Coastal Carolina wants to be in the Sun Belt Conference. That much was made clear this week after the university hosted officials from the conference as the Sun Belt continues to evaluate potential expansion options. Coastal Carolina president David DeCenzo said his university will be quick to take up any potential offer that may come its way, adding just a bit more fuel to the Sun Belt expansion fire.
“I will tell you what I said to them: I will accept an offer from the Sun Belt if an offer is made,” DeCenzo told The Sun Times. “I think as we all know it’s completely up to them as to what they do, whether they extend an offer. They’re hoping in a short time period, now I can’t define what a short time period is, but I’m hoping in the next several weeks to have at least some indication as to what ultimately they would do.”
Sun Belt commissioner Karl Benson has suggested the conference will only want to expand within its current geographic territory, and Coastal Carolina would certainly fit that description. The Sun Belt has Appalachian State in North Carolina but no members in South Carolina, where Coastal Carolina is located. Eastern Kentucky remains another potential option for the Sun Belt Conference, which currently has 11 football-playing members. It is the Sun Belt’s preference to add schools that would become full conference members, instead of associate members like Idaho and New Mexico State. There could be a third possible expansion candidate on the Sun BElt’s radar, as hinted by the report from The Sun Times, but that school has been unconfirmed at this time.
Coastal Carolina would need to upgrade its football stadium in order to accommodate FBS attendance regulations, but the school is prepared to expand Brooks Stadium from 9,000 seats to 20,000 seats if extended an invitation to join the Sun Belt. The stadium was constructed with such expansion in mind. It just needed a reason to justify having so many seats as the program itself is still relatively young.