MacLeod discusses CUSA midweek games, legislation
Published 10:29 am Friday, October 9, 2026
Conference USA Commissioner Judy MacLeod speaks during a news conference Thursday at Houchens-Smith Stadium.
(JEFF NATIONS/jeff.nations@bgdailynews.com)
Judy MacLeod was at Houchens-Smith Stadium to watch a football game Thursday night.
The longtime Conference USA commissioner makes regular trips to member schools of the far-flung league during the season, and the game offered another chance to observe first-hand how the still fairly unique weeknight games are being received by fans.
With host WKU and visiting Missouri State entering with a combined record of 2-7 – the Hilltoppers ended up winning 34-13 – Thursday’s matchup perhaps wasn’t quite the marquee league contest to see, with a modest announced attendance of 11,102 perhaps reflecting that.
CUSA is now in the fourth year of a multimedia rights deal with CBS Sports and ESPN that calls for October mid-week games – WKU has played on back-to-back Thursday nights, with a Wednesday game coming up at Sam Houston on Oct. 14, followed by a Tuesday night game at home against Delaware on Oct. 27.
“Our coaches have really embraced it,” MacLeod said during a halftime news conference Thursday night. “The ratings and the coverage that we get that we probably are not going to get on Saturday have been really beneficial for us, especially with our newly – still kind of new – comprised membership to let people know what Conference USA is all about. It’s our chance on national television when not a lot of other games are being played, sometimes no other games. So it’s been important to us. The next negotiation, I’m not going to say it’s going to last forever, but we’ll see what happens.”
As for attendance, MacLeod said the difference between midweek and Saturday crowds – in terms of numbers – has been minimal.
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“We haven’t found a ton of difference,” MacLeod said. “I think maybe the makeup of the crowd is different. On weeknights when school is in session, we tend to have more students and maybe less families with young children that might have to go home at halftime because it’s a weeknight. The overall numbers haven’t varied that much.”
MacLeod also reiterated CUSA’s support of the Protect College Sports Act, legislation aimed at codifying rules for college athletics that was passed by the U.S. Senate on Sept. 28 and now is making its way through rivisions in the U.S. House of Representatives.
“We’ve been supporters since very early on,” MacLeod said. “It’s gone through quite a few changes, but we still think it will provide some much-needed guidelines for certain things – enable us to actually make rules and enforce them when we need to and just bring a lot more clarity. I hate say the word stable because nothing is really stable anymore, but hope that it will bring some more stability to the system.”
MacLeod sees the current landscape of constant litigation regarding eligibility and compensation as an unsustainable situation, especially for mid-major programs that don’t have a deep-pocketed alumni base backing them.
“I struggle somethings with do programs really want to be governed, No. 1,” MacLeod said. “But in order to have something that makes sense, there has to be some guidelines. Everybody’s described it in different ways, what’s happening, but there’s a lot of chaos and I don’t think that’s good for the student-athletes, fans and certainly not the universities.
“And so if there’s a way to keep education involved – and the part that gets lost sometimes is there is still so much good in college athletics, and when you get to spend time around these young people you see that – I would hate for that to gradually go away because of some of the financial pressures and everything else that continues to build.”
CUSA’s current 10 full-time members – Missouri State and Delaware joined full time last year – give MacLeod hope that the recent turbulent membership turnover has subsided, at least in the short term. The current multimedia rights and the grant of rights agreement signed by all the universities is set to expire in late 2027, barring a renewal.
For now, MacLeod said CUSA must continue to “be nimble” and respond to the changing landscape.
“We’ve got a great group right now that’s trying to build together,” MacLeod said. “We’re always looking to see how we could grow and we’re focused on that right now. I can’t predict the future, but I feel good about our group.”
About Jeff Nations
Sports Editor, Bowling Green Daily News
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