Valpo changing conferences

[DrBear]

Valparaiso is leaving the Mid-Continent to go to the Horizon League, making the Horizon a 10-team league.

This reunites Valpo with some of its old Mid-Con mates, including UW-Green Bay, Cleveland State and Illinois-Chicago. And considering Valpo's success in the Mid-Con, it's a deserved step up.

[Seadragon76]

Man, is the Mid-Con getting slammed here.

Chicago State leaves in midst of an NCAA investigation and now Valpo heads off to the Horizon League.

Now it's time for the Mid-Con to seriously think of adding IPFW, North Dakota State and/or South Dakota State.

[Moser316]

That sound you hear is the rats leaving the sinking ship that is the Mid-Continent Conference. This move makes infinite sense for both the Horizon League (which now has an even number of teams once again) and Valpo (much-deserved move up, and it beats the hell out of Northern Kentucky as a 10th member). Works well for the travel partnerships, too:

UWM-UWGB

UIC-Loyola

Butler-Valpo

Detroit-Cleveland State

Wright State-Youngstown State

[Herk]

Great move for the Horizon League making it an even more credable basketball league. I have always thought that some of the better midwestern basketball schools should consolidate into one league. As for the MCC they should add the Mastodons of IUPU-Ft Wayne. You could build a IUPU-indy vs. IUPU-Ft Wayne rivalry that way.

[Moser316]

Side note: we were actually discussing this move a few years ago on a UWM message board, and Valpo to the HL has been rumored for quite some time. I think this move is just the beginning, and the MidCon is not long for this world. Here's how I see it shaking out (quoted from my original post):

HORIZON LEAGUE

Eastern Division

Butler

Cleveland State

Detroit

IUPUI

Oakland

Wright State

Western Divison

Illinois-Chicago

IPFW

Loyola

Valparaiso

Wisconsin-Green Bay

Wisconsin-Milwaukee

Of the four new teams, Valparaiso would clearly help out the most right away in terms of competitiveness and arena size. IUPUI would be close to Horizon League-level in terms of competition, but their home gym (2,500 capacity) would currently be too small for the conference. IPFW and Oakland probably wouldn't contribute much right away (although Oakland is fairly decent), but they would round out travel partnerships (UWM-UWGB, UIC-Loyola, Valpo-IPFW, Butler-IUPUI, Detroit-Oakland, CSU-WSU). IPFW may provide more benefit long-term if they grow into D-1 in the way UWM has, and the preliminary pieces are there (home games at the 9,000-seat War Memorial Coliseum, good-sized Midwestern market in a basketball-crazed state). In addition, the conference would be getting rid of Youngstown State, which would join the MVC because of the MVC-Gateway Football partnership.

GREAT WEST

Denver

Missouri-Kansas City

North Dakota State

Oral Roberts

South Dakota State

Southern Utah

Texas-Pan American

Utah Valley State

This conference was recently created for football, and will probably end up becoming an all-sport conference because of the inability of three all-sport teams to find an all-sport conference. The three teams mentioned earlier (NDSU, SDSU, and SUU) would be all-sport members, the other five teams (Denver, ORU, UMKC, UTPA, and UVSC) would be non-football members. Denver would get a chance to move into a conference that is more logical for them from a geographic and competitive standpoint (although they did hold their own in the Sun Belt last year). Although Utah Valley State is a D-1 provisional school that became the first college to move up to this level from the NJCAA, they have a brand new 8,500-seat on-campus arena and has apparently played well against D-1 competition. The travel partnerships for this conference would be SUU-UVSC, Denver-ORU, NDSU-SDSU, and UTPA-UMKC.

MISSOURI VALLEY

Eastern Division

Bradley

Evansville

Illinois State

Indiana State

Southern Illinois

Youngstown State

Western Division

Creighton

Drake

Missouri State

Northern Iowa

Western Illinois

Wichita State

This one's pretty much a no-brainer, with Gateway Football Conference members Western Illinois and Youngstown State joining the Valley-Gateway alliance in all sports. Travel partnerships would be Bradley-ILST, Creighton-WSU, Drake-UNI, Evansville-SIU, INST-YSU, and MSU-WIU.

Centenary would probably join with the Atlantic Sun Conference, and Chicago State would probably become an independent...

Note: When I originally wrote this, I had Northern Colorado in place of UTPA in the Great West, but since UNC joined the Big Sky recently, that point is rendered moot.