A Sun Belt Record Four Teams Selected For Bowls
The Sun Belt conference made history on Sunday as four teams were selected to represent the conference in bowl games.
Sun Belt champion Arkansas State will return to Mobile to play #25 ranked Kent State in the GoDaddy.com Bowl. The University of Louisiana-Lafayette was selected by the R&L Carriers New Orleans Bowl to play East Carolina. Louisiana-Monroe was selected to play in the Advocare V100 Independence Bowl against Ohio University. Western Kentucky was selected to play Central Michigan in the Little Ceasers Pizza Bowl.
Overall, five Sun Belt schools were bowl eligible. Middle Tennessee State, who played Arkansas State on Saturday in a defacto championship game in Jonesboro, AK., was the only bowl eligible Sun Belt team to not receive a bowl berth.
MTSU finshed the season with an 8-4 record overall, which tied with ULL and ULM with second-best in the conference. Arkansas State finished with a 9-3 record and each of the second place schools finished with a 6-2 conference record. Western Kentucky finished with a 7-5 record and 4-4 in the Sun Belt and lost to Middle Tennessee during the regular season.
However the Pizza Bowl was more interested in Western Kentucky since it will be the schools first-ever bowl game instead of Middle Tennessee. Earlier this week, Middle Tennessee announced it was leaving the Sun Belt Conference for Conference USA.
Arkansas State’s head coach Gus Malzahn is being mentioned for several coaching vacancies including Arkansas and Auburn. Senior quarterback Ryan Aplin will lead the Red Wolf offense into Ladd-Peebles stadium for the second season in a row. The GoDaddy.com bowl will kickoff on Sunday, January 6 at 8pm and is the only bowl game on that day, the day before the BCS national championship game.
ULL finished the season strong with three consecutive victories once it’s offense solidified. The Ragin’ Cajuns’ are coached by second-year head coach Mark Hudspeth who has also been mentioned for a few coaching positions. The New Orleans Bowl will kick off in the Mercedes-Benz Superdome at 11am on December 22.
ULM is led by quarterback Kolton Browning who helped them upset Arkansas in overtime in the season-opening game in Arkansas. Head coach Todd Berry lead the team to Auburn and a near-win in overtime. They also played tough at Baylor but lost by five points. The Independence Bowl will kick off in Shreveport, LA at 1pm on December 28.
Western Kentucky is coached by third-year head coach Willie Taggart. His first season the Hilltoppers finished 2-10 but now has back-to-back bowl eligible seasons of 7-5, but will go to only their first bowl game this year. WKU is led by running back Antoine Andrews who is the conference’s leading rusher averaging 134.1 yards per game. The Hilltoppers started the season with a pair of wins over Austin Peay and Kentucky with a loss at Alabama between them. They ended a three game losing streak with a win over North Texas in the season finale. The Little Caesars Pizza Bowl will kick off at Ford Field in Detroit, MI at 6:30pm on December 26.
Sun Belt Commissioner Karl Benson Issues Statement
“While I am disappointed that Middle Tennessee State University and Florida Atlantic University have elected to depart the Sun Belt Conference, the SBC is still very well positioned for the future and I remain very optimistic that the momentum that has been created in the past six months will continue to grow. The continuing 10 members of the SBC are committed to excellence and I am confident that the SBC will take advantage of these latest changes in the landscape. As I have stated many times in the past six months, the SBC will be a major player in the future, especially within its geographic footprint.
As for future members, there are several outstanding universities that have indicated interest in joining the SBC. While we have conducted research on these universities in the past six months, we will now focus on identifying the ones that will be the best “fit” for the conference and the ones that will contribute immediately in achieving our goal of being the best of the FBS conferences that currently do not receive automatic qualification into the BCS.
The future is still very BRIGHT for the SBC and I look forward to working with the leadership of the SBC in the coming days, weeks and months to continue the growth and development of this outstanding athletic conference.”
MTSU to Conference USA
Multiple outlets are posting that Middle Tennessee has accepted an offer to join Conference USA. This comes on the heels of the announcement that Tulane and East Carolina were joining the Big East. However East Carolina is only joining the conference in football.
They have also mentioned FAU as a possible target to fill the empty 14th slot left when Maryland and Rutgers announced that they were leaving the Big East recently.
