UT-San Antonio, North Texas part of major overhaul of Conference USA

[Harry]

DALLAS — Conference USA is restocking its league and is about to add more schools than it is losing to the Big East.

UT-San Antonio's move to Conference USA was approved Thursday by University of Texas System regents, the same day that people familiar with the league's plans said North Texas, Charlotte, Louisiana Tech and Florida International would also be joining C-USA. Announcements are expected at each of the schools Friday.

Those five additions in July 2013 will come at the same time Big East-bound Houston, SMU, Memphis and Central Florida are scheduled to leave Conference USA. That will give C-USA 13 schools, one above its current membership.

Multiple people with knowledge of the planned additions spoke Thursday to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because, aside from the action by regents overseeing UTSA, no official announcements had been made by the league or the individual schools.

There could be even more additions in the future to the incoming five and the eight remaining Conference USA schools: Southern Miss , Marshall, East Carolina, Tulane, Tulsa, Rice, UTEP and UAB.

C-USA and the Mountain West Conference announced plans earlier this year to form a partnership in football, with as many as 24 teams located in five time zones. The two leagues are still working through details of such a move that had been planned to begin in 2013.

North Texas, which is leaving the Sun Belt Conference, scheduled a news conference Friday about the “future of Mean Green athletics.”

The news conference with school President V. Lane Rawlins and athletic director Rick Villarreal will be held at the school's $78 million, 30,850-seat campus football stadium that opened last season.

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