notes from Benson presser

I listened to audio from Benson's chat at WKU yesterday and wanted to jot some things down.

-- 2013 divisions are definitely Texas State, UT Arlington, UALR, Arkansas State, ULM, and ULL in the West, and FAU, Georgia State, WKU, MTSU, South Alabama and Troy East.

-- 18 game conference basketball schedule on the way in 2013, with ten played home-and-home in division.

-- The presidents in the league are not interested in further expansion, and he acknowledged the interest of Idaho and NMSU in Belt membership.  He also mentioned several FCS schools were as well.

-- He's looking forward to going head to head - and prevailing - against CUSA.

-- He's going to watch GSU/UTSA in the Georgia Dome 9/15.

-- The rebranding of the league will take place 7/1/13, the day Texas State and UT Arlington join.  They hired a company (I'm guessing whomever the Pac 12 hired) to study over the 12-13 academic year and present proposals.

--Sun Belt lease is up July 1st in NOLA.  He'd like to stay but that's not his decision.  He'd like to play baseball and other sports championships there as it is central geographically in the league.

-- The Sun Belt is the backup for the Big Ten in the Little Caesar's Bowl in Detroit, in case the Big Ten can't fulfill their obligations with Penn State and Ohio State not bowl eligible.  The conference extended the agreement with Mobile/GoDaddy and are looking to do the same with NOLA/R+L over the next 6-8 months.

EDIT:  I left something out.  He referred to only having 10 FBS conferences in 2013 (SEC, Pac 12, Big Ten, Big 12, ACC, MWC, Big East, CUSA, MAC, SBC) and the same amount of bowl games.  While the only WAC tie in game is the Potato Bowl in Boise, LA Tech did fill in at the Poinsettia Bowl last season.  With schools having different affiliations now, there might be some wiggle room in the lower tier that wasn't there before.