For the past six months or so, it's been nearly impossible to open the sports pages of a newspaper without seeing a story about conference realignment.

Over that period, about 20 Division I-A schools have changed conferences, which in some people's eyes has affected the perceived power structure in Division I-A. There have been lawsuits filed over the changes, insults hurled through the media at school officials thought to be less than honest about their intentions, speculation that some conferences may be affected enough to change which leagues gain access to the Bowl Championship Series and debate on whether such shifts should even be allowed.

Through the debate, there has been an outcry from the public and the media for the NCAA to step in and stop colleges from changing conferences. But as NCAA officials have said since these realignments began, the Association has no jurisdiction over the changes.

NCAA President Myles Brand has repeatedly explained to critics that conference alignment is an institutional matter and that each college or university has the autonomy to decide which conference to join.

"The realignment in the Big East and Atlantic Coast Conferences was sensationalized in the press, and many media members criticized the NCAA -- and me -- for not taking a more active role in negotiations," Brand wrote in a recent report to college and university CEOs. "What the critics fail to understand is that there is neither historical precedent nor legislative authority for involvement of the NCAA president in conference matters.

"There have been about 30 conference realignments since 1990, and none involved the NCAA or the NCAA president. This is as it should be. Realignment is an institutional matter, not a conference or national decision."

The Division I Board of Directors has supported that stance as well, reiterating that conference realignment is a membership matter.

Tom Hansen, commissioner of the Pacific-10 Conference, agreed.

"I think that this has to be an institutional prerogative as to conference membership and Myles was completely, unfairly criticized," he said of assertions that the NCAA should become more directly involved. "The NCAA had no role, and had Myles made any attempt to become involved he would have been rebuffed and there would have been considerable resentment."

The most recent conference realignments began with University of Miami (Florida) and Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University leaving the Big East Conference to join the Atlantic Coast Conference. Boston College also eventually left the Big East for the ACC, though that move came later in the process.

After the loss of Miami, Virginia Tech and Boston College, the Big East added the University of Cincinnati, the University of Louisville and the University of South Florida, all members of Conference USA, for all sports and DePaul University and Marquette University, also from Conference USA, for basketball only. The Big East had previous agreements for Temple University to leave the conference next year and the University of Connecticut, already in the conference for other sports, to join in football as well.

With Cincinnati, Louisville and South Florida gone in football and DePaul; Marquette; the University of North Carolina, Charlotte; and Saint Louis University (the latter two headed to the Atlantic 10 Conference) leaving in basketball, Conference USA extended invitations to Marshall University and the University of Central Florida from the Mid-American Conference and Rice University, Southern Methodist University and the University of Tulsa from the Western Athletic Conference.

New Mexico State University, a full member of the Sun Belt Conference, and Utah State University, a member of the Sun Belt in football, will be joining the WAC.

There also have been published rumors that Texas Christian University may leave Conference USA for the Mountain West Conference, and that the University of Idaho and the University of North Texas could leave the Sun Belt for the WAC. The University of Notre Dame, now a member of the Big East in all sports except football (in which it is an independent), also has been rumored to be league-shopping.

The only Division I-A conferences not realigning, at least at this point, are the Mountain West, Southeastern, Big Ten, Big 12 and Pac-10.

"It wasn't difficult for folks to connect the dots when they first started to see the ACC expansion begin to occur," Conference USA Commissioner Britton Banowsky said last month at the National Symposium on Athletics Reform, sponsored by Tulane University. "I think the outcomes may surprise folks. We may be in a position where we can actually have more logical conference configurations than we currently do. From our vantage point, getting a geographic fit was important, getting a greater level of compatibility among institutions was important. As this thing unfolds, maybe that will be one of the outcomes."

Hansen said the changing of conferences is not unusual. What made these latest changes unique, he said, were the scrutiny they received and the large number of changes that seemed to take place in a short period.

"This is unusual in that there have been so many dominoes that have fallen -- all at once virtually," he said. "It's like one of those TV deals where they put all these cards or dominoes or something up and touch one and it goes on for quite a while."

But, Hansen noted, starting with Pennsylvania State University's move to the Big Ten in 1990, every Division I-A conference has changed membership, except for the Pac-10.

"That's a decade-long series of changes that preceded the Big East-ACC, so already in that roughly 10-, 12-year period, every conference had a change, or 10 out of 11," he said. "It was only the prominence of the colleges making the move and the conferences affected, and then the almost certain additional changes that the shift from the Big East to the ACC would cause, that made this more newsworthy.

"It's an unusual event in the totality, but it's not unusual in that changes have occurred frequently."

While the NCAA has no jurisdiction over an institution's conference affiliation, it does have an interest in how conferences relate to the Division I governance structure. Even before the most recent conference shifts began to occur, groups within the Division I governance structure were looking at conference membership requirements as part of a broad review of Division I membership criteria. Though the realignment did not prompt that review, the timing of the shifts serves only to emphasize the need for such scrutiny.

The Division I Board of Directors has 18 members. All 11 Division I-A conferences have a permanent seat and seven I-AA and I-AAA conferences rotate seats. On the current Board, one member would be affected based on the realignments. R. Gerald Turner, president of Southern Methodist, represents the Western Athletic Conference through January 2007. His school will join Conference USA.

