
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, July 15, 1994                   TAG: 9407160015
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: B4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: By SCOTT BLANCHARD STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

METRO MERGER NOT IMMINENT

The Metro Conference, while eager to resolve its nagging football issue, on Thursday backed off talk of a deadline for a decision on its efforts to merge with the Great Midwest Conference.

Metro consultant Dick Schultz told newspapers this week the two leagues ``should make a decision next week,'' before the expiration of an agreement with syndicator Liberty Sports to televise an expanded Metro.

That apparently was an effort to jolt the Great Midwest into action by Schultz, who was out of his office and unavailable for comment Thursday. Ralph McFillen, the Metro's commissioner, agreed that although a merger remains a possibility, a decision by late August or September is more realistic.

Dave Almstead, a Liberty Sports vice president, has said the TV deal is for an expanded Metro, not a Metro-Great Midwest merger, but it could be adjusted if the leagues come together.

Mike Slive, the Great Midwest's commissioner, said his league has a TV agreement ready to go should it expand for football and said he is not working on the Metro's ``deadline'' with Texas-based Liberty Sports. In any case, he said, a Liberty spokesman told a Chicago newspaper this week the Great Midwest's plan to determine its football future by August or September was fine.

Virginia Tech is a member of the Metro but plays football in the Big East Conference. The other schools in the Metro and Great Midwest that have Division I-A football programs play as independents and are seeking a conference.

Slive acknowledged a merger, declared a dead issue several months ago, is one of several options. A merger would bring together Louisville, Southern Mississippi and Tulane of the Metro and Memphis and Cincinnati of the Great Midwest. That group most likely would add Great Midwest member Alabama-Birmingham (reportedly moving from Division I-AA to Division I-A next year), East Carolina and possibly Houston.

Slive said there is no scheduled meeting of Great Midwest presidents, and called talk of a decision next week ``extremely premature.''

``There is nothing on the table at the Great Midwest,'' he said Thursday from his Chicago office. ``My [TV] proposals, which I have developed [and] which are substantial, do not have a timetable.

``I'm not under the same pressure Mr. Schultz apparently is.''

The Metro and Great Midwest have been pursuing each other's football-playing schools, each trying to keep its football schools from departing for an all-sports conference. McFillen said the merger issue was revived by the presidents of the five football-playing schools in the two leagues.

by CNB