COLLEGE FOOTBALL Conference USA focusing on divisions, title game

The athletic directors are studying the Mid-American Conference as a model.
THE ORLANDO SENTINEL
DESTIN, Fla. --Conference USA's new set of athletic movers and shakers showed up Monday at the shores of the Gulf of Mexico for the league's spring meetings, and uncovered a smorgasbord of decisions to be made.
Two of them hold more interest than the rest combined: When will the new 12-team conference officially set up its divisions for football, and when will it start putting together its football championship game?
The first answer could come this week, though football coaches and athletic directors could wait for approval from school presidents before making an official announcement.
The second answer will take a bit more time.
"The prevailing theory is to have one unless there's a compelling reason not to," C-USA Commissioner Britton Banowsky said of a championship game. "There are pros and cons."
Best reasons
Exposure, money and the ability to settle a 12-team title race on the field are the best reasons to have one. Hurting the number of bowl teams -- or possibly knocking a no-loss or one-loss team out of the Bowl Championship Series -- are the chief reasons not to.
"You might see us make a decision on East and West [football divisions]," Houston athletic director Dave Maggard said.
"A championship game, we'll have to talk to our TV partner to see what makes sense."
In other words, the league is so new -- barely a month old, and effective starting in 2005 -- that it hasn't gotten to the nitty-gritty of a title game value in the market. And it certainly hasn't taken any city's temperature on being a host site.
Privately, C-USA's athletic directors already are thinking about the Mid-American Conference model as a title game possibility -- alternating title game sites by putting it on the campus of a division winner.
Ironically, divisional lineups and a football title game both are issues league leaders will need presidents to sign off on.
Presidents are not attending the spring meetings. They have their own gathering next month.