The AAC is close to massive 6-school expansion to reshape conference

Coach Andy Mac · October 19, 2021

The American Athletic Conference is on the cusp of expanding.

The league will be examining expansion and is expecting applications from six schools this week: Florida Atlantic, Charlotte, North Texas, UTSA, Rice and UAB, sources told Yahoo Sports.

The schools applying to the conference is a critical step in the formal process for new members, and the acceptance of the six schools is typically considered a formality in these situations. The process is expected to play out through the course of this week with applications sent as soon as Tuesday, sources told Yahoo Sports.

These additions would boost the AAC to a 14-team conference in football and basketball. (Navy is a football-only member and Wichita State is a full member that plays basketball but lacks a football program.) It would radically reshape Conference USA, which is poised to lose six members in key markets.

The additions come in the wake of the AAC losing three key schools to the Big 12 this fall – Cincinnati, UCF and Houston. UConn also departed following the 2019 season.

One of the guiding philosophies of the AAC’s expansion was to grow through fertile recruiting areas. The AAC expansion committee included a prominent crew of athletic directors from the conference – USF’s Mike Kelly, Memphis’ Laird Veatch, SMU’s Rick Hart and Navy’s Chet Gladchuk.

While the size of television markets is no longer as critical of a guiding principle in conference decisions, this move for the AAC allows the league’s ESPN television contract to grow promising programs through exposure. And it doesn’t hurt that they are all situated in major metropolitan areas that can rally around success. (UTSA, which is 7-0, just got ranked for the first time this week, for example.)

It’s the similar formula that helped Cincinnati emerge into a College Football Playoff contender this season, and both Houston and UCF to reach New Year’s Six bowl games in the past decade.

read more: https://sports.yahoo.com/sources-the-aac-close-to-massive-6-school-expansion-to-reshape-conference-014015069.html