In addition to Florida State, you had South Carolina and Southern Miss (which was in the process of developing some consistency in football before some kid named Favre went there). Since Tulane's basketball program was discontinued around this time, the league made strong overtures to West Virginia to take their place. WVU ultimately opted to remain in the Atlantic 10 to preserve their Eastern allegiance and identity. But if you want to play "what if" it's interesting to imagine the possibilities that may have been generated if the Mountaineers had come aboard. Along with the Eastern independents, the Metro was a key building block of Raycom's "superconference" concept that was developed along the same time. Unfortunately for it (and for Virginia Tech) things went the wrong way. Instead of tipping over in a positive direction by luring stronger members such as West Virginia, the Metro went the other direction and had to backfill its membership with basketball options like VCU, South Florida, and UNC Charlotte.