The Sun Belt faced conference realignment last season when FIU and North Texas accepted offers to join Conference USA. The Sun Belt then extended offers that were accepted by Georgia State and Texas State to fully join the conference in all sports including football. They also added Texas-Arlington, however they do not sponsor football and was an addition to replace Denver.
Georgia Southern recently voted to possibly join the FBS ranks and have expressed interest in joining the Sun Belt before. Other possible targets to join the Sun Belt that have been tossed around is Appalachain State and Lamar University.
Watch for more conference realignment dominoes to fall if MTSU or FAU decides to check out the pastures on the other side of the fence.
Karl Benson Talks Answers Some Questions For AL.com
Press-Register writer Tommy Hicks asked Sun Belt Conference commissioner Karl Benson five questions while he was in Mobile attending the school’s Athletic Hall of Fame induction ceremony on Saturday.
He was also in town to present the conference championship trophy to the winner of the Women’s soccer Championship North Texas who defeated FIU in the championship match. South Alabama hosted this season’s championship tournament at The Cage.
You can view the questions and answers here.
South Alabama Soccer Falls In First Round Of SBC Championship
The Lady Jags fell to Middle Tennessee State on Wednesday night at The Cage in the first round of the Sun Belt Championship tournament. But they did not go down without a fight.
Being down 2-0, junior forward Linsey Snavely cut the lead in half with 13 minutes left in the match but could not find another goal to even the match before time ran out.
MTSU opened the match with seven unanswered shots on goal and three corner kicks before they were able to put one in the net. The first goal was a 40 yard shot that the USA Goalkeeper could not get her hands on.
In the 63rd minute, they doubled their lead.
“Going down two goals made it tough for us,” said USA head coach Mike Varga. “The first goal was a great shot, You have to take your hat off for that finish. We turned the ball over and gave them an open chance on the second goal, but we kept fighting.”
“I’m proud of the girls for continuing to fight back and getting that goal back, but it’s disappointing to end the season like this.”
The Jags fell to MTSU by the same score in Tennessee on October 14. Going into the match the Blue Raiders were ranked third in the nation in goals per game (3.12).
After a day off the tournament will continue on Friday with #1 seed North Texas taking on #4 seed Western Kentucky at 4pm. Then at 7pm #2 seeded MTSU faces #3 seeded FIU. The winners of those two games will face each other on Sunday for the Sun Belt Championship.
Sun Belt Hopes For Six Bowl Eligible Teams
The Sun Belt hopes to have six bowl-eligible teams this season. So far they have two in Louisiana-Monroe (6-2, 4-0 SBC) and Western Kentucky (6-2, 3-1 SBC) so far that are bowl eligible over this past weekend. Neither team has been to an FBS bowl game.
Last season the Sun Belt had a conference record four schools bowl eligible and they hope to improve on that number.
Arkansas State is 5-3 and one win away from being bowl-eligible. They will be favored to win over North Texas this week. They then have a home game on Thursday night against the top team in the conference in Louisiana-Monroe, then a trip to Troy and the regular season finale against MTSU at home.
Middle Tennessee is also 5-3 after recovering from an opening season loss to McNeese State. Their other losses were against the top Sun Belt team ULM and Mississippi State. They have a big game against Western Kentucky this Thursday night before they come to Mobile to play the Jags, followed by Troy at home and a trip to Arkansas State for the season finale.
Louisiana-Lafayette are 4-3 and have lost two in a row. They have been bitten by the injury bug lately. They have a trip to ranked Florida this week before returning home to face WKU, then South Alabama at home before traveling to FAU to end the season.
Troy is 4-4 and are coming off of a loss against FAU in Florida. They may have played themselves out of a bowl game with that loss but can still get bowl eligible. They travel to Tennessee this weekend then return home to play Navy and Arkansas State before closing the season at Middle Tennessee. None of those are gimmie’s so if they can finish 2-2 they can be bowl eligible.
North Texas is 3-5 but still have to play some of the top teams in the Sun Belt. But their win over Wagner cannot be used towards bowl eligibility which means they have to win out or hope that they can squeeze in because a lack of bowl eligible teams to fill the bowl slots. They have to play at Navy, at WKU then host South Alabama.
FAU is 2-6 and would have to win out for eligibility and FIU has been eliminated from eligibilty.
South Alabama would need to at least four wins and hope that there are not enough teams to fill bowl obligations to have a shot at going to a bowl.
