After weeks of speculation, it is being reported that Liberty University has accepted an invitation to join Conference USA. ASOR can confirm these reports with an official announcement expected later in the day on Friday. Liberty is one of four schools that will join Conference USA alongside New Mexico State, Jacksonville State, and Sam Houston State beginning with the 2023 football season.
The news became official on Friday afternoon when Conference USA and Liberty University issued joint press releases.
“On behalf of Liberty University, I want to thank Commissioner MacLeod and the leaders in Conference USA for this exciting opportunity,” Liberty Director of Athletics Ian McCaw stated in a school release. “Today is another important advancement for our University, athletics program and Flames Nation. Liberty’s momentum and rapid upward trajectory in intercollegiate athletics will continue as we train Champions for Christ, provide a high quality student-athlete experience and achieve victory with integrity as future members of Conference USA.”
The news has been a long time coming for the Liberty Flames as the institution has long searched for a conference home at the FBS level. In 2013 and 2014, Liberty appealed to the Sun Belt Conference and Conference USA to join the conference as the Flames were looking to move to the FBS from the FCS ranks. Both of those leagues turned Liberty down then, with reports of LU even offering as much as $24 million to join one of the conferences at the highest Division I football playing classification.
In February 2017, Liberty announced it had received a waiver from the NCAA to reclassify to the FBS as an Independent without a conference invitation. In May 2018, Liberty moved all of its other sports from the Big South to the ASUN, which, at the time, did not sponsor football. Recently, the ASUN has launched an FCS football conference aided by the additions of Central Arkansas, Eastern Kentucky, and Jacksonville State.
With Texas and Oklahoma announcing their intentions to leave the Big 12 and join the SEC this summer, it set off a wave of movement among several Division I conferences. The Big 12 added FBS Independent BYU and three schools from the American Athletic Conference (Central Florida, Cincinnati, and Houston). The AAC responded by adding six institutions from C-USA (UAB, FAU, Charlotte, North Texas, Rice, and UTSA). The Sun Belt proactively added three C-USA teams in Southern Miss, Marshall, and Old Dominion while turning to the FCS ranks to call up James Madison.
That left Conference USA, which was comprised of 14 members just a few weeks ago, with only five members in Middle Tennessee, Western Kentucky, Florida International, Louisiana Tech, and UTEP. That number could dwindle to as few as three as several reports are stating that MTSU and WKU could move to the Mid-American Conference.
The NCAA requires FBS conferences to have eight full members, and with Liberty, NMSU, JSU, and SHSU joining, C-USA would have seven full members if MTSU and WKU depart for the MAC. Previous reports have tied current FBS Independent members UConn and UMass as football-only members to the new-look Conference USA. The league would still need to get one more full member to comply with FBS standards. Though MTSU and WKU could still elect to remain in the new look C-USA.
Liberty and New Mexico State have played each other four times since 2018, both coming in an unorthodox in-season home-and-home series in 2018 and 2019. The Flames and Lobos are currently scheduled to play each other eight times from 2022 and 2029.
Jacksonville State is in its first season as a member of the ASUN while Sam Houston State is currently a member of the Southland Conference as a FCS member.
Liberty will join Conference USA in all sports. The conference currently offers football, men’s and women’s basketball, baseball, men’s and women’s cross country, softball, men’s golf, men’s and women’s soccer, men’s and women’s tennis, men’s and women’s track and field, volleyball, and swimming and diving.
Liberty has been an affiliate member of the Coastal Collegiate Sports Association in swimming and diving as the ASUN does not offer the sport. C-USA does not offer field hockey and women’s lacrosse, additional sports that Liberty competes in at the NCAA Division I level. The Flames’ field hockey program will likely remain in the Big East where it has been an affiliate member since the 2016 season. Liberty currently competes in the ASUN for women’s lacrosse.
The Flames have seen a lot of success in the ASUN in all sports since joining the league a few years ago. Most notably, the men’s basketball team won the ASUN regular season and tournament championship in each of the first three years in the league. Under head coach Ritchie McKay, Liberty won the program’s first ever NCAA Tournament game, defeating Mississippi State in the first round of the 2019 tournament.
Prior to its time in the ASUN and an FBS Independent, Liberty was a member of the Big South from 2002-2017. The Flames won at least a share of the Big South football championship in 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2012 ,2013, 2014, and 2016. Liberty made the FCS playoffs one time, in 2014, defeating James Madison in the first round before falling to Villanova in the second round.
The men’s basketball team won the Big South Tournament and advanced to the NCAA Tournament in 1994, 2004, and 2013. The women’s basketball team won 16 Big South regular season championships and 17 Big South tournament titles during the program’s 27 years in the conference.
Liberty University was founded in 1971, making it one of the youngest NCAA Division I institutions in the country. Liberty was originally an NAIA Independent from 1973-1980 before making the move to the NCAA Division II level where the Flames were an Independent from 1981-1987. LU made the move to Division I in 1988, originally as an Independent until joining the Big South.
