Aug 7, 2017 4 min read

The departure of Thomas More from the Presidents’ Athletic Conference at the end of this upcoming school year leaves many options for the conference’s marquee sport, football.

The PAC can:

• remain at 10 teams and have a balanced schedule of nine conference games and one nonconference game for each team.

• add a team, moving back to 11, leaving an unbalanced schedule in which teams would not play each conference opponent every year.

• welcome at least two more teams, split the conference into two divisions and have a league championship game to determine the automatic qualifier.

Joe Onderko, commissioner of the conference, said he would embrace any of these scenarios, with one caveat.

“It has to make sense,” said Onderko.

“We will not base it on a number. The presidents council wants to align with schools they have a commonality with. If there is a school we feel will make us stronger, we’re going to move on that. If there are two, we’re going to move on that.”

Thomas More informed the PAC in June that it would leave the conference following the 2017-18 season. The Saints have dominated football and women’s basketball, with the former finishing first or tied for first seven times in 12 seasons.

But there were problems. The women’s basketball program had to vacate the NCAA Division III title won in 2015 because of an ineligible player. The NCAA Division III Committee on Infractions hit the Saints with major penalties and sanctions, finding that the college failed to monitor its women’s basketball program.

The Committee found that three-time national player of the year Sydney Moss was provided with free housing by former assistant coach Jerry Allen for eight months while she recovered from a knee injury that ended her 2013-2014 season.

The team was forced to vacate all 33 wins from the 2014-15 season, was put on two-year’s probabtion and fined $2,500.

But Onderko said the PAC presidents did not force this decision.

“I’m not going to get into how the PAC was going to handle this internally,” Onderko said. “Thomas More and their president were very upfront with their issues, took responsibility for. … I wouldn’t want to characterize it beyond that.

“They brought the proposal to the PAC presidents council,” he said. “This was all handled at that level, quietly and confidential. Our bylaws call for a two-year notice and they asked if we would be willing to shorten that to one and the presidents council said yes.”

Onderko said the conferece presidents felt “it was time.” Located in Crestview Hills, Ky., Thomas More is a five-hour trip to its closest PAC institution.

“I think everyone knows the issues: the distance, the cost related to the distance, the missing of class time related to the distance,” Onderko said. “Everyone in Pennsylvania talks about what a tough trip it is and forgets the fact that (Thmos More’s teams) are doing that every single week. That’s a challenge for them.”

Thomas More head football coach Regis Scafe said the future is undecided but some have speculated the Saints might move into NCAA Division II, where athletic scholarships are permitted.

“We’re kind of up in the air,” said Scafe. “I don’t know right now. It hasn’t been decided. We’re looking at different options. I think they are going to announce it in the fall.”

Thomas More’s entry into the PAC in 2005 made it the seventh member of the conference and qualified the PAC for an automatic qualifier into the Division III football playoffs. At the time, the six teams in the PAC were teetering and alliances were tentative at best.

“I get this question all the time: How did a school from Northern Kentucky end up in the PAC?” said Onderko. “Seven schools is always the magic number because it gives your conference the automatic qualifier into the NCAA Division III championships. The PAC was not in a stable place at that point. Thomas More was the first domino. After they came in, then Saint Vincent came in, then Geneva, then Chatham. We’ve been on a roll since then. They brought us a lot of credibility.”