Break up of the WVIAC

This is pretty shocking ... big changes in the W.Va, Va. and Pa., small college football landscape.

http://www.wvmetronews.com/news.cfm?func=displayfullstory&storyid=53329

 

That's really going to leave the Bluefields, Ohio Valleys and UPJs out on a limb, I'm thinking. What do they do now?

 

Something similar happened to the Gulf South Conference. They accepted all these Arkansas schools (I think seven of them at one point), then other eastern schools split off, then the Arkansas schools split off en masse to form their own league last year, leaving an empty shell of a GSC.

 

I didn't know the WVIAC basketball tournament was the oldest continuously-running college basketball tournament in the US.

From the article: The withdrawal will bring to an end the annual WVIAC Basketball Championship, which is the nation’s oldest continuous post-season tournament. The event began in 1936, which predates the NCAA Tournament (1939) and the NIT (1938).

 

As a side note, Will Prewitt was the No. 2 man in the WVIAC and left to become comish of the newly formed league out there.

 

Either remain with what's left and form their own conference? WVU Tech, a former WVIAC school that is struggling to remain open, and Mountain State University, an NAIA basketball power, could join or form a new league.

It's a football vs. non-football split.
Which surprises me.. I didn't think football at that level was anywhere near the revenue maker at the high school and higher college levels.
I thought most of their money came from the buy-a-win games against Jackson State and EKU.

Most the WVIAC schools suck at football. Once upon a time Glenville was good. Shepherd is decent year in an year out. By and large WVC schools can't hold a candle to upper level PSAC teams.

 

Miss that guy a lot.. Super nice guy. Sucked at golf.

Also interesting that no one had a heads up about this until it broke this morning.

 

Join the Big East?

 

Merge with the entrails of the WAC.

 

Was the WVIAC a full-scholarship DII conference? I seem to recall that those schools did not offer the maximum number of schollys allowed at the DII level (I think it's 36). My guess is the new league will offer the max.

 

Born in Kentucky. Educated in Mississippi. Worked in the mountains of Western North Carolina and East Tennessee before moving off West Virginia and on to Arkansas. A noted lover of Coke and Little Debbie.

 

Yes, Shepherd's been spanking my old school pretty good in the annual opener. And West Liberty has had some prolific offenses in recent years. The PSAC depth isn't there, but their best is not too bad.