Jags Ranked Ahead Of Auburn In Latest USA Today Article
Head Coach Joey Jones speaks to his team after the conclusion of the Jaguars first practice of preseason camp.
USA Today’s Paul Myerberg just published the article titled “NCAA football re-rank: Our list from 1-124” on the USA Today website with some interesting rankings. It was basically a given that the University of Alabama would top the list with other schools lining up behind them. Their top five in order is: Alabama, Oregon, Kansas State, Notre Dame and Georgia.
But if you look towards the bottom of the list, you would probably expect see teams who are making their transition to FBS. But there are a few surprises down there.
South Alabama is ranked 110th in the list of all 124 FBS teams. They are ahead of Auburn University (111th) and in order from there Florida International, Colorado State, Akron, Tulane, Colorado, Memphis, Florida Atlantic, UAB, New Mexico State, Hawaii, Idaho, Southern Mississippi and UMass at 124. The Jags first opponent this season, Texas-San Antonio, is ranked 106.
Other Sun Belt schools are ranked: Louisiana-Monroe (43), Western Kentucky (52), Arkansas State (65), Middle Tennessee State (75), Louisiana-Lafayette (76), Troy (89), North Texas (95).
The Jags remaining games are against #112 FIU this weekend in Mobile, at #95 North Texas, vs #75 MTSU in Mobile, at #76 Louisiana-Lafayette before ending the season on the road against #121 Hawaii.
You can see the whole rundown on the USA Today website here.
Ronnie Arrow Speaks In Preseason Media Day Press Conference
South Alabama Men’s Basketball coach Ronnie Arrow spoke at the Sun Belt Conference media day on Wednesday. They also announced the all-conference teams and preseason polls earlier in the morning but they also listed the television schedule for the upcoming season.
The South Alabama – FAU game on February 9 was selected to be shown on the Sun Belt Network and the tip-off was changed to 7:30pm for the broadcast. Also the season opening game against Florida State can be seen on ESPN3.com at 6pm CST.
Below are highlights of the teleconference.
Coach Ronnie Arrow’s opening statement. “We have seven guys back from last year’s team, with Aug, Freddie, Javier Carter and Mychal Ammons, guys that were able to give us a lot of good minutes last year. Xavier Roberson broke a bone in his foot last year but is back full-strength. We’re looking forward to it. We think we have the players in place to be able to make a run at the championship, as long as everybody stays healthy. I think the conference is going to be up. Last year there were four to six teams that had seven or eight new players and now those teams have all those guys back this year with experience.”
Arrow spoke about the race for the Sun Belt title. “When you have Tony Mitchell back… I was telling everybody he could in the pros that I know that he was ready and he needs to go. He chose to come back and he brings instant notoriety to the league with a player of that status. I think Augustine Rubit is right there with him. I think Aug has proven he’s not only one of the top players in the conference, but also in the country. As far as teams being able to come on, we believe that we’re one of those teams. I think it’s going to be very competitive. Middle Tennessee has 10 of their 12 back, North Texas has a lot of their guys back and Arkansas State has a lot of their guys back. I think it’ll be a competitive race and there will be teams in this conference knocking off big-name schools in preseason.”
Arrow then spoke about how the preseason is going for the Jaguars so far. “We had an intrasquad game last game and we had some good things happen in certain areas. We’re playing Mychal Ammons inside and outside. He averaged 10 points and five rebounds as a freshman. If Tony Mitchell wouldn’t have been a freshman last year, Mychal would have been looked at as one of the top two or three freshmen in the league. He’s playing very well. We have a new guy, Viktor Juricek from Slovakia, who has come in and is learning. He’s getting Americanized quickly. He’s used to the European style where he hangs around the 3-point line, he can shoot the ‘3’, but we’re getting him Americanized so that he can go inside and outside. He’ll be a young man to watch this year. Javier Carter was the eighth-best shot blocker in the country last year before he got hurt and he ended up being the 16th-best shot blocker. Antoine Allen and Dre Conner are two guards that we brought in to keep people off of Aug and not be able to double down on him.”
Then Arrow spoke about getting ready for the season. “One of the things that helped us was our trip to Canada. We got to have eight practices and play three games over there. So we got to play against good competition to get us ready. With all the guys back and the new guys, it gave them a chance to know each other on and off the court. Our first regular season game is at Florida State, so we better be ready. So all of that and the strong non-conference schedule will help us.”
