WKU Athletic Director Todd Stewart speaks about the upcoming athletic season, his desire to become more competitive in Conference USA, the creation of the TOPS Fund, the upcoming completion and lasting legacy of the Hilltopper Fieldhouse, WKU’s three C-USA Hall of Fame Class of 2025 inductees and other topics during a press conference in E. A. Diddle Arena on Wednesday, July 23, 2025. GRACE MCDOWELL / BOWLING GREEN DAILY NEWS

All may seem quiet for Western Kentucky in the midst of another recent round of conference realignment.

WKU remains in Conference USA despite recent rumbling speculating that the school could be headed back to the Sun Belt Conference – fellow CUSA member Louisiana Tech accepted an invitation earlier this month and will depart by July 1, 2027. No movement on the surface doesn’t mean WKU hasn’t continued to be active in the changing landscape of college athletics, athletic director Todd Stewart said during a news conference Wednesday at E.A. Diddle Arena.

“I think probably one of the biggest misconceptions out there is sometimes when people don’t hear things they just assume that nothing’s happening and I can assure our fans and everybody else that we constantly have a lot of conversations,” Stewart said. “When I say we, I’m talking about President Caboni and myself, and we’re always talking to people all across the collegiate landscape – to other conferences, and everybody does that. Every school is having those conversations. You talk to other conferences, you talk to other schools including our conference. Those things are all normal. It’s just not the kind of thing that you report on or you talk about publicly a lot.

” … The analogy that I would use is the ocean. If you look out at the ocean, all you see is water. But you know there’s a lot of things going on underneath the water and that’s kind of how college athletics is right now. There’s a lot of things going on that people just can’t really talk about. I do think where everybody is today is not as important as where everybody is maybe three to five years from now. I think as you get to the end of the TV deals that every conference is in right now, there is likely to be more movement in many leagues. The key to me is that timeframe, is where are you and are you ready for that if and when movement happens there. And we will be if that happens.”

Since joining CUSA in 2014, WKU has been part of a league that has seen significant upheaval in membership with Louisiana Tech and UTEP – which will depart for the Mountain West Conference in 2026 – being just the latest after Delaware and Missouri State joined CUSA this year.

CUSA’s odd geographical footprint – with member schools stretching from Delaware to New Mexico State – has made travel an expensive challenge, and with so many new schools in the league some conference rivalries have been lost. That has led to displeasure among some WKU fans with the Hilltoppers’ current situation. But Stewart thinks the current makeup of the league has been on par for the most part with fellow Group of 6 conferences.

“There’s certainly some chatter out there that you hear – again, not just in our league but nationwide,” Stewart said. “I think because our conference has had such a change in membership, fans aren’t as familiar with some of the new members. But if you look at the facts, if you look at the data, it’s a league that’s very competitive with our peer conferences. And obviously we are in a situation right now where we can only control us. And we are obviously surveying the landscape as we always do. We’ll always do what’s right for Western Kentucky University. But being a better version of ourselves, which is winning, which is adding onto facilities and putting ourselves in the best position that we can is what we can control and that’s what we’ll do.”

Stewart sees some short-term advantages in a CUSA reduced to 10 teams by 2027, including the ability to play all conference rivals and an increased payout to member schools for NCAA postseason play in football and basketball. Still, Stewart doesn’t expect that will remain the status quo for CUSA.

The next three to five years, when the majority of league network broadcast deals will end, may well offer an opportunity for schools outside the Power 4 conferences to restructure. Stewart said those conversations have been ongoing for a number of years among his peers, though so far it has been business as usual as G6 leagues continue “trying to constantly one-up each other.”

“If the Group of 6 – and this is kind of a radical idea – but if the Group of 6 could all kind of come together and align on a geographic footprint – that way, you’re playing people closer to you with more natural rivalries and you have one television deal, I think that would be a very sustainable model to have.”

AN UNLEVEL PLAYING FIELD

WKU athletics heads into the 2025-26 coming off another strong overall performance, with successes nearly across the board among its programs. That momentum is something Stewart hopes will continue as the school aims to remain in a strong position.