The Division I Management Council has 49 members. Each of the following Division I-A conferences has three representatives: Atlantic Coast, Big East, Big Ten, Big 12, Conference USA, Pacific-10 and Southeastern. One representative from the following Division I-A conferences each have 11/2 votes: Mid-American, Mountain West, Sun Belt and Western Athletic. One representative from 20 Division I-AA and I-AAA conferences each have one vote.

On the current Management Council, the recent realignments would affect one member. John T. Romeo, the faculty athletics representative from South Florida, represents Conference USA through January 2007. His school will join the Big East.

Noreen Morris, associate commissioner of governance and national policy for Conference USA, said her group has not yet had any formal discussions about Romeo stepping down from his position, though she expects the topic will be discussed at the next conference meeting. However, she added, South Florida is still in the conference and will not leave for the Big East until the 2005-06 season.

Other Division I groups affected by the conference realignment include:

* On the Division I Championships/
Competition Cabinet: Judy MacLeod, athletics director from Tulsa, represents the WAC through July 2004. Her school is moving to Conference USA. Robert G. Goin, athletics director at Cincinnati, represents Conference USA through July 2004. His school is moving to the Big East.

* On the Division I Academics/Eligibility/Compliance Cabinet: Paul Rogers, faculty athletics representative from Southern Methodist, represents the WAC through July 2007. His school is moving to Conference USA. New Mexico State student-athlete Andrew Garretson represents the Sun Belt through July 2004. His school is moving to the WAC.

Perhaps the biggest change from an NCAA viewpoint could involve a shuffling of conference vote allotments on the Management Council.

Richard Ensor, chair of the Management Council's governance subcommittee, said the issue has been on the group's agenda for a number of years, dating back to when the Sun Belt moved to Division I-A. The subcommittee is the primary body that has been shepherding the Division I membership criteria proposals through the structure. Ensor said the realignment issue has added some intrigue to the voting system currently in place at the cabinet, Management Council and Board levels.

"When the Sun Belt changed affiliation, we were first presented with the issue of how do you get from column A to column B, basically in terms of your voting rights, and then if once you get into the Division I-A category, how are you assigned votes in terms of different membership criteria," said Ensor, commissioner of the Division I-AA Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference.

Art Cooper, the former faculty athletics representative from North Carolina State University who represented the ACC on the Management Council until 2001, said he looked at the issue in 1999 shortly after the Council was restructured.

Cooper said he specifically examined differences among the conferences and why some conferences had more votes than others.

"I spent the better part of a year fooling around with all sorts of criteria," he said. "What I came up with is basically what's reflected in the structure of the Management Council now."

Cooper said the criteria to determine voting included how much money an institution earned from the basketball tournament and bowl games, how many sports they sponsored and how many scholarships they provided for athletes.

Ensor said the conversation stopped while the membership committee looked at proposed Division I-A membership criteria. The committee finished its work last year, and the new Division I-A requirements are set to go into effect in 2005.

The governance subcommittee now plans to resume its look at the issue in January, Ensor said. He added that some members are looking for clarification on why certain conferences receive three votes while others receive 11/2 votes.

"There are some members of the committee that would like to see that happen. I think others recognize it as more of a political issue and that's part of the debate that we'll be undertaking in the next six months as we look at the issue," he said.

Ensor said the subcommittee is asking the Division I-A commissioners for input.

While the subcommittee has discussed the recent conference realignments, Ensor said those conversations have been general and have not involved discussions on any specific changes that should be made.

"We've talked about it in a general sense that certainly it points to the need to have some kind of criteria, but not in any specific way as far as this conference now has these members and this conference has these, (and) how do you juggle that," he said.

Ensor said the earliest anything new could be enacted likely is April 2005, based on the new legislative cycle. The governance subcommittee will continue to serve as the body within the structure that monitors realignment issues.

If history is any indication, these latest conference realignments will not be the last moves, by any means. Schools likely will continue to shift conferences, striving to find the best fit for their athletics programs.

"It's unfortunate that people do move in some regards, but at the end of the day, hopefully people will find a natural position in whatever conference they end up," Mountain West Commissioner Craig Thompson said at last month's symposium. "People are trying to find a home that is most comfortable to them for whatever reason, and that can be geography, that can be marketplace, that can be historical rivalries, etc. And all those things are taken into consideration."

Hansen said that changes will continue to be made in conference membership, though he predicts future changes are more likely to occur in leagues other than the ACC, Big East, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-10 and SEC.

"We may see a fairly significant settling in because when these moves are accomplished you're going to have the ACC with 12 (teams), the Big 12 with 12, the Pac-10 having made it very public that we are content to be a 10 and the Big Ten at 11 and looking very stable," Hansen said. "So it looks like you've got some stability in that part of Division I-A.

"But I believe that the modern pressures of media rights, which is just a part of the overall financial pressure to pay for these programs that are so expensive and steadily growing even more so -- that is the factor above all factors that is causing these changes. I see no halt to the increasing financial pressures on athletics directors and institutions."