Robert Morris officially joins Horizon League for most sports; football to become Big South member

The Robert Morris men’s basketball team won the Northeast Conference’s championship game with a 77-67 victory over St. Francis at UPMC Events Center on March 10.

The Colonials celebrated with a trophy and began to cut down the net. But they never got to enjoy the ultimate reward of that triumph, a game in the NCAA tournament.

The coronavirus pandemic brought all NCAA sports to a halt in March.

Three months later, Robert Morris is hopeful it is on the verge of greater rewards.

On Monday, the school announced it would become the 12th member of the Horizon League for most of its sports, including men’s and women’s basketball, in 2020-21

Additionally, the football program will join the Big South in 2021.

The jump to the Horizon League was motivated primarily by men’s basketball.

“The main priority within the Horizon’s League’s strategic plan is a commitment of focus and emphasis on men’s basketball,” Robert Morris athletic director Chris King said during a news conference Monday. “The Horizon’s League’s national ranking of competitive success in basketball is commensurate with RMU basketball’s current competitive success and our aspirations.”

Along with the 2019 opening of UPMC Events Center, the move to the Horizon League is seen as another step in the growth of the program.

“It was certainly part of the next step in our process,” men’s basketball coach Andy Toole said. “Obviously, the UPMC Events Center was a great addition to our athletics department and our basketball programs. With the evolution of how we were operating, I think this was kind of the next step for that.”

Better seedings in the NCAA Tournament would validate that idea for Robert Morris, which was a founding member of the Northeast Conference in 1981.

During the 2018 and ‘19 NCAA tournaments, the Horizon League champions ( Wright State and Northern Kentucky) were granted No. 14 seeds. In those same years, the Northeast Conference champions, Long Island-Brooklyn and Fairleigh Dickinson, competed in a play-in game to determine the No. 16 seed.

The Horizon League also offers potential cost savings with its geography.

Based throughout the Midwest, Horizon League schools average 313 miles in distance from Robert Morris’ campus.

In contrast, Northeast Conference schools, most of which are located in New England or New York, average 384 miles from Robert Morris.

Youngstown State (59 miles) and Cleveland State (106 miles) are fairly short drives from Robert Morris. Within the Northeast Conference, Robert Morris’ closest foe was St. Francis in Loretto (96 miles).

“The geography and location of the Horizon League was one of the many driving forces into our decision making,” King said. “Eight of the Horizon League members are located within 350 miles of campus, which creates a setup for natural geographic rivalries, in particular with Cleveland State and Youngstown State.”

The Horizon also includes Detroit Mercy, Illinois-Chicago, IUPUI, Oakland, Purdue Fort Wayne, Green Bay, Milwaukee and Wright State.

In addition to basketball, the Colonials will compete in the Horizon League with men’s and women’s soccer, volleyball, women’s cross country and indoor and outdoor track and field, men’s golf and softball.

The league does not include football or lacrosse. King said the school was still investigating its options to find a conference for its men’s and women’s lacrosse programs.

For football, Robert Morris will operate as an independent in 2020 before joining the Big South in 2021.

“I’m very familiar with those areas, especially being from Florida and being in the south,” said football coach Bernard Clark, Jr., a native of Tampa who previously served as a defensive coordinator at Hampton. “As we grow in the conference, I think it’s going to help us get more recognition.”

This move also represents an upgrade in conferences as the Big South has had two teams qualify for the FCS playoffs over the past three years. During that same span, the Northeast Conference only had one.

Additionally, it was announced Robert Morris had scheduled games with FBS schools Central Michigan (2021), Miami, Ohio (2022), Air Force (2023) and West Virginia (2025).