Football: Getting It Wright: Conference on same page this year with bowl bid process

Joshua Parrott • jparrott@theadvertiser.com • July 22, 2009

In many ways, the Sun Belt Conference reached new heights last season in its eighth year of NCAA Division I-A football.

The league’s attendance figures continued to climb, reaching a new single-season high.

Sun Belt teams proved that they could play with the power conferences as Arkansas State (Texas A&M) and Middle Tennessee (Maryland) upset bigger-name programs.

The conference produced four teams – Troy, UL, Florida Atlantic and Arkansas State – that were bowl eligible, tying the league mark established in 2006.

Troy and FAU went on to play in bowl games, marking the third time that the Sun Belt sent multiple teams to the postseason. FAU later became the first team in league history to win bowls in back-to-back years.

All that progress, though, was paired with frustration once the bowl picture came together.

In July 2008, Sun Belt commissioner Wright Waters announced that the league had reached secondary bowl agreements with the Independence, Papajohns.com and St. Petersburg bowl games. The initial perception was that a 6-6 Sun Belt team would fill any open spots in those bowls if the SEC, Big East and Big 12 fell short of fulfilling their contractual tie-ins.

Ends up that was only the case for 7-5 Sun Belt teams.

That revelation translated into a major lesson learned for the nation’s youngest I-A football conference.

"The Sun Belt and I hope our teams have learned that they need to aspire to be winning teams," Waters said Tuesday during the Sun Belt Media Days video conference call. "If you have winning teams and those bowl opportunities are available, there would have been opportunity.

"If Arkansas State had (beaten Troy), the Papajohns.com Bowl was prepared to extend the invitation (to Troy)."

But Arkansas State lost to Troy. As the league champion, Troy earned the right to play in the New Orleans Bowl. Despite finishing third in the conference standings behind Troy and second-place UL, FAU surprisingly got a bid to play in the Motor City Bowl.

UL and Arkansas State ended up being two of only four bowl-eligible teams that failed to get a postseason invite. The most painful part for the two schools was watching the Independence Bowl in Shreveport take Mid-American Conference member Northern Illinois.

As more details leaked out about the agreements, it ends up that the document used was a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU). That’s defined as an agreement between parties that indicates an intended common line of action. It did not hold a legal commitment.

Last December, Waters pointed out that the MoU would protect any Sun Belt team with a winning record from bowl game exclusion. Troy felt such pain in 2007 after going 8-4 but getting snubbed for a bowl.

That MoU, though, was not necessary. The NCAA addressed that issue by guaranteeing all teams with winning records priority over bowl-eligible 6-6 teams when contracted conference openings went unfilled.

The MoU only guaranteed that those three bowls had to take a 7-5 Sun Belt team over all other available 7-5 teams, granted there were any open slots.

UL coach Rickey Bustle admitted his frustration over the bowl snub but has decided to focus on the fact that the Ragin’ Cajuns could have eliminated all doubt by winning a seventh game.

"When it gets into people voting or trying to help you get in, that’s why I’ve taken the approach that I did," Bustle said during Monday’s Sun Belt Media Days. "Win seven games and don’t put it in other people’s hands."

Waters addressed multiple other issues on Tuesday. He said the new web-format for the league’s annual media days was being considered even before the nation’s economic concerns. Media participation, Waters said, increased from 25-to-30 people in the past to 50 this year.

Projected savings under the new format are expected to be available in September. Earlier reports mentioned the savings to be around $30,000.

The Sun Belt, Waters added, is set to extend its deal with the New Orleans Bowl, which puts the league champion against an opponent from Conference USA. The league’s lone automatic bowl tie-in expires after this season, according to the Associated Press.

Waters said there’s a chance that the Sun Belt might send its champion to another bowl in the future, given the right situation. That’s where geography and attendance come into play.

In a written statement, New Orleans Bowl chairman Paul Valteau said "we have already presented a contract to the Sun Belt Conference to host their champion through 2013, as we have done since the inception of the bowl."

Troy suffered a 30-27 loss to Southern Miss in last year’s New Orleans Bowl before a Louisiana Superdome crowd of 30,197. That set a New Orleans Bowl attendance record.

"We’re going to have to have some flexibility," Waters said, "to make sure we’re providing the best team for not only this bowl, but other bowls."

Another topic of conversation was February’s agreement between the Sun Belt and ESPN, which extends the network’s relationship with the league through the 2011-12 academic year.

Under the new agreement the Sun Belt will get a minimum of two football games on either ESPN or ESPN2. ESPN Regional Television also will get the right to produce, distribute and syndicate up to five football games each year. ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPNU also will get additional opportunities to air games. That trio of networks will have a 12-day rolling window during the season to select additional games, after the third Saturday of the season.

The league’s television schedule, released on Monday, included two games on ESPN2, one on ESPNU and one on ESPN�Plus.

In May, the conference also announced a partnership with Cox Sports Television (CST) and Comcast Sports Southeast (CSS) to air league games on their channels with what will be known as the Sun Belt Network.

"You have to have a national package, but you don’t have to be on national TV every week," Waters said. "The meat and potatoes is the regional package. The next piece is to develop television at the local level and get exposure for schools from their own community."