Conference Carolinas Continues to Help Member Institutions Fulfill Their Missions Through Latest Forward-Thinking Enhancements

This is the continuation of a series of Body, Mind & Soul stories that highlights member student-athletes, coaches and administrators of Conference Carolinas.

GREENVILLE, S.C. -- In perhaps one of the most innovative and hectic periods of the league’s 93-year history, Conference Carolinas continues to try and enhance and evolve into one of the more forward-thinking conferences in all of the NCAA. 

Conference Carolinas Commissioner Chris Colvin recently announced two new initiatives that will only add to the interest and intrigue of competition this academic year.  

First, the conference unveiled a unique three-division model for its 14-member schools in the sports of men’s and women’s soccer, women’s volleyball, men’s and women’s basketball and softball.

Second, the league has entered a partnership with Abakus, LLC to create a conference-only KPI that will determine seeding order for the conference tournaments in those six sports. Abakus, which already provides its services to the NCAA and the National Football League, will also assist in future scheduling for the conference.

Since Commissioner Colvin and his staff arrived in the league office in 2019, one of its trademarks has been its progressive agenda. Despite the added challenge of COVID, the conference has reached new milestones in various areas of operation during the past four years.  

They include:

• Adding four schools to its membership (UNC Pembroke, Francis Marion, Shorter and Young Harris).
   
• Reinstituting football in the fall of 2025 after a 51-year absence.
   
• Expanding its competition to 29 sports by 2025-26, the most sports of any NCAA Division II conference.
   
• Becoming the first athletic conference of any level of the NCAA to feature Developmental Championships. The sub-varsity championships earned Conference Carolinas a special NCAA Division II grant for exemplary strategy.
   
• Introducing a special feature series called “Body, Mind and Soul,” which also received honors from the NCAA.
   
• Adding championship opportunities for its student-athletes in spirt and esports. The NCAA recently honored Conference Carolinas for its efforts as part of its Atlantic Casualty Spirit Championships for its strategic positioning as a conference.

Now, a new conference format and seeding process only adds to the conference’s national reputation for innovation. Commissioner Colvin, for one, believes the move to three divisions was a logical next phase for the conference.

“Since I’ve been here, one of the goals of the conference Board of Directors was to grow our membership so we could better regionalize scheduling,” Colvin said. “While two divisions would have been more conventional, it was really a product of the geography of our conference that led to a three-division format. We have five schools on the eastern side of our conference along I-95 and prior to the most recent expansion, we had eight of our schools on the western side stretching from northeast Georgia to the mountains of North Carolina and Tennessee. There wasn’t a logical two-division split that would have served our membership well.”

The decision was ultimately made by the board.

“I credit them for seeing the opportunities created by a three-division format,” Colvin added. “It made a lot more sense to place competing institutions in closer proximity.”

CONFERENCE CAROLINAS (2023-24 DIVISIONS)

East Division             

Barton

Chowan

Francis Marion

Mount Olive

UNC Pembroke

Northwest Division

Belmont Abbey

Converse

King

Lees-McRae

Southwest Division

Emmanuel

Erskine

North Greenville

Southern Wesleyan

Young Harris

*Note: In 2024-25, Shorter will join the Southwest Division and North Greenville will move to the Northwest Division.

The new divisions will enhance the conference in several ways. It starts with cutting travel costs, as any long bus rides across multiple states will occur less often. Positive by-products of shorter trips also will include less time outside the classroom for the student-athletes, the opportunity for families, friends and die-hard fans to attend more road games which are shorter drives from campus, and the prospects of heightening or expanding rivalries with schools which play more often.

David Hicks, the Vice President for Athletics at King University in Bristol, Tennessee, sees the divisional shift as a total positive.

“I think it’s exciting, I really do,” said Hicks. “It’s great when our conference thinks outside the box and also good to see our Presidents and Chancellors see the value of giving our student-athletes a better experience. With three divisions, there is going to be more emphasis on regional rivalries. Sports like soccer and volleyball, we’ll play divisional teams twice so the games are going to mean a little bit more.”

The King Vice President for Athletics also appreciates the reduction in long road trips.

“There will be fewer trips where our kids get home at 3 a.m., which certainly helps with rest and on the academic side.”

