After this year, the Maine Athletic Conference will look decidedly different: St. Joseph’s College, a charter member of the seven-team league, has decided to abandon the NAIA, the conference, and strike out on its own.

The school announced its decision on Tuesday, and has been considering such a move since 1993, according to the Portland Press Herald.

St. Joseph’s, a private college that sits along the shore of Sebago Lake in Standish, has held dual NCAA-NAIA affiliation since the 1970s, but will operate as an NCAA Division III independent institution until it finds a suitable league to play in.

The Monks will continue to play in the MAC through this school year.

The defection of St. Joseph’s will leave the MAC with six schools: Husson College, Thomas College, and the University of Maine campuses at Farmington, Machias, Presque Isle and Fort Kent.

“We hope, quite frankly, not to be an independent for an extended period of time,” St. Joseph’s athletic director and men’s basketball coach Rick Simonds told the Press Herald.

“But by the same token, rather than to rush into a conference for the sake of being aligned with a conference, we’re not sure what might present itself.”

St. Joseph’s has been one of the marquee athletic programs in the MAC, and has recently upgraded its athletics facilities with the $8 million Alfond Recreation Center.

Husson men’s basketball coach Warren Caruso, whose teams have engaged in some epic battles with their rivals from St. Joseph’s, said the loss of one foe won’t really change much.

“Each institution has to look at what they need to do, and what’s best, and certainly what they did,” Caruso said. “And rivalries? Another one will come up. We’re rivals with a lot of MAC schools. That was just one institution that everybody in the state knew about, and [knew about] the rivalry we had with them.”

Caruso said St. Joseph’s decision doesn’t present the league with a situation they’ve never seen before.

“This is just a change. Just as [The University of New England] left four years ago, and just as Maine Maritime Academy left two years ago, and Fort Kent joined us last year … it creates another opportunity.”

Caruso said he expects the MAC teams to continue to schedule St. Joseph’s in non-conference games, individual institutions may decide not to play the same two-game, home-and-away sets they play now.

The Husson coach also said the MAC will likely continue to court other schools to bolster its membership.

“Our conference has been looking for some other members down in New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Vermont, and now that will probably come to the forefront a little harder,” Caruso said. “And hopefully we’ll be successful in replacing them.”