actually been a little chatter about those two potentially coming to the UAC as well. The Big South is currently in a combined football conference with the OVC. If Eastern went to the Big South, they might as well just go back to the Ohio Valley.

Its terrible because no recruit anywhere has ever heard of the United Athletic Conference. Will create challenges with scheduling as well, at least in MBB. Plus, they are the travel outlier in this league. For Low Majors those longer travel costs will add up quickly.

On 7/14/2025 at 1:20 PM, InItToWinIt said:

Its terrible because no recruit anywhere has ever heard of the United Athletic Conference. Will create challenges with scheduling as well, at least in MBB. Plus, they are the travel outlier in this league. For Low Majors those longer travel costs will add up quickly.

Yeah, something is going to have to give on this sooner or later.  I can see more realignment in the future when schools on the lower tier of Division 1 or 1-AA just decide to redo conferences based on geography and to limit travel.  This was a big reason WKU wasn't selected to go back to the Sun Belt (although another was the fact they couldn't pay the CUSA exit fees + entry fees into the Sun Belt).

We all know football drives a lot of the existing realignment to the point that it almost needs to become its own animal.  Due to that, you have things like Stanford and Cal's other sports like volleyball, basketball, etc. having to travel all the way to the Eastern seaboard to play ACC conference games.  It's ridiculous.

EKU needs to rejoin the OVC, the idea of them moving beyond that league of teams is just dreaming, they just will never be good enough to reach out and further.

If I remember correctly when Coastal Carolina was admitted to the Sun Belt it came down to them or EKU. I believe CCU's current president had ties to Eastern, possibly as president. CCU has sold out the first two home football games, baseball is big time, but as I tell my wife when we go to basketball games I was used to coaching HS boys and girls games with crowds to match them. Sad thing is Sun Belt basketball is pretty good.

On 8/25/2025 at 8:56 AM, nikeman49 said:

EKU needs to rejoin the OVC, the idea of them moving beyond that league of teams is just dreaming, they just will never be good enough to reach out and further.

I think they either need to go back to the OVC-Big South or try to join the SoCon.  I think that would be their best move and there is some resemblance of stability with those conferences unlike what they are in now.