As the Sunbelt stands now after the early May 2012 realignment they have 12 members, 10 of whom play football spread out across the southeast from east Texas to Atlanta and from Kentucky to Fort Lauderdale. my suggestion for the Sunbelt is that they should, while the realignment frenzy is still upon us, grab the SoCon's two premier programs: Appalachian St and Georgia Southern. Both of these moves would be for on-the-field quality as opposed to media market grabs but these programs have a lot to offer the league. Appalachian St leads FCS in average season home game attendance at over 28,000 and would have been second only to Louisiana Lafayette in the SBC last year and miles ahead of the next best attended school, Arkansas St. Georgia Southern was also in the top 10 in attendance in the FCS last year, outpacing Georgia St, whom the SBC has added due to their media presence in Atlanta. Both of these schools have excellent football pedigrees and each have multiple national titles at the FCS level and who can forget Appalachian St's victory over Michigan?
This move would secure the Sunbelt as a solid southeastern FBS conference and through victories by Sunbelt schools over C-USA schools, can gain respect. For football I would align the Sunbelt like this:
West
Texas St
Arkansas St
Louisiana Lafayette
Louisiana Monroe
Middle Tennessee
Western Kentucky
East
Troy
South Alabama
FAU
Georgia St
Georgia Southern
Appalachian St
Non-Football
UT-Arlington
Arkansas-Little Rock
I placed the Alabama schools in the east and shifted WKU and MTSU to the west because the Alabama schools are closer to geographic outlier FAU. For basketball I would go without divisions--each of the 14 members would play everyone once (13 games) and would play 5 schools close to them twice. The schools in Texas, Arkansas and Louisiana would all play twice for example. This way there is less travel for everyone.
I also think that the Sunbelt should encourage its two non-football members to add the sport and for them launch their programs at the same time to avoid having 13 football members.
One thing everyone misses about the two non football schools is that Arkansas-Little Rock is part of the U Arkansas system and as such are prohibited from fielding a football team so as not to compete with Fayetteville. They will never have football. UT Arlington is seriously looking into it.
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