“We feel like we have a lot of momentum based on how last year went,” Stewart said. “Obviously last year we started off in the fall strong with football going to a bowl game for the sixth consecutive year, and then volleyball went to the NCAA Tournament of the sixth consecutive year. Then in the spring women’s golf went to the NCAA Tournament for the first time ever in the history of the program. Baseball kind of capped it with an historic season, second-most wins in the history of the program and going to the NCAA Tournament. So that gives us a lot of momentum on the playing field. And then I have to point out that academically also right now we have a 90% graduation success rate – that’s the highest in the history of WKU athletics – and all 14 of our team sports have a team GPA of of a 3.0 or higher. That also has never happened before.

“This is a group, the players and coaches that we have, did almost 5,000 hours of community service last year – which was also an all-time high. So I think from an athletic department standpoint, it’s a case study in how to maximize resources while making an impact on the playing field, in the community and in the classroom. So that’s what we’re excited about and we’re looking forward to building on that this year.”

The recent House vs. NCAA antitrust lawsuit settlement, which now allows schools to directly pay athletes with up to $20.5 million in annual revenue, also has clear ramifications for WKU, other G6 programs and even some current Power 4 schools.

“We won’t come anywhere near that, but we’re looking at things that we can do because if you want to win the game you have to play the game,” Stewart said. “That’s the new landscape that we’re in now, so we’ll have to do that. But I think kind of lost sometimes in the NIL shuffle is that NIL aside, I don’t think there’s been a better time for an athlete to here than there is right now because in the last five years we’ve invested more in sports medicine, mental health, strength and conditioning, nutrition, academic advising, career development – all those areas that directly impact an athlete’s experience both here and prepares them when they’re not here. We’ve invested in those areas more than every before and also in our facilities.”

FIELDHOUSE UPDATE

The latest addition to WKU’s facilities portfolio is on schedule to open Oct. 15.

The $50 million Hilltopper Fieldhouse, which features an indoor practice field for the football program and a rebuilt clubhouse and hitting facility for the baseball team among its slated uses, may be available to those programs for at least limited use even before the official completion date. The project also included a new press box at Houchens-Smith Stadium, which opened early in the 2024 football season.

“That’ll be huge because if you think about it, players come and go, coaches come and go, administrators come and go but buildings remain and that fieldhouse will also have a generational impact,” Stewart said. “First of all with the athletes that are here – it’s a better area to train. And from a recruiting standpoint, it’s certainly a selling point.”

HONORING HUDSON

In November, WKU announced plans to erect a statue of current head volleyball coach Travis Hudson.

Stewart confirmed the future location of the bronze statue – near the Gate 2 entrance outside Diddle Arena, where the Hilltoppers play their home volleyball matches. Russ Faxon, a 1973 WKU graduate, was commissioned to create Hudson’s sculpture.

The statue will be mounted on a granite base. This will be Faxon’s eighth sculpture on campus and ninth in Bowling Green. His others include E.A. Diddle outside of Diddle Arena; Robert Guthrie at Guthrie Tower; Jody Richards at Jody Richards Hall; Lee Robertson at the Martens Alumni Center; Big Red outside Martens Alumni Center; Big Red on Red Towel at Downing Student Union; The arm waving the Red Towel at Houchens-Smith Stadium, and The Dancing in the Spirit sculpture outside of SKYPAC.

Hudson is entering his 31th season leading the program and joined WKU’s Athletics Hall of Fame in 2024. He has amassed 777 career wins, surpassing Ed Diddle for the second-most among any Hilltopper coach in a single sport (Diddle owns 1,030 total head coaching victories among the four sports he coached at WKU).

Hudson has led his Hilltoppers to 33 conference championships, 16 NCAA Tournament appearances (including the 2020-21 Sweet 16), been named conference coach of the year 11 times and AVCA South Region Coach of the Year seven times, had 64 first-team all-conference honorees, 12 All-Americans (including four, four-time All-Americans), 11 conference players of the year, seven freshmen of the year, seven defensive players of the year, six South Region players of the year and five setters of the year.

Additionally, WKU will celebrate the induction of Hudson along with former Hilltopper standout quarterback Brandon Doughty and volleyball standout Jessica Lucas into as part of the CUSA 2025 Hall of Fame class. The trio will be recognized on the field at Houchens-Smith Stadium during WKU’s nationally-televised home game against Florida International on Oct. 14.