Who Replaces UIC in the Horizon League?
The Flames' departure leaves the Midwestern conference at an awkward 11.
The conference realignment flame continues to burn into 2022 as the Missouri Valley Conference continued the Ohio Valley Conference’s death descent by adding Murray State. The OVC is in even worse shape at only seven members, five of them football-playing schools.
The MVC also plans to add the University of Illinois at Chicago from the Horizon League. This addition garnered less attention due to the relative stability of the Horizon League and UIC’s lack of status in men’s basketball.
These moves will likely begin more shuffling among conferences in Division I, with the possible demise of the OVC along the way. While straits are not as dire for the Horizon League, they do stand at an interesting position at eleven teams.
A few options exist for the league to expand to a more comfortable number of 12 members. The first and best option looks to be SIU-Edwardsville. Now is as good a time for the Cougars to leave the Ohio Valley Conference, as it only has seven members, but SIUE and Morehead State are the only non-football members in the league.
While it does not replace the access, albeit limited access to the Chicago market that UIC provided, SIUE is only 30 minutes away from St. Louis, a market untapped by the conference. However, the Cougars have much work to do athletically, as the school has been a consistent cellar-dweller in most OVC sports.
Morehead State is another good candidate out of the OVC. As the other non-football member, they have all the same reasons as SIUE for leaving the OVC but have more athletic success than their Illinois counterparts. In men’s basketball, the Eagles have been to three NCAA tournaments since 2009 and made the CBI finals in 2016.
While Morehead is a two-hour drive from both Louisville and Cincinnati, the Horizon League already has a strong footing in both regions. While another school in the Louisville/Cincinnati region would not hurt, Northern Kentucky and Morehead State are not going to take significant attention away from the triumvirate of Kentucky, Louisville, and Cincinnati.
Another less attractive option is Chicago State. The Cougars are currently a free agent on the conference market, bowing out of the WAC in early 2021 after the conference announced its ambitious expansion plans. The Cougars have had their fair share of institutional and existential issues, so much so that they are “damaged goods” in realignment talks.
The only benefits that really exist for Chicago State joining the Horizon League are them putting the league at even numbers and replacing UIC’s presence in the Windy City but to a lesser degree. SIUE may have some catching up to do if they join the Horizon League, but Chicago State has much more to do. The Cougars’ women’s basketball team had a 59-game losing streak that only ended in 2018, while the men’s basketball team has not had a winning season since 1985 and has lost over twenty games in their last six full seasons.
To say the least, Chicago State is the last resort for a league in no need to go to such lengths. In the short term, it may be best for the Horizon League to sit out of this round of conference expansion and deal with the minor inconvenience of having eleven teams. Yet, there’s always consolation in not being the Ohio Valley Conference at this moment.