Conference USA

Introduction
C-USA is currently at 8 members that are geographically diverse spanning the entire southeastern US and as far west as El Paso.  They are: Marshall, East Carolina, UAB, Southern Miss, Tulane, Rice, Tulsa, and UTEP. C-USA main difficulty in rebuilding will be determining which direction to grow and reconciling the very diverse interests of its member schools.  As mentioned in my previous post on the irrationality of the MWC/C-USA merger and the need for them to remain separate entities I hit upon the the importance of UTEP in that decision making process as they could very logically decide to move westward and join the MWC.  In many ways, losing UTEP could be a blessing in disguise, allowing the conference to focus on reestablishing itself as a southern conference.  I will explore both options.

UTEP left
If UTEP leaves, presumably North Texas and UTSA have joined the MWC as well and C-USA has no shot at those schools.  I am also working on the premise that the goal is to get back to 12 members and thus C-USA would now need to find five replacements rather than 4.  The list of expansion candidates is very long--every member of the Sunbelt would be up for grabs as would Louisiana Tech.  Some of these candidates are better than others and each has a different set of pro's and cons.  Some bring a presence in a large television market, others a successful product on the football field, and others a presence in a recruiting hot bed.  Some play in new stadiums; others play in glorified high school stadiums.  The following are my five favorites:

Louisiana Tech--the bulldogs are a WAC refugee that has long sought C-USA membership.  They don't bring a big tv market but they are a successful program that has solid attendance for a non-AQ even playing against opponents in the far flung WAC.  I would expect that already solid attendance to increase if they were playing more teams within their region.

Middle Tennessee--the blue raiders have had some good years in the SBC and have had solid attendance.  They are also just a short distance from Nashville and might attract a few viewers from that area.  They would also form a bridge between the members in the Deep South and Upper South members Marshall and ECU.

FAU and FIU--C-USA should highly consider bringing in both of the Miami area SBC programs to steal away that recruiting area for themselves and restore the presence in the Sunshine State lost when UCF upgraded to the Big East.  Both play in new, albeit small stadiums but Florida is a growing state and these programs will hopefully grow as well. It's hard to distinguish between the Owls and the Panthers so let's just take both.

South Alabama--yes, for the last spot I picked the youngest football program in the SBC but the Jaguars play in Mobile, Alabama which is a considerably larger metro area than the other options at hand.  The nascent program has received a ton of fan support despite playing DII, FCS, and NAIA schools in their early years.  This is a case of taking a work-in-progress over more established programs based on the potential USA has shown.

UTEP commits to C-USA
If UTEP sticks with C-USA this whole decision process becomes appreciably more complicated with the various factions of C-USA having their own preferred candidates.  Presumably to hold onto UTEP, UTSA or North Texas (or both) had to be admitted to placate the Miners.  This would leave only 2 or 3 slots left in a 12 team league.  Because of the lack of singular vision amongst the members the end product could very well be a 14 or 16 member C-USA with the expansion candidates coming from the pool I listed above.  It's simply impossible to try to guess what parameters the C-USA war room will value and which schools are calling the shots.  In the process of C-USA expansion whoever was left behind in the Sunbelt would find themselves in a shell of a conference.  Troy, Western Kentucky, LA-Monroe, LA-Lafayette, and Arkansas St would still be there and probably WAC member Texas St but it would once again make the SBC the gateway to FBS with schools like Georgia St, Georgia Southern, and Charlotte being possibilities.

Should the C-USA not give in to over expansion and cap off at 10 for the time being I believe North Texas and Florida International due to their presence in great tv markets.  They are by no means the best on field products but C-USA probably is more concerned about money.  The SBC in turn isn't reduced to barely getting by as they've only lost two members and can easily rebuild from the WAC refugees and FCS upgrades.