First reported by Jeff Goodman, NJIT will join the America East, leaving the ASUN. The Highlanders will begin competing in their new conference immediately.
With NJIT’s departure and the addition of Bellarmine, the ASUN will remain at 9 members in men’s basketball. A late scratch does force ASUN men’s basketball teams, including Liberty, to find two more non-conference games as the league was planning on 18 games in 2020-21. League members will again play 16 conference games.
NJIT and the ASUN was always a strange marriage, as prior to Liberty joining the conference two years ago, the closest conference member to the Highlanders was located in Nashville, Tennessee. In the America East, NJIT will compete in a much more geographically friendly conference competing against primarily Northeast teams such as Stony Brook, Verymont, Hartford, New Hampshire, Albany, and Maine.
The Highlanders finished this past season in 8th place in the ASUN in men’s basketball. They finished with an averall record of 9-21 and 6-10 mark in league play. NJIT fell to Liberty in the first round of the ASUN men’s basketball tournament.
Liberty won all five games against NJIT over the past two seasons.