South Alabama has an exhibition game agaisnt Spring Hill College on Monday, November 5. They will begin the season against Florida State on Friday, November 9 in Tallahassee, Florida with a 6pm tip-off. The game can be seen on ESPN3.
Three Jaguar Men’s Basketball Players Name To All-SBC Team
The South Alabama Men’s Basketball team had two players voted to the preseason All-Sun Belt Conference team on Wednesday. They also were picked to finish second in the Eastern Division.
Junior Augustine Rubit and seniors Javier Carter and Freddie Goldstein were chosen for the All-Sun Belt team. The Jags are tied for second most with Arkansas State behind Middle Tennesee State who had four.
Rubit returns as the top scorer in the Sun Belt Conference with an average of 15.2 points per game, 9.2 rebounds per game and 12 double-doubles last season to be the first Jaguar player named to the First Team All-Sun Belt Conference Team since 2008. His rebounding average led the conference and was 38th in the nation while finishing second in the conference in scoring.
Rubit was the 2010-2011 Sun Belt Freshman of the Year and already ranks eighth in South Alabama school history in career rebounds with 576 and third in rebounding average with 10.1 per game.
Javier Carter and Freddie Goldstein were both third team selections. Carter blocked 72 shots with an average of 2.7 blocks per game which ranked 16th in Division I. Those 72 blocks are third in school history and ranks second place in school history with 132 in his career. He also averaged 6.1 points and 5 rebounds per game last season with two double-doubles.
Goldstein is the Sun Belt’s defending 3-point champion. He made 2.5 3-pointers per game last season and was second on the team in scoring with 11.7 per game. He set and tied the school record for 3-pointers in a game with nine and placed 15 in the conference in 3-point percentage (37.1%). He used his 3-point skill to become the first Jaguar to score 30 or more points in a game twice in a single season since the 2007-2008 season.
In the preseason poll of conference coaches the Jags were voted to finish second in the Eastern Division behind Middle Tennessee State. MTSU received all 11 first-place votes and 65 points while the Jags had 51 votes. Behind the Jags were Western Kentucky with 47, FAU with 29, Troy with 22 and FIU with 17.
In the western division North Texas was a unanimous pick with 55 points. Arkansas State had 40, UALR had 33, ULL had 24 and ULM had 13.
SBC Teams Have Close Weekend, Show Competitive Spirit
South Alabama will go from facing FAU, a team who has not won a Sun Belt Conference game this season, to Louisiana-Monroe who has not lost a Sun Belt Conference game this season.
ULM has been part of the reason why the Sun Belt Conference is having it’s best season ever. They defeated Arkansas after coming from behind and nearly defeated Auburn. They also played Baylor very close.
Middle Tennessee State defeated Georgia Tech in Atlanta. Western Kentucky defeated Kentucky. They all turned the national spotlight on a conference trying to get better and to be mentioned among the top of the “non-AQ” conferences.
This past weekend was another example of the competition in the Sun Belt. The Jags defeated FAU in double overtime for their first-ever FBS win.
ULM defeated Western Kentucky 43-42 in overtime on the road where ULM went for a two-point conversion for the win. This was after they trailed 28-7 in the second quarter. Both teams had been unbeaten in Sun Belt play.
Troy’s Will Scott hit a 42 yard field goal with 11 seconds left for the Trojans first home win this season.
Furthermore on Tuesday night of last week, North Texas upset Louisiana-Lafayette 30-23 when they had trailed 20-7 in the second half.
More Conference sparks could fly this evening when Arkansas State (4-3, 2-1 SBC) travels to ULL (4-2, 2-1 SBC) for the Tuesday night game on one of the ESPN networks. Then this weekend South Alabama (2-5, 1-2 SBC) travels to ULM (5-2, 3-0 SBC), Troy (4-3, 3-2 SBC) visits FAU (1-6, 0-4 SBC), North Texas (3-4, 2-1 SBC) travels to MTSU (4-3, 2-1 SBC) and finally Western Kentucky (5-2, 2-1 SBC) visits FIU (1-7, 0-4 SBC).
Mind you, FIU is winless in conference play while they were the preseason pick to win the conference championship.
Troy, FAU, ULL and South Alabama all have non-conference games left this season where they can put their name, and the Sun Belt’s name, back in the headlines again this season. We’ll just have to wait and see.