The Ohio Valley Conference is very interested in soon becoming one of the largest basketball conference in Division 1-AA athletics.

“I don’t think it’s any secret that we are considering the option, but we haven’t contacted anybody regarding the issue,” OVC director of media relations Ryan Altizer said.

The OVC is being very deliberate in how it goes about investigating the option of adding a 12th team because the conference has to follow specific procedures to broach the topic.

“I have come up with a internal document that I use to evaluating membership issues,” OVC commissioner Jon Steinbrecher said.

The one issue he recognizes must be dealt with is regional stability because Eastern, and possibly Southeast Missouri State are the only two schools that would be considered to be Midwest institution members of the eighth oldest conference.

“I would like to think that if (the OVC) were to get that 12th team, they would try to find one closer to the midwest area,” Eastern Director of Athletics Rich McDuffie said.

Some of the areas of importance Steinbrecher is looking for in a possible new institution are the financial sources’ stability, the campus culture, whether the school is private or public, the qualities of athletics and how it may help the OVC in the attendance category.

“We evaluate the schools based on these main principles,” Steinbrecher said.

Once the commissioner makes the request and finds a university that meets these requirements, it leaves his hands and is voted upon by the other OVC schools.

“What usually happens is that a fact-finding comission is formed and ironically, when Eastern was being considered by the OVC, I was at Southeast Missouri and part of the group that toured and evaluated Eastern’s qualifications,” McDuffie said.

The benefits of gaining a 12th basketball institution for the OVC is the ability for the conference to establish two divisions of six schools which would drastically change the organization of the brackets for the OVC Tournament where the winner is given the automatic berth into the NCAA Tournament.

“It’s a situation where 12 is obviously better than 11 for so many reasons one of which is the idea of two divisions,” Steinbrecher said. “The problem lies in how would I establish the regional boundary lines?”

The system would seem to be similar to the way the Southeastern Conference sets up its tournament, where the top ranked team from the east division plays the last ranked team from the west and vice versa.

The adding of a 12th institutions would not affect the big-money sport of 1-AA collegiate football because even if this institution were to bring the sport to the OVC it would only give them a 10-team football conference. This becomes a problem when the NCAA has an established rule stating any conference wishing to establish an extreme money making conference championship game must have no less than 12 football schools.

“I really don’t think this process could involve football,” McDuffie said.

The important aspect to understand for fans anticipating an extra team very soon is the OVC isn’t pushing this policy through publicly and drastically. According to Steinbecher, there is no specific deadline to find the school or even begin the process of searching.

“There is no termination point to begin conversations with institutions because of one simple fact that people need to understand, we don’t need to add a team but it’s just an option worth consideration,” Steinbrecher said.

Steinbecher uses a high school comparison for the search of a new OVC institution.

“I like to use the example of a relationship because it takes time,” he said. “First, there’s dating then an engagement and finally a marriage but all this takes time