Marshall files suit against Conference USA in bid to leave league this summer
The litigation between Marshall and Conference USA has begun.
The school has filed a lawsuit against the conference as it attempts to leave the league this summer along with Old Dominion and Southern Miss. The three schools are leaving Conference USA for the Sun Belt and have said they intend to leave C-USA at the end of the school year.
Conference USA, meanwhile, is not budging. The league's 2022 football schedule was released last week and it includes all three of the departing schools. That football schedule portended litigation and Marshall acted quickly.
"For more than two months, Marshall University has attempted to reach a resolution with Conference USA regarding our decision not to participate in the league after this academic year; however, no progress has been made," the school said in a statement.
"The action we brought [Monday] is the beginning of litigation intended to protect our rights, help us reach an agreement in a timely manner and clear the way for our shift in conference affiliation. We look forward to a successful resolution of this matter and a bright future with the Sun Belt Conference."
The suit, filed Monday, asks for relief via a declaratory judgment and injunctions against Conference USA and says that Marshall gets sovereign immunity as a West Virginia state school. The conference wants to head to arbitration regarding the matter, a process that Marshall wants to avoid.
Per the Herald Dispatch, Marshall says in its lawsuit that the league’s current rules — including the arbitration clause that C-USA wants to enforce — were not in effect at the time it joined and therefore the school isn’t bound by them.
Marshall has been a member of Conference USA since 2005 after announcing it would be joining the league from the MAC in 2003. The departure of Marshall, Old Dominion and Southern Miss to the Sun Belt has been a part of the domino effect of conference realignment that started when Oklahoma and Texas announced they were heading to the SEC. After the Big 12 took three members of the American Athletic Conference, the AAC added members from Conference USA. That forced the league to add teams in a bid to stay alive with six teams leaving for the AAC and three heading to the Sun Belt.
