Being the result of a merger, CUSA was originally a sprawling, large league that stretched from Florida to Missouri, Wisconsin to Texas.

Many of its original schools were located in major urban centers and had strong basketball traditions, which helped establish the league on a national basis.

With the loss of these members, CUSA lured six schools from other conferences: UCF and Marshall from the MAC, as well as Rice, SMU, Tulsa, and later UTEP from the WAC.

This was again the result of Big East schools leaving for the ACC, this time being Syracuse and Pittsburgh, as well as Notre Dame for non-football sports.

Charter member Charlotte returned from the A-10 and accelerated its recently established football program, which was set to begin play in 2013 as an FCS school, to FBS in 2015 with full conference rights in 2016.

Conference USA responded by adding Middle Tennessee and Florida Atlantic, both from the Sun Belt.

On April 1, 2013, Conference USA announced it was adding Western Kentucky, also from the Sun Belt, to offset Tulsa's departure to The American in all sports which was confirmed the next day.

[24][25] The board of trustees in the University of Alabama system (of which UAB is a member) voted to shut down that football program on December 2, 2014, in a highly controversial move that many have attributed to a pro-Tuscaloosa bias (including trustees such as Paul Bryant Jr., son and namesake of Alabama football coaching legend Bear Bryant).

[26] On June 1, UAB announced that it would reinstate football effective with the 2016 season, presumably keeping the school in CUSA for the immediate future.

[29] Marshall University's men's soccer program captured the league's first team national championship with its 1–0 overtime win over Indiana in the 2020 College Cup, held in May 2021 due to COVID-19 issues, in Cary, North Carolina.

[30] On October 18, 2021, Yahoo Sports reported that the American Athletic Conference, which had been rocked by the impending departure of three of its most prominent schools (Cincinnati, Houston, UCF) for the Big 12 Conference, was preparing to receive applications from six CUSA members: Charlotte, Florida Atlantic, North Texas, Rice, UAB, and UTSA.

[35] The report added that the Sun Belt was preparing to add two other CUSA members in Marshall and Old Dominion, as well as FCS program James Madison.

[37] On March 29, 2022, CUSA agreed to allow Marshall, Old Dominion, and Southern Miss to move to the Sun Belt beginning July 1, 2022, a year earlier than initially announced.

[38] In response to these losses, on November 5, Conference USA announced the addition of four new members to start the 2023 athletic season.

[42] This was followed by the Sun Belt Conference adding beach volleyball for the 2023 season (2022–23 school year), taking with it the three full SBC members that had previously housed that sport in CUSA: Coastal Carolina, Georgia State, and Louisiana–Monroe.

[49] On November 27, 2023, Pete Thamel reported on X that Conference USA was expected to add Delaware as a new member for the 2025–26 season.

The most recent changes in sports sponsorship were the dropping of men's soccer and women's swimming and diving after the 2021–22 season, plus the addition of bowling in 2023–24.

[59] CUSA champions Bowl games Through the 2023 season, the highest-ranked champion from the so-called "Group of Five" conferences (The American, CUSA, MAC, Mountain West, and Sun Belt) was guaranteed a berth in one of the non-semifinal bowls of the College Football Playoff if the group's top team was not in the playoff.

Marshall won the 2020–21 men's soccer championship in May 2021 (with the tournament having moved from its normal schedule in fall 2020 to spring 2021 due to COVID-19).

Total expenses includes coach and staff salaries, scholarships, buildings and grounds, maintenance, utilities and rental fees, recruiting, team travel, equipment and uniforms, conference dues, and insurance.

The following table shows institutional reporting to the United States Department of Education as shown on the DOE Equity in Athletics website for the 2021–22 academic year.

[64] Former men's soccer associate members Kentucky and South Carolina have an agreement with their primary conference for other sports to carry all home matches online through the SEC Network service.

This included all of those teams' matches against CUSA opponents before the two schools moved men's soccer to the Sun Belt Conference in 2022.

ESPN and the SEC Network had first rights to all CUSA home men's soccer matches featuring both schools.

In a statement CUSA Commissioner Judy MacLeod said, "Thanks to our partnership with SIDEARM Sports, this new site showcases a clean modern look with easy access to information and we are proud to offer live content and original feature stories through our CUSA.tv.