One of the darlings of college football over the past several years is changing conferences — again.
James Madison University announced Monday that it will join the American Conference “no later than July 1, 2028,” leaving the Sun Belt Conference to do so.
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This marks the second conference move of the decade for JMU as it has seen its athletic department profile skyrocket, thanks in large part to the success that former head football coach Curt Cignetti (now a national championship head coach at Indiana) brought from 2019-23 and that Bob Chesney (now in his first season at UCLA, where he is 5-0) continued after Cignetti left for Indiana.
After being in the FCS ranks, JMU moved to the FBS in 2022 and joined the Sun Belt, where it has gone 46-11, including 28-7 in conference play; it is 6-0 so far this season — including 3-0 in Sun Belt play — under new head coach Billy Napier, who was previously the head coach at Florida.
ESPN’s Pete Thamel and Yahoo’s Ross Dellenger reported that JMU made the move now in part because the Sun Belt was exploring increasing the fee that schools who exit the conference must pay, with Thamel adding that JMU will pay an exit fee of $23 million.
