NEW ORLEANS -- A few steps away from the main stage, the newest Sun Belt Conference hardware glittered metallic gold and rested on a dimly lit platform inside the Mercedes-Benz Superdome.
The championship belt will be given to the MVP of the inaugural conference championship game Dec. 1, and someone from Arkansas State University will wear it if the program finishes first, like the coaches' preseason poll predicted at the conference's media day Monday.
Red Wolves senior safety Justin Clifton would settle for the championship trophy placed to the belt's left, which has been shared between Sun Belt co-champions in nine of the conference's 17 seasons.
"Nobody wants to share a championship," said Clifton, a preseason All-Sun Belt first-team member who was part of the ASU team that shared a championship with Appalachian State in 2016. "Who doesn't want to be at the top of the mountain with the crown on your head, saying we're the ones that run this conference?"
The Sun Belt signed a new eight-year contract with ESPN in March that guaranteed the championship game will air on ABC, ESPN or ESPN2.
The contract, which Sun Belt Commissioner Karl Benson said doubled the conference's previous revenue from rights fees, also arranged for the predicted West and East Division champions -- ASU and Appalachian State, respectively -- to play each other Tuesday, Oct. 9, on ESPN2.
Benson would not disclose the contract's dollar amount.
"I think it's good for us," said ASU senior quarterback Justice Hansen, the reigning Sun Belt Offensive Player of the Year. "Playing those midweek games on national TV is just marketing for the brand. If a lot of people get to see us play, and play well, that's good for recruiting, good for anything."
Both the Red Wolves and Mountaineers have a decent chance of entering the game with a single loss, since both teams are aligned with the Sun Belt's outline of scheduling just one money game with a Power 5 program (ASU at Alabama; Appalachian State at Penn State).
Only two Sun Belt members -- Louisiana-Lafayette and Louisiana-Monr0e -- have two games against Power 5 members, which is a stark difference from four seasons ago.
Sun Belt teams now can schedule more competitive games because the money they receive from the conference's share of the College Football Playoff revenue -- $17,115,246 in 2016 -- has helped supplant the financial necessity to play money games.
"It's a big difference," ASU Athletic Director Terry Mohajir said. "It's real money that we can actually use to build our athletic programs."
Now the Sun Belt can match up more often at a equal level in nonconference games against peer Group of 5 programs, enter the conference season with an impressive record, and finish the season with a conference championship game, like every other conference in the Football Bowl Subdivision.
Benson said all of the changes are steering the conference toward boasting the highest-ranked Group of 5 champion, which is automatically placed in one of college football's top six bowl games, called the "New Year's Six."
"Until we accomplish that," Benson said, "that will be our goal."
Eliminating the possibility of co-champions, plus adding a quality game at the end of the season, will boost the Sun Belt's chances of playing in the New Year's Six.
"I think that the championship game gives the committee an additional data point to evaluate the teams," said Alfred White, the CFP's senior director of marketing and strategy. "It's an entire body of work. The championship game is a 13th game they can use to evaluate a team."
The newfound scheduling freedom, Benson said, frees up the conference members' ability to schedule nonconference games with regional rivals.
Benson said "Southern Miss needs to play South Alabama," "UAB needs to play Troy" and "Louisiana Tech needs to play the other two Louisiana schools that are FBS."
Mohajir already has scheduled two home-and-home series with American Athletic Conference member Memphis from 2020-23.
"Regional matchups are what built college athletics," Mohajir said. "Regional matchups are why we have the TV resources we do."
He said ASU's series with Memphis also establishes a connection with a regional program that could become a partner in future conference realignments.
"Regional rivalries, I think that's the new frontier of conference realignment," Mohajir said. "It will be, should be, considered when our presidents consider this -- what the regional rivalries, or regional matchups, can do for ticket sales, sponsorships, higher education promotion."
For now, ASU has a chance to catapult itself toward the Sun Belt's first conference championship game.
Fifth-year head Coach Blake Anderson called this year's Red Wolves "one of our most experienced teams going in."
Going into the 2017 season, Anderson said, ASU added 42 new players, which led to in-game gaffes that contributed to four losses by seven points or less.
The Red Wolves had the nation's eighth-lowest red-zone scoring percentage (.719), ranked 109th with 2.75 sacks allowed per game, and turned the ball over on plays that could have resulted in touchdowns in losses to SMU and South Alabama.
Anderson believes those mistakes will not happen again because of his team's depth and maturity.
"We've had the entire offseason to grow from that," said Anderson, 49, whose team went 7-5 in 2017. "Everything has been holding players to a higher accountability and getting leadership to emerge. We've taken everything and overhauled it, and put those things at the top of the list."
Hansen's 16 interceptions in 2017 were tied for the third most in the nation.
"It's just details," said Hansen, who set single-season Sun Belt records in 2017 for passing touchdowns (37), total touchdowns (44) and total offense (4,389 yards). "It's communication with receivers, telling them what you see. At the same time, just little stuff like ball placement. It might not have been a bad decision. It could have been a slant, and I threw it high, and it hits him off the tip of his hands or his helmet and bounces up in the air.
"Just eliminating some of those mistakes is big for me."
If Hansen does that, he could wear that new MVP belt at season's end, and the Red Wolves could earn their first outright Sun Belt title since 2015.
"We've always wanted to win it outright," said Anderson, who won the Conference USA championship game in 2011 as an offensive coordinator at Southern Miss. "I think the addition of a championship game is going to be fun. I've been able to play in one of those before. It's one of the most memorable parts of my career as a coach, to raise that trophy in a championship environment.
"We want to be the program that does that."
Sports on 07/24/2018