Teams in sunbelt conference10/4/2023 They lost 45-20 to Colorado State to finish 5-7 overall. They were the first team since 1970 to appear in a bowl game with a losing record. Ultimately, North Texas won the head-to-head matchup against MTSU and went to the New Orleans bowl with a 5-6 record. Also part of the initial group was Idaho, a school that has since returned to the FCS level. Only one team – Middle Tennessee – had a winning record in 2000, a feat that was matched in 2001 when they and North Texas were co-champions of the Sun Belt. The first teams were remnants of the Big West and fellow Division 1-A independents (now known as the FBS). While this could easily be summed up with “and the rest is history”, it’s important to look at the teams that comprised the early seasons to understand how much the Sun Belt has truly evolved. The Sun Belt Conference began in 1976 as a basketball-only conference but that changed at the turn of the century when they decided to sponsor football. We hope you take the time to read each section to get a better idea of the Sun Belt’s evolution but you can skip to the summary here. We’ll take a look at each season since 2001 focusing on the membership changes and overall conference strength. However, it wasn’t always on the ascendancy as there were times it resembled a hodgepodge of schools that simply wanted a place to call home, even if only temporarily. The Sun Belt has become one of the emerging Group of 5 conferences in Division 1 college football and is set to strengthen with teams comprised from the mid-Atlantic to the Southeast and Texas as a result of the latest realignment changes. Specifically, we looked at how the football membership has changed since the Sun Belt began sponsoring football in 2001. That made us think more about the Sun Belt and look back on the history of the conference. Our November 2021 article on winners and losers of the recent college sports realignment opined that the Sun Belt Conference was one of the winners in the latest ongoing realignment cycle. #College Football, #NCAA Football, #Sun Belt, #Sun Belt Conference
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