C-USA basketball will move to divisional standings

Conference USA men’s and women’s basketball will move to a divisional standings format for the 2020-21 season, as approved by the league’s Board of Directors.

The move was announced Wednesday, two days before the start of the C-USA conference season.

C-USA will feature East and West divisions and will crown divisional champions at the conclusion of conference play in March.

Standings will be based on overall conference winning percentage. In addition, divisional seeding will be utilized for the C-USA Men’s and Women’s Championships. A cross-divisional bracket will be used to determine first-round matchups.

The conference announced the divisions as follows:

East — Charlotte, FIU, Florida Atlantic, Marshall, Middle Tennessee, Old Dominion and Western Kentucky.

West — Louisiana Tech, North Texas, Rice, Southern Miss, UAB, UTEP and UTSA.

UTSA men’s coach Steve Henson said “there are a lot of advantages” to having divisions in a 14-team league.

“Over the years, conferences have continued to get bigger and bigger,” Henson said. “Years ago, a seven-team league was not uncommon. Seven- or eight-teams in the league was kind of normal. Having divisions can provide a lot of positives. It can give you key games late in conference play.

“The way we’re doing it this year, we’re just playing a schedule but then ranking the results based on divisions. It’s kind of a unique way of looking at it this year.”

UTSA men’s and women’s conference competition begins this weekend, with the men set for back-to-back games at Rice on Friday and Saturday. Also Friday and Saturday, the UTSA women will host Rice.

The C-USA Basketball Championships will be held at The Star, in Frisco, from March 10-13. This will be the fourth year that the event will be held in Frisco.