You really have to hand it to the presidents of the alliance universities: they really are thinking outside the box: "We haven’t taken any options off the table," Cowen said. Merging the conferences or having them operate separately as divisions are the most likely options, it appears. "At the end of the day, we might have twenty four institutions in separate divisions which each division having met the requirements of a conference," Thompson said through a spokesman. "This is uncharted territory and many ways to structure the arrangement, and each approach is being considered to maximize the potential."