Sunday, July 1st saw 20 current Division I schools switch conferences for the 2012-13 academic year. In a year's time, two dozen more moves will be made. The overwhelming majority of these lame ducks are lucky because they'll be allowed to compete for conference tournament titles, and the automatic NCAA bids that result, but a select, unlucky few find themselves facing long odds to make the field of 68 long before the season tips off.
Late last week, the America East Conference barred the Boston University Terriers from claiming conference championships during this coming year, in response to the Terriers' pending move to the Patriot League for the 2013-14 academic year. That decision reduces the America East Tournament field from nine to eight, meaning there won't be a play-in game in Albany. Boston University joins 2013-14 Colonial departures Georgia State and Old Dominion in needing an at-large bid to make the 2013 NCAA Tournament, not a likely proposition. Still, the three schools are in a better position than the 10 squads banned from all the NCAAs because of APR issues.
It will be interesting to see if BU's administration, like Butler's and VCU's before, attempts to move into its new conference a year early, something the pair of future CAA departures have yet to do themselves.
I've updated the 2013 Conference Tournament Info page with the information about Boston University's exclusion from the America East tourney.
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