There are a couple unfortunate facts that NDSU is going to have to deal with here, sooner rather than later:

1) Oakland is leaving for the Horizon.

The question is really, who else is going with them? If only Oakland leaves the Summit, it'll be ok for now. If one or especially if both IU-PU schools leave the Summit...it's sunk. They'd have to go after WAC schools like Chicago St and UMKC. Good luck...

2) NDSU is *NEVER* going to get into the MVC.

It's never, ever going to happen -- unless conference realignment of such epic proportions occurs and at that point you'd have to question whether the MVC would still be worth going into (likely not). NDSU is too public, too far away and even if they had the new BSA finished the bball program is not at that level. It's a dead corpse of a dream that needs to be disposed of in our minds.


That said, the Horizon is not impossible but the geography of that conference closes it off in my mind. They're too tight around the great lakes.



So...if the Summit does collapse, I think NDSU has to entertain an offer from the Big Sky for full membership. This would be my proposal back to the Big Sky if I was NDSU's president: bring in NDSU, SDSU, USD and U of Denver as full-members. That brings the membership to 16. Cut into two divisions of 8 each:

East:
NDSU - UND
SDSU - USD
Montana - MSU
No Colo - Denver

West:
Idaho - ISU
So Utah - Weber St
East Wash - PSU
Sac St - No Ariz


Omaha will have to partner up with UMKC in the WAC and Western Illinois will have to partner up with EIU in the OVC. Sucks for those two schools, but that's the only possibilities I see for them.



Another thing that would be fun to consider, but could probably never happen would be to split off an "FBS" football conference from the Big Sky that would include Idaho.

FBS league:
Idaho, Montana, MSU, NDSU, UND, SDSU, USD, UC Davis, Sac St

FCS league:
E Wash, Port St, Cal Poly, No Ariz, So Utah, Weber St, Idaho St, No Colo