While UNC Pembroke Athletic Director Dick Christy cites missed class time and travel cost reduction as his top priorities in supporting the move to divisions, he is particularly pleased to see increased rivalries in Conference Carolinas’ future. 

“When UNC Pembroke joined Conference Carolinas (July 2021), one of our goals was to re-establish some of our rivalries with schools located close to us,” Christy said. “So this new divisional setup only adds to that effort. I look forward to seeing a lot of our alumni attending away games, which is certainly important to staying connected with them.”

Moving to a three-division format necessitated a new seeding process for conference tournaments, so Colvin and Conference Carolinas sought out the services of Abakus, LLC and its computerized KPI system.

“We’re only utilizing KPI in the six sports that have three divisions, because they’re playing a pretty significant imbalanced schedule,” Colvin pointed out. “There had been a strong feeling by our members from the beginning that we had to account for that imbalance. Winning percentage in the division will determine the division champions and standings, but the seeding for the conference tournaments will be solely based on KPI using all conference contests.”

Because the KPI model utilizes conference-only results, the first KPI rankings will not be released until after several conference contests have been played in each sport. The first KPI for men’s and women’s soccer were published on Monday, Oct. 2 with women’s volleyball to be published for the first time on Monday, Oct. 9. The release dates for men’s and women’s basketball and softball will be determined at a later date.

A key ingredient in the KPI rankings, much like the NCAA’s March Madness at the Division I level, will be strength of schedule and significant wins on the road. It’s very possible that a third-place team in one division might be seeded higher than a champion in another division.

Hicks is fully supportive of the new KPI partnership.

“I think it’s outstanding! I credit the conference staff for being willing to do what we are doing, and that the Presidents and ADs are on board with it. I also think our students are becoming much more analytical and will be interested in following the periodic updates.”

And as coaches, student-athletes and fans become more knowledgeable about how KPI works, Hicks believes it will only add to the importance of certain games.

“There’s no doubt it’s going to add more value to some games. If King plays Converse on the road, everyone will know that it could have a greater impact on our seeding because of the strength of schedule.”

As UNC Pembroke’s athletic chief, Christy has a unique perspective on Conference Carolinas implementing a computerized seeding system.

“I’ve had the benefit of working with KPI in the past because of some of the NCAA committees I’ve sat on,” he said. “It’s been amazing to see how accurate the rankings are and how those teams have fared in the postseason field.”

While the division championship is another goal now for schools and student-athletes to shoot for presently, Christy is all in favor of giving the conference the chance to send its best representative teams to the national playoffs. 

“I have a lot of confidence in KPI,” he added. “When one pod is stronger than the other, a second- or third-place team might be rated above a champion in another pod, and the seeding should reflect that.”  

At a time where there is a seismic shift in NCAA Division I power conferences, with most Pac-12 schools departing for conferences in the Midwest and Eastern time zones, there’s a hint of irony that a smaller Division II conference in the Southeast is moving towards more regionalization and easier travel for its student-athletes.

That irony is not lost on Hicks.

“Yeah, it’s interesting isn’t it?” Hicks chuckled. “But we are operating with different paradigms. But whether it’s the Big 10 or Conference Carolinas, it’s still because of financial reasons. For them, it’s about maximizing network TV revenue. For us, it’s about finding ways to save money to benefit our institutions and our student-athletes overall.”   

Christy credits the leadership of Colvin and his conference staff for a steady progression of innovations within the league and its members.

“I think it’s more than their strategic vision,” the UNC Pembroke AD said. “It’s also their elbow grease. We get great consensus among the ADs because the league office has already done the work and laid things out for us. They make it easy to make decisions.”

While Colvin appreciates the kind words, he knows that the key to current and future success in Conference Carolinas comes down to the cooperation and support shown by member Presidents, Athletic Directors, coaches and student-athletes.  

It boils down to one word - teamwork.

Bob Rose is a longtime sports public relations executive who has worked for the San Francisco Giants, Oakland Athletics, the NFL Cardinals, Cal, Stanford and other organizations. Bob works with Associate Commissioner for External Relations Brian Hand and the entire Conference Carolinas office to help tell the stories of the tremendous student-athletes, coaches and administrators in Conference Carolinas.