Michael L. Aresco is an American college sports and television executive. Aresco is the current commissioner of the American Athletic Conference (AAC/The American), a college athletics conference. He was the last commissioner of the old Big East Conference from August 14, 2012 to June 30, 2013. He continued as commissioner of The American, the legal successor to the old Big East, when that league formally began operations on July 1, 2013.
Aresco is a graduate of Tufts University, the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and the University of Connecticut Law School . He practiced law privately in Hartford, Conn., for several years. He previously served as the Executive Vice President, Programming of CBS Sports. [1] and started in TV with ESPN where he was responsible for overseeing the acquisition, scheduling and development of long-term strategies for all ESPN college sports properties. He joined ESPN in 1984 as Counsel and was named Assistant General Counsel in 1988 before moving to the programming department.
The Big East Conference was a collegiate athletics conference that consisted of as many as 16 universities in the eastern half of the United States from 1979 to 2013. The conference's members participated in 24 NCAA sports. The conference had a history of success at the national level in basketball throughout its history, while its shorter football program, created by inviting one college and four other "associate members" into the conference, resulted in two national championships.
Conference USA (CUSA) is an intercollegiate athletic conference whose member institutions are located within the Southern United States and Western United States. The conference participates in the NCAA's Division I in all sports. CUSA's offices are located in Dallas, Texas.
The Mid-American Conference (MAC) is a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I collegiate athletic conference with a membership base in the Great Lakes region that stretches from Western New York to Illinois. Nine of the twelve full member schools are in Ohio and Michigan, with single members located in Illinois, Indiana, and New York. For football, the MAC participates in the NCAA's Football Bowl Subdivision.
The Sun Belt Conference (SBC) is a collegiate athletic conference that has been affiliated with the NCAA's Division I since 1976. Originally a non-football conference, the Sun Belt began sponsoring football in 2001. Its football teams participate in the Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). The 14 member institutions of the Sun Belt are distributed across the Southern United States.
The Western Athletic Conference (WAC) is an NCAA Division I conference. The WAC covers a broad expanse of the western United States with member institutions located in Arizona, California, Texas, Utah and Washington.
National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Football Bowl Subdivision independent schools are four-year institutions whose football programs are not part of an NCAA-affiliated conference. This means that FBS independents are not required to schedule each other for competition like conference schools do.
The Big Eight Conference was a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA)-affiliated Division I-A college athletic association that sponsored football. It was formed in January 1907 as the Missouri Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Association (MVIAA) by its charter member schools: the University of Kansas, University of Missouri, University of Nebraska, and Washington University in St. Louis. Additionally, the University of Iowa was an original member of the MVIAA, while maintaining joint membership in the Western Conference.
Valerie B. Ackerman is an American sports executive, former lawyer, and former basketball player. She is the current commissioner of the Big East Conference. She is best known for being the first president of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA), serving from 1996 to 2005. She was inducted into the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame in 2011 and the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2021.
Xavier High School is an all-boys college preparatory Catholic high school in Middletown, Connecticut, United States. It is run by the Xaverian Brothers. Teenage boys from over 65 towns surrounding and including Middletown attend Xavier; despite the fact that students commute from a very broad area all students, their parents, faculty, and staff, regardless of how far away they live from the school, are referred to by Xavier officials as "The Xavier Community".
Oliver Francis Luck is an American business executive and former professional football player. He is currently the executive director of the United Athletic Conference, a new NCAA Division I FCS conference starting play in 2023 as a football-only merger of the ASUN Conference and Western Athletic Conference. He was the CEO and Commissioner of the XFL until it suspended operations due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Prior to that, he was Director of Intercollegiate Athletes at West Virginia University (WVU), his alma mater, and an executive with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in charge of the organization's regulatory functions. Luck played football professionally as a quarterback for five seasons in the National Football League (NFL) for the Houston Oilers (1982–1986). He was also the first president and general manager of the Houston Dynamo of Major League Soccer (MLS). Under his watch, the Dynamo won the MLS Cup in 2006 and 2007.
The Old Dominion Monarchs are composed of 18 intercollegiate athletic teams representing Old Dominion University, located in Norfolk, Virginia. Men's sports include baseball, basketball, football, golf, sailing, soccer, swimming, and tennis. Women's sports include basketball, field hockey, lacrosse, golf, sailing, soccer, swimming, tennis, rowing, and volleyball. The Monarchs compete in the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) and are members of the Sun Belt Conference (SBC); the university joined the conference on July 1, 2022.
The 2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment was a set of extensive changes in conference membership at all three levels of NCAA competition—Division I, Division II, and Division III—beginning in the 2010–11 academic year.
The 2010–13 Big East Conference realignment refers to the Big East Conference dealing with several proposed and actual conference expansion and reduction plans among various NCAA conferences and institutions. Following on the 2005 NCAA conference realignment, resulting in the move of 23 teams across various conferences after an initial raid of three Big East teams, the Big East was severely impacted in the follow-up 2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment. Beginning in the 2010–11 academic year and continuing into 2013, 13 Big East schools announced their departure for other conferences and 13 other schools announced plans to join the conference, but three of the latter group later backed out of their plans to join. Most notably, the seven schools that did not sponsor football in Division I FBS announced in December 2012 that they would leave as a group, which led to a formal split of the conference effective in July 2013.
The Big East Conference is a collegiate athletic conference that competes in NCAA Division I in 10 men's sports and 12 women's sports. Headquartered in New York City, the 11 full-member schools are primarily located in Northeast and Midwest metropolitan areas. The conference was officially recognized as a Division I multi-sport conference on August 1, 2013, and since then conference members have won NCAA national championships in men's basketball, women's cross country, field hockey, men's lacrosse, and men's soccer. Val Ackerman is the commissioner.
The American Athletic Conference (AAC), also known as the American, is a collegiate athletic conference in the United States featuring 14 full member universities and 8 affiliate member universities that compete in the National Collegiate Athletic Association's (NCAA) Division I, with its football teams competing in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). Member universities represent a range of private and public universities of various enrollment sizes located primarily in urban metropolitan areas in the Northeastern, Midwestern, and Southern regions of the United States.
The 2010–13 Atlantic 10 Conference realignment refers to the Atlantic 10 Conference dealing with several proposed and actual conference expansion and reduction plans among various NCAA conferences and institutions from 2010 to 2013. Moves that involved the Atlantic 10 Conference were part of a much larger NCAA conference realignment.
The 2010–2013 Colonial Athletic Association realignment refers to the Colonial Athletic Association (CAA), renamed in 2023 to the Coastal Athletic Association, and Colonial Athletic Association Football Conference dealing with several proposed and actual conference expansion and reduction plans among various NCAA conferences and institutions from 2010 to 2013. Some moves affected only the all-sports CAA; others affected only CAA Football; and still others affected both sides of the CAA. Moves that involved the overall CAA were part of a much larger NCAA conference realignment.
Kevin Fulbright Warren is an American attorney and sports executive. He is the team president and chief executive officer (CEO) for the Chicago Bears of the National Football League (NFL). He was previously the commissioner of the Big Ten Conference from 2020 to 2023, overseeing negotiations for expansion of the conference.
Beginning in the 2021–22 academic year, extensive changes occurred in NCAA conference membership, primarily at the Division I level.